The Business of Crime by Humbert S. Nelli
The Business of Crime: Italians and Syndicate Crime in the United States, written by Humbert S. Nelli, contains the history of Italian criminal organizations in the New World, between 1880 and 1930. The book is divided into three main parts. The first chapter, From Italy's South to America's South, contains the political, social, economic, and cultural background of Italians before they entered in the New World. Also, it describes the beginning of criminal organizations, and the national wide impact created with the murder of Chief Hennesy (October 15, 1890). The second chapter, The Immigrant Era, describes the Italian involvement in syndicates activities, and discusses the widely publicized
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Moreover, he argues that "much of the confusion concerning the Italian experience in American crime is related to unclear and imprecise terminology used by writers" (Preface).
Part II
He puts forward several examples in which it is evident the inaccuracy of certain facts over many criminal cases which are reported as products of organized Italian mafias. For instance, he remarks in his book: "Gaster's report contained errors in almost every case outlined, and each error served to blacken the reputation of New Orleans Italians" (32). Gaster, the Superintendent of Police, believed he would be killed by the mafia in the same way the Chief Hennesy was killed. In fact, the author listes several reported cases in which the names and nationalities of criminals were changed as Italians. For example:
On January 18, 1887, Dominica Tribiga shot and killed Jean Tamora, according to Gaster's list; the impression given was that victim and killer were Italians. The coroner's report indicated that both Dominique Trebigue and Jean Marie Trebigue (the actual names) were natives of France (33).
According to the Gaster
Salvatore Lucania was born on November 24, 1897 in Sicily, Italy; almost ten years later, he began a new life of crime and prosperity in New York City’s lower east side. Upon arrival, he could not speak english; he bullied the other kids into paying him for protection and participated in drug dealing. One day, Lucania was abducted, beaten, stabbed, and left for dead; miraculously, he survived. This rather fortunate recovery led him to become known as Lucky Luciano (“Lucky Luciano Biography.com.” Edited by Biography.com, The Biography.Com website, A&E Television Networks, 17 June 2015, www.biography.com/people/lucky-luciano -9388350). In 1916, he became the leader of the Five Points Gang and continued to make a name for himself. During these early years, Luciano was in and out of jail-- mostly for getting caught dealing drugs.
In the article, “Dangerous Minds” Malcolm Gladwell first grasps his reader’s attention via crime stories, then goes on elaborating the criminal profiling processes. He defines the types of criminal profiling, whodunit and hedunit. In whodunit, “the traditional detective story…centers on the detective search for the culprit” while in hedunit, “the nest is narrowed. The crime doesn’t initiate our search for the killer. It defines the killer for us.” He emphasizes on the profiling type with the best advantage and explains its significance. Using the FBI agent John Douglas’ investigation stories and profiling techniques to support his claims, he explains the structure of criminal profiling and how it is applied to cases. However, is this type of profiling effective? The author raises this question to evaluate the FBI criminal profiling. He asks a rhetorical question, “but how useful is that profile, really?” to make the readers think and follows up this question by a counter argument which set the author’s state of neutrality in the article. With analogies, crime stories and group research analyses as supportive evidence; the author informs and explains the flaws of FBI profiling, its problems and its ineffectiveness. As a result, the author uses the counter argument to refute his previous claims
“It was during the troubled years of the 1860s that the Italian kingdom’s ruling class ruling class first heard talk of the mafia in Siciliy” (Dickie, s38, 2004). In this quote we find a potential reason to why the idea that the mafia was born during the making of the modern Italian state has become leading with scholars. Most likely this event shaped the mafia into what it has become because of the political influence that the Italian state bestowed upon Sicily. However, it is not unlikely that the mafia wasn’t already existing in Sicily during this time, and most definitely that criminal gangs of Sicily before this time had traits that were transferred into the mafia as it evolved under the new Italian kingdom. While the mafia is largely
Crime is a timeless component of society. For as long as humans have existed among each other, crime has coincided. Throughout time, crime has taken many different forms, some much more subtle than others. Alphonse Capone, a first generation American-Italian born in Brooklyn, would dramatically redefine the nature of criminality. Al Capone was a notorious Chicago mob boss who played a crucial role in the Chicago Outfit as well as the bootlegging industry. Throughout his rise to power in the Chicago, Capone took part in many nefarious dealings that culminated in the creation of a undisputed “King of Crime” until his death in 1947. However, Capone is a timeless figure, his impact on Chicago and influence he’s had on the world of crime, continues to live on.
5. Which humorous devices apart from the ones mentioned above are used in the text’s portrayal of the Mafia?
Conceived in 1899 in New York, to poor settler guardians, Al Capone went ahead to end up noticeably the most notorious criminal in American history. In 1920 amid the prohibition heights, Capone's multi-million dollar Chicago undertakings in prostitution, betting and bootlegging ruled the sorted out wrongdoing scene. Capone was in charge of numerous ruthless demonstrations of viciousness, mostly against different criminals. St. Valentine's Day Massacre in 1929 was the most famous killings, in which he requested the death of seven adversaries. Capone was never prosecuted for his racketeering yet was, at last, conveyed to equity for money tax avoidance in 1931. After serving six-and-a-half years, Capone was discharged (Kobler, 2003). However, his death occurred in Miami in 1947. Capone's life caught the general population creative ability, and his hoodlum persona has been deified in the numerous books and movies propelled by his exploits. Additionally, this paper tries to give an outline of Al Capone life, violations, and passing.
If ever there was an incubator for crime it was the Italian Harlem tenements of the South Bronx. In one of those crowded dirty apartments, a young John Gotti seeked an impoverished existence with his parents and eleven sisters and brothers. His father rarely worked and then, only at menial jobs, risking the money that the family did have on gambling.
However, chapter five and chapter seven are also different. The prosecutor’s behavior and conduct are displayed differently in these two readings. The crime in chapter five is treated like nothing and in chapter seven it is taken seriously. In chapter five the prosecutors lack the willingness to take bike theft serious and seek harsher punishments. In chapter seven, the prosecutors are quick to act against the rape, kidnapping, and sexual assault allegations, as well as determined
In 1920, during the height of the Red Scare, a shoemaker, Nicola Sacco (1891-1927), and a fish peddler, Bartolomeo Vanzetti (1888-1927), were accused of robbing and murdering the paymaster and guard of a shoe company in South Braintree, Massachusetts. Known as anarchists and draft evaders, the accused men faced a hostile judge and a public convinced of their guilt. Despite Sacco 's corroborated testimony that he was at the Italian consulate in Boston at the time of the murder, the two were found guilty on the basis of witness identification and their suspicious behavior after the murder, and were sentenced to death by Judge Webster Thayer. The trial of two Italian immigrants, Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti, grasped the entire nation. Both men were accused of murder and robbery of a shoe factory in Braintree, Massachusetts. They were both sentenced to death for the robbery and murder even though there was insufficient evidence. Many people strongly disagreed with the verdict as they believed the men were innocent and were prosecuted because of their politics.
The 1920s proved to be hysterical in Braintree, Massachusetts. Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti were Italian immigrants during a time period that showed great animosity to foreigners. In the presence of two crimes, one a robbery and assault, the other a holdup and murder, Sacco and Vanzetti were ultimately executed with minimal evidence to support the allegations against them. In the presence of prejudice, acts of injustice to another are inevitable. A witness arraigned Vanzetti of committing a crime based on the overgeneralization that all foreigners run the same. The judge adjudicating the trials disclosed to a friend of a noted humorist about his intentions to have Sacco and Vanzetti executed based solely on the fact that they were
1911 Mayer Lansky arrives in the U.S. and immediately starts to analyze conditions in the country with regard to Italian crime families with the purpose of getting involved in their affairs.
The American media has had a substantial influence on the Italian-American stereotype, especially that regarding mobsters. The American cinema has created movies and TV shows such as The Godfather, Goodfellas, The Sopranos, and more. The media has the power to influence how people think and see things, including ethnic groups and races. This was seen extensively in the 2016 United States Presidential election. Hollywood has always had the strength to have ethnic groups be seen in a positive or negative light. In the twentieth century, the media had a negative portrayal of Italian-Americans that has evolved as time passed. The reason for the views changing with each passing decade is the fact that foreigners and their future generations became more “Americanized.”
The Mafia way of life may seem like a romantic updated version of the western movie played out on the streets of the big cities where the good guys and the wise guys who share the same instincts and values do battle before an enthralled public but it is actually very different. The Mafia is really just a group of uneducated thugs making money by victimizing the public. Initially, the Mafia was setup as a prominent supplier of bootlegged liquor, but it has spread into many different areas of crime. During this research paper I will discuss three aspects of the Mafia which are crime, structure and decline in leadership.
In Timothy J. Gilfoyle’s book, The Urban Underworld in Late Nineteenth-Century New York: The Autobiography of George Appo, we learn that life was hard being a 19th century immigrant and choosing a life of crime was sometimes, but not always, the easy way out although it came with many consequences. George Appo was one who chose the life of crime.
There are many perceptions of what defines crime. The definitions appear to change throughout history and are still changing today (Henry, S. and Lanier, M. M., 2001 ,p.139). For example, in the past marital rape was not considered a crime as it was thought that women were believed to be “sexual property” of the male and, therefore it couldn’t be classed as rape (Brownmiller, 1975, cited by Bergen, R.K., 1996, p.3). However, in the United States in 1978 a man was convicted of rape on his wife (Russell, 1990, cited by Bergen, R.K., 1996, p.4). This shows how it is hard to define crime due to the changes in views over time. Different cultures also have different perceptions of what is, or is not considered to be a crime. For example,