Making Of The Mob: Recap "A Rising Threat," Ep 104

Dewey and Eunice Carter

Lucky Luciano orders the hit on Dutch Schultz to get Thomas Dewey to back off from the mob. The most uncontrollable gangster is killed, and the threat to the New York mob is elminiated. By 1935, Luciano and his crew are living the high life and making the modern equivalent of over a hundred million dollars a year.

The mob begins to expand. Meyer Lansky revolutionizes the gambling rackets inventing the first modern casinos by transforming low-rent gambling dens into high-class establishments. Vito Genovese's heroin racket pulls in millions of dollars a year, but he decides to diversify into poker games which are fixed in his favor. He lures in unsuspecting businessmen, but makes sure he always wins. Bugsy Seigel makes sure the money is collected and that the mob's authority is understood. As a member of Murder, Inc., he carries out the orders sent down by the commission. Frank Costello keeps the authorities at bay using his connections with corrupt politicians and law enforcement to make sure business runs smoothly. They paid off politicians. Lucky Luciano was a creative genius who understood how to run a business.

Luciano meets a showgirl that catches his eye. They begin seeing each other.Luciano moves into a residential suite at the Waldorf-Astoria, the City's fanciest and most expensive hotel. He begins to settle down and build a life with his new girlfriend, a 20-year-old Broadway dancer named Galina "Gay" Orlova.

Luciano decides to diversify his own operation by taking advantage of the illegal business of prostitution. He wants a cut of the brothels. He streamlines the prostitution business. He soon has a citywide network of 200 brothels,  madams and prostitutes paying a percentage to the Mafia. He is making 12 million a year, the modern day equivalent is 200 million. Lansky advises Luciano against his dirty business. He tells them these girls get diseases, they need doctors. Luciano is annoyed. So Lansky asks him if he is okay dealing with all these drug addicted women who would turn him in for some heroine? Or an army of pimps who would sell him out? He tells Lucky he is risking everything they have built. Luciano ignores the warnings of his trusted friend. Within months he's living a double life, spending days with his girlfriend and nights at his brothels. His favorite brothel is run by a madam named Cokey Flo.

Prosecutor Thomas Dewey has named Luciano his number one target for years. Luciano's rackets are so well organized that bringing him down is nearly impossible, but Luciano is about to play right into his hands. Dewey brings in an ambitious young investigator named Eunice Carter, an assistant district attorney and the first African American in New York City to serve in that capacity. Carter quickly discovers that more than half the city's prostitutes are connected by the same bail bondsmen, a known criminal with ties to the mob, and the same attorney. It's enough of a break for Dewey to bring in a booker tied to Luciano's prostitution ring, Vincent Pastore, but the questioning leads to a dead end. Pastore refuses to break the mob's code of silence and swears he has never seen Luciano before. Lansky tries to warn Lucky again that Dewey is coming after him and has half the city council's support. Lucky tells him it's a good thing they have the other half. Lansky tells him he can't buy Dewey, but Lucky answers everybody's got a price.

The wiretap that is the beginning of Luciano's arrest

Carter decides to use the latest technology in wiretapping to try to trap Luciano. Dewey's investigators listen to hundreds of hours of calls, and finally hear a booker mention Luciano by name. This gives Dewey the evidence he needs to issue a warrant. Dewey organizes a citywide raid on Luciano's brothels, arresting dozens of prostitutes and madams, but he fails to find Lucky. Lucky escapes. Dewey interrogates one prostitute. Dewey tells her he has a long list of charges against her which he is willing to expunge for information on Luciano. She reluctantly agrees to cooperate. Dewey sends his people out to find Luciano no matter what it takes.

In order to avoid arrest, Luciano takes his girlfriend Gay, to Hot Springs, Arkansas, the perfect hideout for mobsters. There the corrupt police force has transformed the small town into a mob haven, filled with casinos and gamblers. Dewey issues a nationwide manhunt. Luciano feels safe, but has the misfortune of bumping into a New York detective on the street, who recognizes him and brings Luciano into custody. The most powerful gangster in America has finally been arrested.

Luciano doesn't want to go to trial in New York, and feels he has a better chance of bribing someone in Arkansas. Luciano uses his mob connections to keep himself in the Arkansas jail. He calls Frank Costello, who assures him they are calling in all their political favors. The bribes pay off. The local sheriff, paid off by the mob, refuses to hand Lucky over to Dewey. From a jail cell in Arkansas, Luciano and his gang continue to run their rackets. Vito Genovese continues his heroine operation. Meyer Lansky is overseeing the largest casino racket in the country. Costello keeps using his connections to keep Luciano out of Dewey's reach. And Lucky is still in full control of his empire.

Dewey decides to put pressure on Arkansas officials. He takes his case to the media and names Luciano public enemy number one. He gets the press involved and accuses Arkansas authorities of being afraid to release him into his custody. Luciano becomes exposed nationwide as a notorious gangster. To counteract Dewey's negative attack, Luciano launches his own press campaign denying any and all connections to prostitution. The media war goes on for days. Luciano believes he will be released, it's only a matter of time. However, Dewey's press campaign has paid off.

Dewey orders a team of heavily armed state troopers to Hot Springs to force Luciano to surrender and to take him back to New York on April 4th, 1936. Luciano tries to bribe the cop taking him back to New York with $10,000. It doesn't work. Lucky gets out on bail and meets with his lawyers and his crew. Luciano has just days to prepare for a trial facing charges of forced prostitution. They are worried that nothing will stop Dewey. Dewey has spent three years building his case against Luciano and now, on May 13, 1936, they come face to face in the New York State's Supreme Court. The prosecution of Luciano was the first time a high ranking mafia boss was facing trial in a courtroom.

Thomas Dewey launches into his case by calling a prostitute to take the stand. She testifies that plenty of girls who talked got burned with cigarettes, tongues cut. She says she would see 15 to 20 men a day. Another prostitute testifies she didn't even know what heroine was and that at first it was free and then it wasn't free any more. Dewey calls 68 witnesses. The jury appears to be outraged. Luciano is unphased. He believes it will take more than the testimony of prostitutes to take him down. Then Dewey calls Florence Brown to the stand. She says she is called Cokey Flo because she likes to use cocaine. She says she gets her cocaine from different sources and, when pressed by Dewey, she points to Lucky Luciano as one of her sources. Dewey asks if this cocaine was a gift or a token of Luciano's generosity? She answers, not exactly. She adds, "He knew I was an addict, he knew it was my weakness, so he used it to control me and my girls . . . he said he wanted to run whorehouses like grocery stores . . . people come in, they pay for the merchandise, they leave happy. He wanted to get as many customers in and out as quickly as possible." Things are looking good for the prosecution, but Luciano is determined to make a come back. Against his lawyer's advice, Luciano decides to take the stand in his own defense. A move that could destroy everything.

Watch The Making of the Mob on Monday night at 10 PM ET on AMC, There are four episodes left to the series but you can catch up on the first four online or on demand.

Making of the Mob: Recap "King of New York," Ep 103

Lucky Luciano becomes "King" of New York's Mob,

organizing the Five Families.

Now that Lucky has killed both Joe Masseria and Salvatore Maranzano, Lucky becomes the King of New York's mob. It's September 11, 1931, Luciano and his crew (Meyer Lansky, Frank Costello, Bugsy Seigel, and Vito Genovese) send an army of hit men to kill all the old leaders which ended with the murder of 40 men across the country in just two days. They were ruthless killers. This was the biggest purge the mafia has ever seen. He spares a few who he feels are valuable. 

The murders are planned

Lucky calls a meeting with Maranzano's underboss, Joe Bonanno, and offers him the opportunity to head his own crime family. With Bonanno on board, Luciano has eliminated his competition. Luciano decides to prevent future mob wars, they need to be organized and have rules. In Sicily there were 100 crime families and each family has a boss who reports to the boss of bosses, "il capo di tutti capi." They have rules and are organized, it's a system that has worked for 100 years and is known as La Cosa Nostra. Luciano bases the structure of his organization on the Sicilian model. He keeps mafia membership limited to Italians. Lansky will remain Luciano's most trusted adviser. 

Luciano calls for a big meeting in Chicago of all the major bosses in New York and around the country. Until this time, there was no real mafia in America, just individual gangs operating the way they see fit. Luciano tells them he wants to end all the bloodshed and cycles of revenge and organize the American mob the same way the Sicilian mob was run. They may be criminals, but they aren't savages. We have to run our business like a business. He says they will have capos, crews, underbosses, and counselors. He says there will be no more boss of bosses, the days of the "capi di tutti capi" are over. Instead they will have a Board of Directors, a commission run by the heads of the five New York families, who will have final say in all matters including life and death. The members of the Commission are Giuseppe Profaci, Vincent Mangano, Tommy Gagliano, Joseph Bonanno, and Lucky Luciano. "To peace and profit." He creates the modern mafia.

The Commission divides territories and orders hits. It will be like an underworld court. They need to solve their own disputes peacefully to keep law enforcement out of it. They need and enforcement army to carry out any hits from unresolved disputes. Luciano turns to Meyer Lansky to recruit people from the Jewish mafia as hit men. These hit men recruits included: Benjamin "Bugsy" Seigel, Albert Anastasia, Abe "Kid Twist" Reles, and Louis Lepke, dubbed Murder, Inc. by the press. They are told to be like ghosts, nothing is left behind. Law enforcement would not expect Jewish guys to be hit men. They all have their own signature styles of murder. They transformed the art of killing into a science. They prepare for weeks planning their hits and were responsible for 100's of unsolved murders. They averaged one murder every three days. 

Although Luciano has organized the mafia he is unaware that the mob is about to face it's biggest threat from within. Dutch Schultz, a Jewish gangster becomes one of Luciano's biggest earners and not part of the five families. Schultz's numbers racket alone brings in 20 million a year. At this same time, Thomas Dewey, an assistant U. S. Attorney who becomes governor and later runs for president, becomes the mob's number one enemy. Dewey's inability to arrest Schultz causes Hoover to declare him "public enemy number 1." This all stemmed from the mob tampering with elections and, in doing so, Schultz caught the eye of Thomas Dewey. In New York City people were voting multiple times. Dewey went after Lucky Luciano to make a name for himself. He can't get to Luciano so he goes after Luciano's associates, and Schultz in particular. Schultz is their way into organized crime. Dewey declares war on the mob. Dewey has to find a way to prosecute Schultz. 

Years ago, Al Capone was arrested and convicted of tax evasion by Eliot Ness. He was sentenced to life in prison. Tom Dewey found his answer in that criminal case. He goes after Schultz on tax evasion. It takes months because Schultz stays one step ahead of Dewey. It becomes a national embarrassment. It ends up on Hoover's desk. Up until now, Hoover never took on the New York mob. The theory is the mob had pictures of him in dresses and threatened to reveal him as homosexual. But now Hoover decides it's time to go after the mob. Lucky becomes concerned by all the FBI's attention. It's not good for business.

Luciano tells Schultz to turn himself in, in order to take some of the heat off the mob. Luciano says he will get him the best lawyers. Schultz agrees in return for a guarantee from Luciano that he'll do everything possible to help him beat the rap. Luciano hires lawyers who successfully get Schultz's trial  moved 400 miles north to the small town of Malone, New York. There Schultz uses his money and charm to influence the outcome of the trial. He spreads money all over town and throws parties for officials. He actually convert to Catholicism to gain favor. The trial ends and the jury is unable to reach a verdict. Schultz gets off. Dewey is not happy that two years of work was wasted. But, just six weeks later, Dewey pins Schultz as the leader of New York's largest illegal gambling ring and he issues another warrant for his arrest. Schultz goes into hiding. Schultz feels the only way out is to kill Thomas Dewey.

Schultz asks the Commission to order a hit on Dewey, but the idea is shut down by Luciano. They realize Schultz is bad for business, it would bring all of law enforcement down on them. Schultz goes behind the Commission's back and tries to hire Albert Anastasia of Murder, Inc. to murder Dewey for him. He tells Schultz everyone is watching him and it will cost him double. However, Anastasia tips off Luciano, and a hit is ordered by the Commission, but not on Dewey, on Schultz. 

Now that Schultz is dead, Luciano has eliminated the mafia's biggest internal threat, but he has also made himself number one target on Thomas Dewey's most wanted list.

Note: All episodes can be watched on demand on AMC.