Vol III When the Outfit Ran Chicago: The Frank Nitti Era

This book is about the Outfit Under Frank “The Enforcer” Nitti. When Al Capone went to prison in 1931, for income tax evasion, he appointed Nitti to temporarily take over running the Outfit in his absence. When it became apparent that Capone would not be returning to run the Outfit Nitti became its figure head boss, frequently being overruled by Tony Arccado and Paul Rica. Unlike the Hollywood image of Nitti as a touch talking, murderous psychopath who killed anyone who stood in his way, he was in reality a fairly mild-mannered “heads down” businessman. He would kill only when necessary but only as a last resort and only surginally. The ‘shoot-em’-up” days of Al Capone were over. The depression had hit, Prohibition had ended, their political lock on Chicago had been broken and the Outfi had fallen on hard times. It’s income was no longer sufficient to support the 1,000 gangsters had on his payroll in 1931.

Fortunately, Nitti was allowed to run the Outfit operationally and the first thing he did was to resctructure it to run like a modern corporation. Like any business manager, he first cut expenses by paring down the outfit to 500 gangsters, by their dispensing with unneeded gunmen or giving them a bullet send-off. No longer did her retain hundreds of expensive gunmen on payroll to standby by for instant use, he now contracted the killers out from the East Coast at $2,500 each for the “hits” he needed to make. Nitti then moved out of the “blue collar” crimes of robbery, burglary, and prostitution and moved into “white collar” crimes of Hollywood movie studio extortions, casino skimming, and union racketeering. He also made engaging in narcotics a death sentence. Nitti always took care to come in under the public’s radar screen in order to not stir up an law enforcement scrutiny or public outrage. He had the Outfit focus on crimes the public had little interest in, as they did not directly affect them. And he was extremely careful that in the event someone had to be “knocked off” the public perception was that it was only a mobster who probably deserved it anyway and was elimated at no expense to the public.

From the Outfit’s interest in several Las Vegas casinos and a large number of unions they skimmed off millions from an almost never ending supply of money, be it gambling bets or union does. Initially, the Hollywood movie stodios also proved a gold mine, as threatened union unrest blackmailed millions from them, which was treated as just another business expense. However, as Nitti had little understanding of human nature, despising nearly everyone he associated with in the Outfit, his front-men in the movie studio extortions, Billie Bioff and George Browne was badly chosen and when they were brought down by their own excesses, they threatened to take down virtually the entire upper heirachy of the Outfit with them. Blamed for the upcoming fiasco, Nitti knew it was only a matter of time before his “bullet send-off” and so on March 19, 1943, Nitti chose to commit suicide instead.

Al Capone was similar to Alexander the Great in that he was able to establish an empire but not one that would survive without him. Whereas Alexander’s empire quickly broke up into component parts, Nitti kept his empire together. He was the forerunner of the modern businessman gangster who ran a “heads down” illegal organization whose sole purpose to make as much money as it could. Anything which interfered with its profits was not to be tolerated and anything which increased its profits was to be encouraged. The modern age of organized crime had dawned and for the next two decades it would be the Outfit’s golden age. This thanks to a small withdrawn man who is widely perceived as something he never was, a tough-talking thug who reached for his gun every time someone crossed him.