----------------Chicago's Mob Bosses-----------------
BIG JIM COLOSIMO
Killed in his own cafe at 22nd and Wabash Avenue on May 11, 1920. Colosimo was then the top mob boss of Chicago. His death, believed ordered by underlings Al Capone and Johnny Torrio, made way fro Capone's rise as Chicago's number one mobster. The FBI believes Colosimo was set up for the murder by a friend and guard, Big Jim O'Leary. O'Leary is the son of the Mrs.
O'Leary whose cow is believed to have knocked down a lantern that started the famous Chicago Fire many years before. Colosimo was waiting at his restaurant with O'Leary allegedly preparing for a business meeting. The unknown gunman stepped out of the cloakroom and gunned Colosimo down, sparing O'Leary.
JOHNNY TORRIO
Torrio helped kill his uncle, Jim Colosimo, placing him briefly in charge of Chicago's growing rackets and underworld endeavors, while his compatriot in crime, Al Capone, steadily strengthened his own power base. Having helped set up his own uncle for assassination, Torrio got the message when he escaped death in a foiled assassination attempt on his own life in 1925. Torrio turned over the rackets to his partner, Al Capone.
MICKEY COHEN
He was Ben 'Bugsy' Siegel's shadow. Ben was tall, handsome, suave and welcome in the elite Hollywood circles. He mixed with the glitterati, courted royalty and bedded starlets while his shadow -- Mickey -- was picking their pockets, robbing their safes and breaking their bones.
CHARLES ARTHUR "Pretty Boy" FLOYD
Floyd succeeded John Dillinger as America's Public Enemy Number One when Dillinger was killed on July 22, 1934. He was accused of taking part in the Kansas City Massacre on June 17, 1933, but there is no conclusive evidence that he did. In the midst of the Depression, when sheriffs were enforcing farm foreclosures, a Populist myth grew up around Floyd as a modern Robin Hood. Floyd was killed by D.O.I. special agents on a farm near Clarkson, Ohio. Melvin Purvis, who was leading the D.O.I. unit, immediately called Director J. Edgar Hoover to tell him Floyd was dead.
SAM GIANCANA
In the first two decades of the twentieth century, a scourge to the familia of Little Italy were the Black Handers. Sicilian themselves, their modus operandi was simple but deadly: Residents would receive a knock on the door in the dead of night; when they answered, they would find naught but a letter left on the threshold demanding so-much money to be paid to an anonymous entity who would return on such and such a day.
FRANK 'The Enforcer' NITTI
Frank Nitti was nicknamed the "enforcer". Frank started off as a barber fencing stolen goods on the side. He would emerge as Capone's right-hand man. He joined the Outfit and rose to be the number two guy in Capone's Organization. Part of his responsibilities was to oversee the gambling operation. When Capone went to prison Nitti took control of the Oufit and served as the boss for eleven years. Nitti kept the operation very low-key, (the exact opposite of Al's public reign)and moved into prostitution. Frank was also greatly involved with controlling local elections, and corrupting as many judges, cops, and officials he could.
Nitti endured many legal problems which would prove to disable his ability to move freely. On March 14, 1930 a federal grand jury indicted Nitti on five counts of evading taxes. He went into hiding following these charges but eventually was found living under a alias with his wife. Nitti's downfall came in the form of the Hollywood Extortion Case. This case involved Nitti (along with other members of his organization) extorting major Hollywood Movie Companies. They Controlled the unions, and would threaten a strike if a tribute in the form of money wasn't payed. This worked for a while but eventually everyone involved was indicted and sentenced to prison. Rather than face trial and perhaps prison time, on March 19, 1943, Frank Nitti walked to a Railroad, put a pistol to his head and pulled the trigger. Making him the only known mob boss to commit suicide.
DION O'BANION
While Capone's name was often linked with these murders, the fact was that there were many other gangsters responsible that Capone and Torrio had tried to keep in line. One flamboyant example was Dion O'Banion who had a burgeoning bootlegging and florist business. Schoenberg describes him as having a perennial-boy likability. Dion "never acted tough. His habit of calling even enemies 'swell fellow' mirrored an ingrained cheeriness and courtesy. He chronically beamed at the world; it amounted to a fixed grin, belied only by unblinkingly cold blue eyes. He was an indefatigable handshaker and backslapper, though never at the same time: at least one hand stayed free to go for one of the three gun pockets tailored into his clothes."
O'Banion was known for bizarre behavior which included gunning down a man in front of crowds of people for the flimsiest of reasons and then killing a man after meeting him at Capone's Four Deuces, which dragged Capone into a murder investigation needlessly. There was a growing sense of realization that something was going to have to be done about Dion O'Banion's irresponsible and childishly impulsive behavior.
FRANKIE YALE
Although Frankie Yale was a New York mobster he was close with Johnny Torrio and Al Capone, both of Chicago. Yale was John Torrio's partner in the Five Points Gang in Brooklyn and had killed a dozen men before his twenty- first birthday. When Torrio left for Chicago, Yale took over all the gang's rackets in NY.
<div