Fifty years ago this spring, Mario Puzo changed the way we view organized crime
Mario Puzo needed money. His first two novels, The Dark Arena (1955) and The Fortunate Pilgrim (1965), received good reviews…
Author: Jackie Apoyan
Happy New Beer’s Eve!
On the evening of April 6, 1933, lines formed outside of bars and breweries. In Chicago, WGN Radio broadcast special…
New movie rekindles debate over Jimmy Hoffa killing
Martin Scorsese’s upcoming movie The Irishman is reviving a dispute over who killed former national labor leader Jimmy Hoffa. The…
‘Mob Cops’ saga still reverberates 10 years after their life sentences
A former New York garment dealer, Burton Kaplan, sat down with DEA agents in 2004 to tell them an incredible…
Ninety years ago, Thomas ‘Fatty’ Walsh died as he lived — by the gun
The setting was a suite on the 14th floor of the lavish Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables, Florida. Thomas Walsh,…
The Mob hit that wasn’t
It could have been a classic “Mob rub-out,” a new case for the FBI’s Criminal Investigations Division and the U.S….
The inspiring rise and tragic fall of the ‘Italian Sherlock Holmes’
On the evening of March 12, 1909, New York Police Department detective Joseph Petrosino left his hotel on the east…
Dealing death in drag
It was February 6, 1939. A loud bang at three a.m. disrupted the winter silence and slumber for residents of…
Chinese manufacturers, Mexican cartels are primary sources of deadly opioids
Fentanyl and other synthetic opioids smuggled from China and Mexico, heroin from Mexican drug cartels and the misuse of prescription…
Drug kingpins in media spotlight
Jailed after a manhunt, the drug kingpin known globally as El Chapo expressed genuine surprise several years ago when interrogators…