Shaking Hands Can Be Unhealthy

By 1925 the six Genna brothers, or "The Terrible Gennas" as they were known ran the illicit activities in Chicago's Little Italy. practically the whole neighborhood was on the Genna's payroll cooking alcohol. The Genna empire began to fall in spring of that year when, depending on who tells the story, either Al Capone or the North Side gang struck out at them.

The first to go was brother Angelo that spring, followed by brother Mike, both of whom were the muscle of the family. On July 8, 1925,  brother Anthony aka Tony the Gent, received a phone call from a former associate named Joseph Nerone, alias Anthony Spano, known in the underworld as Il Cavaliere because of his polished demeanor. Feeling that the Genna's didn't pay him his worth, Nerone had moved on to Chicago Heights, and a more lucrative bootlegging career.

Nerone asked to meet Genna at the corner of Grand Avenue and Curtis Street.  Genna arrived first and waited. A sedan pulled up and Nerone alighted. Genna went up to greet him. As the men shook hands, two men walked up and fired a number of shots into Genna's back before running off. Nerone too, fled the seen.

We know that Nerone set up Genna because Tony the Gent didn't die right away. Later at the hospital, he was overheard telling his brother Sam that the Cavaliere was behind the murder. 

With the death of Tony, the Genna family was all but through in the Chicago underworld.

Tony the Gent Genna

I Spy

Ralph D'Amato was a gangster associated with Frankie Yale and Al Capone. It was with the latter that he was arrested just after Christmas of 1925 for the murder of White Hand gang members Richard "Pegleg" Lonergan, Neil "Needles" Ferry and Aaron Harms in the Adonis Social Club.

By the mid-twenties the relationship between Yale and Capone had started to sour. When Capone's alcohol trucks, supposedly being protected by Yale, began to get hijacked, Capone started getting suspicious. He called on Ralph D'Amato to spy for him. Sure enough, D'Amato was able to report that Yale was indeed the one behind the hijackings.

Unfortunately for D'Amato, Yale found out that he had a spy in his midst. The gang leader rectified the situation on July 7, 1927. Shortly before midnight, D'Amato was speaking to two men on a corner. They parted ways, but the men followed him and opened fire. D'Amato was hit in the neck, stomach and side. The gunmen ran back to the corner and jumped into a sedan and escaped.

D'Amato was about forty-years old and lived with his dad and sister. He had six arrests under his belt and did a year in prison for possessing narcotics.

Ralph D'Amato

Sorry Charlie

Charles Entratta was a former associate of Jack "Legs" Diamond with dealings go back to the 1920s. He was with Diamond in the Hotsy-Totsy club when the guns went off  in the summer of 1929 leaving gangland fellows, William Cassidy and Simon Walker dead.

Like Diamond, Entratta disappeared while the homicide detectives searched in vain for them. Eventually arrested in Chicago, Entratta was sent back to New York City to face a murder trial. He beat the rap, which allowed Diamond to come out of hiding and to be himself, exonerated.  Since none of the boys helped Entratta during his troubles, his relationship with Diamond soured.

Fast forward to the summer of 1931. In addition to a box factory and dress manufacturing plant, Entratta is part owner of Winkenfeld Bottling Company in Brooklyn. Using his underworld connections, it is assumed that Entratta was bottling beer and sales skyrocketed. Though lucrative, his enterprise was most unwelcome by the local beer barons and on July 6, of that year he was put out of business; permanently.

Moments after arriving at the bottling office in his chauffeured sedan, Entratta was gunned down by three men while talking to his partner. His partner was physically unharmed...economically? Sales probably plummeted.

Charles Entratta

Murders in Cleveland

Ninety-years ago there was tension in Cleveland, Ohio's underworld. Seven brothers by the the name of Porrello were the top purveyors of corn sugar in the region. A most needed ingredient in the manufacturing of alcohol. The Mayfield Road Mob, the top Mafia gang in the city, headed by Frank Milano, was attempting to seize control or, at the very least, shake down the Porrellos for protection money.

On July 5, 1930, Joe Porrello, head of family operations, and his lieutenant, Sam Tilocco, attended a meeting with Milano and a hand full of his gang at Milano's Venetian saloon. They played cards for a while and Milano laid it all out. He wanted a piece of the Porrello's corn sugar business. Porrello said no and, as he and Tilocco were getting up to leave, the guns came out.

Porrello never made it out of the saloon, with two bullets to the face, he fell to the floor. Tilocco, though wounded, was able to stagger outside before collapsing and having a another round of shots fired into him by Milano's retreating men.*

Joe Porrello

*For the full story on the Porrello clan and the Cleveland Mafia, check out Rick Porrello's book in the link. A great book.

No Dynamite for the Fourth of July

Unfortunately for New Jersey gangster, Dynamite Joe Tricoli, the explosions in the wee hours of July 4, 1929 were the ones resulting in his demise. He was shot twice in the back of the head and twice beneath the rear left shoulder.

He was last seen leaving a Newark restaurant at 1:30 a.m. Four hours later a man was walking his dog through the Eagle Rock reservation in West Orange, New Jersey when his dog ran up and found Tricoli laying face down in the road.

Tricoli on the spot

Police stated that they were going to question him that day regarding the kidnapping of local bank executive and that the kidnap gang bumped him off before he had a chance to speak to detectives. The executive in question went to the morgue but stated that Tricoli was not one of his abductors.

Tricoli had been accused of kidnapping in the past, as well as robberies and being a beer runner. Another motive given was that he was killed for messing around with another gangsters girl.

On his person was found a wallet containing $295, drivers licenses from four states, a diamond studded pocket watch and a large diamond ring.

Dynamite Joe Tricoli

Fireworks a Day Early

For gangsters William Cannon, George Collins and Mike Stitzel, 4th of July fireworks went off a day early in Detroit. Both Cannon and Collins were Motor City desperadoes who had moved to Chicago, probably for their own safety.

Cannon was shacking up with a woman named Julia Kuffell, who was the widow of a North Side gangster named Henry "Hoops-a-Daisy" Connors. He borrowed her car at the end of June and said he and Collins had to go to Detroit on business. She took this to mean, picking up booze.

July 3, 1930, found Cannon, Collins and Stitzel shooting pool. The trio left the pool hall and walked to Cannons sedan, which was parked in front of the Lasalle Hotel's entrance on Adelaide Street. As the men walked to the car they noticed two men following them. One poorly dressed, the other in a blue suit and panama hat.

"Who are those guys?" Stitzel asked Cannon.
"I don't know. I've never saw them before," Cannon replied.

At the car, which was parked between a cab and another auto, Stitzel climbed into the back seat. Collins the passenger seat and Cannon behind the wheel. Initial reports stated that, as the latter worked to get the car out of it's tight parking spot, the man wearing the panama hat walked out of the Lasalle and up to the car.

"They dropped Collins first and then Cannon," Stitzel would tell the police, "I knew what was coming so I slumped in the back seat, all doubled up. But they got me anyhow."

Police inspect the death car

The following day however, it was reported the the gunman actually jumped on the running board and swore at Cannon in Italian and shot him before turning the gun on Collins. Both versions ended up with Stitzel getting it last.

Following the shooting, the gunman placed the gun in his pocket and entered the Lasalle Hotel through the Adelaide Street entrance and exited out on Woodward Avenue.

Cannon and Collins were both 28 and each had fifteen arrests under their belts. They each had badges provided by Stitzel and it was believed that they were murdered for shaking down speakeasy owners. Though it was initially reported that gangster Fred "Killer" Burke was possibly the gunman, Stitzel, who said he knew Burke, stated it wasn't him.

William Cannon                George Collins

A Gopher Gets it

May 9, 1929 saw the demise of New York City gangster Vincent Gaffney. Born in 1897, the racketeer was a member of the infamous Gopher gang during his youth. His record dated back to 1914 with arrests for burglary and assault. He gained some fame in 1918 when he murdered another hoodlum named Charles "Chick" Tucker.

Gaffney was sentenced to 18 years but managed to escape from the Tombs prison and remain free for about four months before being picked up in New Jersey. After serving eleven years, Gaffney was released in 1929 and married his girl friend who had waited for him.

The Gaffneys moved to Queens where the self proclaimed rehabilitated gangster open a few "cordial" shops, which were speakeasies. He came to the westside of Manhattan regularly where it was said that he wanted to form a new Gopher gang and "take the whole west side over." The west side was currently controlled by another former Gopher named Owney Madden.

Whether it was Madden or friends of Chick Tucker or someone else entirely, Gaffney went out in an ugly way. He had been stabbed upwards of forty times. The palms of his hands were sliced to ribbons so he had attempted to ward off the blows. After he was dead (or perhaps dying) his body was run over numerous times by the killers' auto. To make it worse, there was no tire on the rim that had gone over him, slicing and smashing him up even worse.

Vincent Gaffney