Special Agent Eliot Ness (Robert Stack) forms The Untouchables, an elite squad of incorruptible lawmen, in order to bring down underworld kingpin Al Capone. First televised as a two-part episode of the Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse in April 1959, The Untouchables was later combined into one seamless version for movie theaters titled "The Scarface Mob."
Narrator: "Chicago, May 5, 1932. After 7 months of legal delays, Al Capone... was on his way to federal prison, to serve 11 years for income tax evasion."* Eliot Ness and his Untouchables had spent 18 months to get Capone behind bars-- but now who would try to take over the throne, the Empty Chair? May 8. Barbara Ritchie (niece of Jake Guzik) has been grieving over the death of her husband George Ritchie for 12 months-- unaware that it was her own uncle Jake who had him knocked off for being an informer to Ness. At a service at the cemetery, marking the first anniversary of George's death, are: Barbara Ritchie (George's widow), her uncle Jake "Greasy Thumb" Guzik (treasurer and bookkeeper for the Capone mob), Norma Guzik (Jake's widowed sister, Barbara's mother), Phil D'Andrea (expert machine-gunner), "Fur" Sammons (hijacker and rumrunner), Gus Raddi ("pineapple" expert), Tony "Mops" Volpe (chief triggerman) and last and most important Frank Nitti ("The Enforcer"). May 12. Two of Capone's principle lieutenants-- Gus Raddi and Tony "Mops" Volpe-- go to a barber shop where Enrico Rossi is working as a barber. Nitti barges in with a machine-gun and blasts them, eliminating some competition for the Empty Chair. (Unfortunately, some stray machine-gun bullets hit pretty Tessie DiGiovanni, the 17-year-old manicurist working in the barber shop.) Enrico Rossi uses his straight razor to attack Nitti's henchman and agrees to testify against Nitti. Since being a witness against "the Enforcer" can be hazardous to one's health, the Untouchables must give Rico protection. They figure the best way to do this is to hire him on as their driver. Thus, Rico joins the squad where he will remain for the entire run of the series. Guzik calls a meet of the 4 still-living heirs at the Montmartre Cafe, headquarters of the Capone gang: himself, Frank Nitti, "Fur" Sammons and Phil D'Andrea. Nitti sits in Capone's Empty Chair, saying "Big chair-- big man. It fits all right. Anybody ob
January 16, 1935. Oklawaha, Florida. Eliot Ness, along with Bill Youngfellow and Martin Flaherty, are closing in on Ma Barker, who is holed up in a house along with 2 of her sons, Lloyd and Fred. Ness says they are wanted for everything from bank robbery, kidnapping, to first-degree murder. Now that Ness has found where the Barkers are, he contacts half a dozen state troopers and local police for backup. From a distance, Ness yells at Ma Barker and her boys to surrender and come out with their hands up. Ma Barker goes to a closet, and inside is an arsenal of weapons-- machine guns, pistols, hand grenades, etc., enough for a small army. She fires a chopper at Ness; he jumps behind an 8-foot long wooden flower pot that gets riddled with bullets. Ma Barker throws a hand grenade that almost blows up Bill Youngfellow. Ma Barker is the most vicious outlaw they've ever faced. In a flashback, we see how it all started in Tulsa, Oklahoma years ago: Ma Barker was a church-goer, but always making excuses for her 4 boys who were committing petty crimes, which escalated into serious crimes. In 1927, while the 4 boys were looting a store, Herman got shot by a policeman. Pa Barker finally had the guts to walk out on the bunch. Ma and her 3 boys committed bank robberies, and killed a bank guard; also a kidnapping. They committed crimes in a 10-state area. In 1935, Pa Barker tipped Eliot Ness, and Ness almost caught the Barker gang in St. Paul, Minnesota. Then the Barkers kidnapped a millionaire's son and got $200,000 ransom. Arthur "Doc" Barker and his fiancée Eloise left the gang; Arthur took his share of the ransom and went to Chicago, but all the serial numbers were recorded with the police. Around the first of January, 1935, when Arthur spent a $10 bill, the grocer informed Eliot Ness, so Ness knew Arthur was in Chicago. Ma Barker stupidly sent a birthday cake to Arthur (who was using the alias Clarence Tillman), and enclosed a postcard, "Greetings from Oklawaha, Florida." Art
Gangs have divided Chicago in 2-- the northside is run by the Bertshce mob, the southside by the Viale brothers, Augie & Vito. The line of demarcation being Madison Street. At the news office, Jake Lingle phones in a story to the front desk: gang war has erupted on the near northside, 2 hoods with machine guns smashed the liquor supply at Bertsche's Club Chapeau, in retaliation for Bertsche's mob raiding a Viale warehouse. Jake Lingle gets shot in the back at the subway station. The public turns out by the thousands for his funeral. It was the first time in history that a newspaperman was killed by the mob. Publicly, Augie Viale says Bertsche killed him; Bertsche says Viale did. The newspaper puts up a $25,000 reward for the capture of the killer. Former hood Bill Hagen meets with Ness. He says he'll give Ness information about the booze racket, if Ness finds out who killed Jake Lingle and tells him first, so he can get the reward money. Ness reminds him the Lingle killing is not a federal matter. Later, Ness meets with D.A. Beecher Asbury; he tells Ness the truth. Dead, Jake Lingle is a martyr, a rallying point for the public to demand reform; but alive, Lingle was pocketing 50 grand a year by being a broker-- through him, the mob bought protection from the police. Bill Hagen, who used to be a big-time bootlegger from St. Louis, meets with Barney Bertsche, and gets a job with his mob. Barney Bertsche trusts him. Hagen tips off Ness about one of Bertsche's stills, at a farmhouse 9 miles outside of town. Ness grills all the crooks there, and finds out that a Patty O'Day, who used to drive a truck for Bertsche, supplied the gun for the Lingle killing-- Ness relates this info to Hagen. Over the next few weeks, Hagen tips Ness off 5 more times. Bertsche figures these raids are just bad luck; Jack Zuta tells him Hagen is a stoolie. They set a trap: they give Hagen false info about a still. Hagen calls Ness, tells him there's a cooker on Columbus Drive. If Ness raids it,
March 2, 1932. Gangster Joe Carroll, sidekick of George "Bugs" Moran, kidnaps 9-year-old Larry Halloran, Jr.-- the son of Lawrence Halloran, president of the United Trucker's Union. It just so happens that at this very moment, Ness and his Untouchables are trying to nail Bugs Moran-- who is now the top criminal in Chicago, since Capone is in prison. Ness leaves Agent Martin Flaherty in charge; Ness has to fly to Washington, DC, since the brass wants him to give Congress the whole story about the Capone operation. Bugs Moran and Joe Carroll phone Lawrence Halloran at his home; they say Halloran should meet them at his union building. There, Moran spells it out: he wants control of Halloran's union. Halloran is to call a meeting of the union, recommend they elect Moran as vice president, and Joe Carroll as executive secretary-- and then Halloran is to keep his mouth shut. In exchange, Halloran will get his kid back; Halloran has no choice but to agree. Flaherty and Youngfellow are tailing Moran the whole time; after Moran leaves, Flaherty talks to Halloran-- but Halloran won't make a move until he gets his son back. Later that night, the kid is returned to Halloran. Next day, Halloran drops in on Flaherty in room 208 of the Federal Building. Flaherty wants to get Moran; but he tells Halloran that as a Federal agent he can do nothing, since kidnapping is not a federal offense, (if it doesn't cross state lines). Halloran leaves, disgusted. Flaherty phones Ness for some sage advice. Ness surprises Flaherty by telling him he should let Moran take over the union: give him enough rope and he'll hang himself. Ness says, let Moran try to put his arm on some interstate hauler, and they'll nail him for violation of interstate commerce: a federal offense. (that's why Ness is the brains of the Untouchables.) Halloran pays a visit to non-union "Patterson & Sons" Trucking & Hauling. Halloran wants to warn them that Bugs Moran is taking over his union, and Bugs will take over their
Summer 1933, Chicago. The mobsters were branching out from liquor, going into the numbers racket, call girls, gambling and dope. One of the most successful gangsters is "Big" Jim Harrington; right now he and his gang are in back of Benny Hoff's Blue Poodle nightclub, and they smash a truckload of liquor. Harrington tells Hoff, from now on, he will only buy booze from him-- and Harrington demands 75% ownership. When Hoff balks, one of Harrington's boys, Loxie the Torch, intimidates Hoff. Loxie takes out a whiskey hip flask, but it's not filled with whiskey. Loxie goes, "Alright, now, smell it," as he pours the gasoline on the terrified Hoff, "light a match and >fshhh!!<" and he holds the lighted match up to him. Hoff doesn't want his club to be torched, too; the club becomes Jim Harrington's Blue Poodle. Harrington was out to get ownership of all the speakeasies and nightclubs in Chicago, and flood the town with his rotgut-- 1,000 gallons a day. The violence was a matter for the police; the booze was a federal matter. And so Eliot Ness meets with Hoff, but Hoff doesn't want to talk about it. Hoff also owns another small club on the side, a German beer garden called the Double Eagle. Hoff is manager and best friend of a stand-up comedian named Johnny Paycheck, who is working there this week, and his jokes are strictly from hunger. Paycheck regales the audience, "We were so poor, one day my mom said to the landlord, 'What about the floor?' and he said, 'What about it?' and my mom said, 'We want one'." You get the idea. Harrington is in the audience with his moll Renee Sullivan, and figuring that Paycheck's rotten jokes are no worse than his rotgut, he offers Paycheck a job in one of his downtown speaks, the Blue Poodle. Harrington now has his sights set on taking over the swankiest nightclub in town, Schlessinger's Mohawk club. Eliot Ness warns the owner about Harrington's plan to take over. 6 weeks later, Johnny Paycheck has picked up some better jokes (thank heavens)
February 1931. In Churchill Downs, the entries for the Kentucky Derby are closed. Tight-fisted Dutch Schultz, beer baron of the Bronx, places a bet with the Syndicate: 100-grand in the Winter-book on Enchantment to win the Kentucky Derby. Trying to get the most for his money, Dutch knows he will get much better odds now than if he waits until race day. Dutch's lieutenant is "Lefty" Gallagher, and his bodyguard is Benny Bristow. Schultz has a powerful enemy in Vincent "Mad Dog" Coll, who earned his nickname (which Schultz stuck him with) due to his violent actions; his sidekicks are "Needles" Bledsoe and "Fats" Finney. Lefty Gallagher cautions his boss Dutch: if anything should happen to the horse between now and the Kentucky Derby in April, the Syndicate doesn't give refunds. But money-loving Dutch is savoring the 7-to-1 odds he's gotten; at post-time, he might only get 8-to-5. When Lefty leaves.
Chicago. October 1, 1932.* In 32 hours, Judge McGinnis will consider evidence against racketeer Theodore Newberry-- owner of gambling parlors, speakeasies and houses of prostitution. Ness and his men had been working on the case for a year. The key witness in the case against Newberry is a timid City Hall clerk named Julius Embry. That night, Newberry's hitman Jerry Fanning goes to Embry's house to shoot him-- he fires at a shadow in the window. But police guarding the place fire back, chasing Fanning away. Fanning then goes to Newberry's place to report his failure-- Newberry takes the bad news graciously: he belts Fanning, giving him a black eye. Newberry is holding a party, and one of the guests is a corrupt Commissioner. Ness has Embry moved to a hotel room for safe keeping. However, the corrupt Commissioner sends a couple of City Hall crooks (Whelan & Dottweiler), pretending to be agents (and having a document signed by the Commissioner) to the hotel, and they tell the guard they have orders to put Embry into protective custody. The hoods knock the guard unconscious, and put the snatch on Embry. The next day, D.A. Beecher Asbury has to ask the judge for a postponement because Embry has vanished. That night, Ness is sitting alone at a table in the Savoy restaurant. A Mr. LaMarr strikes up a conversation with him. Then LaMarr hands Ness an envelope with $20,000 in it. Before a surprised Ness can react, a photographer takes a picture of the "transaction." Ness has been framed! The photo winds up on the front page of the newspapers the next day, along with the headline: "What was in that envelope, Mr. Ness?" To make matters worse, the kidnapped Embry has been taken out of the country-- down to Chihuahua, Mexico. Newberry decides to rub out Ness and Embry at the same time. Newberry has Fanning pose as a cab driver, and give Ness and Agent Martin Flaherty a sob story-- Fanning tells them he's ratting on Newberry because he "added a new girl to his collec
April 19, 1931. New York City. Every 48 hours, more than 25 million pounds of fruits and vegetables stream into the city; this multi-million dollar business is the target of gangsters. Eliot Ness and his Untouchables have recently been brought to New York on special assignment to investigate the produce market racket. After senior Angelo Cestari, a produce retailer, is machine-gunned by one of Terranova's gangsters, Ness talks to his son Tony Cestari; Tony tells Ness that his father didn't deal with Terranova like the other retailers did, and now he's paid the ultimate price. Ciro Terranova is The Artichoke King; his racket is simple: he buys carloads of artichokes at $6 a crate, and sells them for twice the price-- at the point of a gun. Despite his wealth, Terranova is a notorious cheapskate. Right now, Terranova is mad at his henchman Frankie Yale, and Yale's sidekick Marlowe, for rubbing out Cestari. But Yale has a surprise for Terranova: Yale says that Terranova is no longer his boss, from now on they are partners. Yale and Marlowe go to Tony Cestari and demand $1,200 for artichokes he should have bought from them; and they tell Tony he has to buy $600 worth of artichokes a week from them from now on. Ciro Terranova, meanwhile, goes to Chicago and hires a hitman for 20 grand-- to get rid of his new "partner." Hitman Felix Burke is expensive because he's the best, he did the St. Valentine's Day Massacre. Terranova gives him 5 grand now, and promises to pay the rest of the money immediately when the job is done; Burke makes him sign a contract, in case Terranova tries to stiff him. Felix Burke rubs out Frankie Yale, and tosses the machine gun. Eliot Ness finds the tommy gun, and traces it back to the Capone mob. Just as Burke figured, miser Terranova is slow to pay him the rest of the 20 grand; so slow, that Ness and his men have time to tail Burke. When Burke gets the rest of the dough, he demands another 20 grand from Terranova, since his procrastination has pu
In the latter part of 1933, there was an epidemic of truck hijackings in the states of Virginia, Maryland and Pennsylvania; this was the work of 6 gangsters: the Tri-State Gang. Tonight, in Richmond, Virginia, they're hijacking a truckload of radios. As usual "Big" Bill Phillips, a 6'4" ox of a man, takes over the hijacked truck, transferring the load onto their truck; Artie McLeod, a cheap tinhorn gambler, puts a burlap sack over the driver's head, blinding him, and chains the driver to a tree. Other gang members are Georgie Kaufman, an ex-boxer, the oldest of the gang; and James Jonathan Harris, aka Gentleman Jim, aka "Harris the Fence"; and the 2nd-in-command, Bobby Mais. Their leader is the vicious, sadistic Wally Legenza-- he shoots 4 bullets into the driver (who never got a good look at the gang members, and couldn't identify them) because Legenza is a psychopath. Ness and his men, who had been assigned by Washington, DC, to investigate the Tri-State Gang, are on the scene. May 14, 1934. That night, Wally Legenza calls a meet, to go over tomorrow night's hijacking job. "Big" Bill Phillips is absent-- he's seeing his sweetie, Elizabeth "Lizzie" Dauphine, a French girl from Quebec, Canada that he nicknames Alouette. Legenza goes to their place and breaks it up. The night of May 15, in Oakhurst, Virginia, the gang hijacks a truck hauling $20,000 of tobacco. Again they chain the driver to a tree, but this time Legenza only shoots one bullet into him; the driver doesn't die, and when the sack over his head falls off, he sees their license plate number: T-4514. Ness and his men are staying in Richmond; Ness investigates this first break in the case. The Dept. of Motor Vehicles shows the truck is registered to Briggs Salvage Co.; the Internal Revenue shows the owner is James J. Harris. Ness and his men stake out the Briggs Salvage place; it is virtually deserted, only Harris and one watchman. But on the 5th night, Harris shows up with Legenza and "Big" Bill Phillips.
March 1935. One of the toughest mobsters in New York City is Dutch Schultz. He and his mob were responsible for over 100 murders. Dutch is into every racket: liquor, narcotics, labor shakedowns, the numbers, selling protection. But "Lucky" Luciano is muscling in on his territory; to try to keep his clients from paying to Luciano, Dutch Schultz has his boys work his clients over with fists. When Joe Floris won't pay 30% protection money to Schultz, saying he is already paying 15% to Luciano, Joe Floris gets some acid in the face, blinding him. But Dutch has a gentler side, too-- his wife just had a baby. Eliot Ness and his Untouchables are on special assignment in New York City. Agent Flaherty works undercover, and Ness and his men get Schultz's books. It looks like Eliot Ness is about to nail Dutch Schultz on income tax evasion, just like he did Al Capone. One night, Dutch Schultz offers Eliot Ness and Flaherty a $75,000 bribe; the Untouchables facetiously pretend they are interested. Flaherty: "That's a lot of money. I could buy a whole chain of delicatessens." Ness: "You know, I've always thought I'd like to own a chateau in France." Flaherty: "Well, if you throw any parties, I'll cater them from my delicatessen." Ness: "Special rates?" Flaherty: "You'll be rich, you can afford to pay the going price." Ness: "Now wait a minute, with a special chateau I ought to get special rates..." Dutch Schultz is angry at being mocked, and leaves in a huff. Later, Schultz is indicted. But Schultz's crafty attorney says his client can't get a fair trial in New York City, and asks the judge for a change of venue. Arriving in the small town of Clearview, in upstate New York, Schultz ingratiates himself to all the townsfolk by spreading money around; not by bribery, but legally. For example, he talks to the grade school teacher, Marsha Harper, and offers to buy uniforms for the school's baseball team; that sort of thing. By the time the trial starts on September 7, the town thinks
Chicago, October 1932. The depths of the Great Depression, marked by unemployment and poverty. The only chance some people felt they had to rise out of poverty, if only for a short time, was to win the lottery or at the punch-boards. The mob saw this as an opportunity, by coming up with a numbers game. People picked a number from 0-999; their odds of winning were 1-in-a-1,000-- the payoff was 600-to-1. The thousands of losers, pouring money into the mob, were never mentioned. Right now, mobster Phil Morrisey is pulling up in his fancy car, and making a big show for the crowd by giving today's winnings to a Mrs. Pollock-- for her investment of 25 cents, she is now getting $150, a fortune by Depression standards. And all those watching are determined to bet again, convinced they will all be winners someday. Phil Morrisey has also attracted the attention of Eliot Ness and Agent Flaherty. Ness tells Phil that $400,000 out of every million collected goes to the Syndicate-- for corr
The night of August 3, 1933, outside the Louisburg Federal Prison in Pennsylvania. After serving 2 years of a life sentence for his part in the holdup of a Federal Reserve bank shipment, Frank Halloway is busting out, climbing over the wall. When a fellow inmate breaks his leg from the jump from the high prison wall, ruthless Frank Halloway hops into the getaway car that was left there for him-- and runs over the hapless inmate. Halloway's share of the loot, which was never recovered by the police, comes to $250,000-- and it's being held by Ed Johnson in Los Angeles, who never got caught. At the Palace Ballroom, they are in hour 257 of a dance marathon; Mona just wants to win and collect her half of the $500 prize money, but gangster Daniel Oates has other plans for her-- he wants her to escort Frank Halloway to L.A., since a traveling couple would look less suspicious to the police than Halloway traveling by himself. Daniel fixes Halloway up with a car, driver's license, suits and
(No date given, but probably 1932 which was a presidential election year.) 30 miles from Chicago, the (fictitious) Calum City; population: 10,000. Judge Leon Zabo is running for mayor, to clean up the town. Working hard in his campaign headquarters is his lovely daughter, Rosetta Zabo. Judge Zabo tried to put an end to vice, graft and corruption; in the last 6 months, he had closed down 110 bars, clubs and gambling casinos in the notorious Barbary Coast district. Late at night, Judge Zabo takes a taxi home; driver Joe Donato makes it a point to tell him the right door is stuck, and he has to use the left door. In front of Zabo's house, Donato again tells him to use the left door, which opens to the street side. A car driven by gangster Harry Mauldin runs the judge over. Ness and his men are on the case. With Capone in prison, and a crime crackdown in Chicago, the Syndicate is looking for another city to make its headquarters for the nationwide narcotics racket: Ness knows they
Chicago, March 31, 1933. Giuseppe ""Joe"" Bucco is at home when he gets a visit from his wife's cousin, Barbara Vittorini-- she says her husband Arturo has been missing for 3 days, and accuses Bucco of killing him. Bucco has his flunkie Abe Garfinkel take her home. Bucco knows about rub-out attempts, Guzik's boys once shot him 4 times, but he lived; Bucco swears to his wife Anna that he doesn't know where Arturo is. That night Ness and Flaherty go to the Vittorini restaurant for a raid. Mrs. Vittorini won't tell Ness anything about her missing husband; Ness knows that's Omertà , the Mafia code of silence. Inside, Ness finds crates filled with bottles of cheap whiskey. When Ness walks into the freezer room, he finds Arturo's body, tied up and hung on a meat hook. Barbara Vittorini breaks the code of silence, and tells him Joseph Bucco did it. Ness and his men pay Bucco a visit at one of his places. Although Bucco, in his 50s, gives the outward appearance of being a family man, he i
1934. The Depression was over 4 years old, and Al Capone was in Alcatraz. Many of the rackets had seemingly legit fronts, such as Midwest Enterprises, Inc. -- the president is Luigi Renaldo, former lieutenant for Capone. Renaldo is going to Florida on business, and leaving his 2nd-in-command in charge: his Enforcer Paolo Rienzi. But, unbeknownst to his boss, Rienzi tells Tubby to get a couple of guys and work over their accountant, William Norbert, who wanted to retire from the rackets; (nobody is ever allowed to retire). William is a mild-mannered sort, 42, with a wife and kid; is also a genius with numbers which he keeps in his head, and he never makes a mathematical mistake; (sort of like a computer, before they were invented). They rough up William with some brass knuckles. Florida was the gambling mecca of America; (this is long before Las Vegas was built).
Spring 1931. Gangland warfare had broken out again with sudden violence in the streets of St. Louis. Tim Harrington, who was long entrenched as the undisputed boss of the city, was fighting off the challenge to his leadership from Joe Courtney, an upstart hoodlum. The elder Dink Conway calls for a sit-down between the two, at the Jockey Club. Dink points out they are operating the old way: shootouts and dealing in cash. He offers them organization and protection, and says the new way is to use fronts to cover your criminal activities and keep books so the Feds can't get you on income tax evasion (he knows what happened to Al Capone). Dink wants them all to pool their resources; he says working together they can triple their take. Joe Courtney says, ""I buy that,"" but Tim Harrington says, ""I pass."" As Harrington leaves, Dink gives a sign to Whitey Deering. Instead of the valet pulling up with Harrington's car, the driver is Whitey-- ready to take him on the infamous ""one way ride
Chicago, February 1932. Crime has been spreading all over, from the dark alleys of Cicero to the social atmosphere of the Gold Coast. Crooked attorney Paul Curtiz is attending a party being hosted by gangster overlord Augie Viale, king of the southside of Chicago. At the affair, Viale is openly paying off this guests with cash-- police commissioners, judges, lawyers, and businessmen; all of them ready to hand Chicago to Viale on a silver platter. There are also lots of women at these parties. However, Eliot Ness has the place under surveillance--one of his Untouchables, agent William Youngfellow, is working there as a waiter. The next day, he reports to Ness and his men. Viale's newest racket will be slot machines, One-Armed Bandits. While they are only nickel slots, it adds up-- to $15-million a year in St. Louis for the underworld; it would be twice as much in Chicago. Meanwhile, Frank Odine is just being released from the Illinois State Pen in Joliet, after doing 7 years, 6
Little Egypt (not the Belly Dancer) was the city of Morraine, the heart of the gangster-infected area in downstate Illinois known as ""Little Egypt."" Election night, 1931. New mayor Marcus Stone is giving a speech on the radio-- he meant what he said about reform, and promises to rid the town of Charlie Byron (a Major in WWI) and his gang, whom he calls ""bloodsuckers"" and ""scum."" Listening to the radio is Major Byron, who gives his gang orders to knock off both Mayor Stone and Sheriff Mooney; they both get tommy-gunned that night. Governor Joseph Stone calls in Eliot Ness; they decide one man should infiltrate this gang, and pick Cam Allison Jr., the son of Judge Cameron Allison who was killed by the mob. Since trying to communicate by phones (which can be wiretapped) is too risky, they decide Cam should communicate with Ness via carrier pigeons, which Enrico Rossi has trained for a hobby. The birds can fly the 100 miles from Morraine to Chicago in less than 2 hours (they say). Ca
Chicago. Prior to May 1934, robbing state banks was not a federal offense. Bandits only had local police to contend with, and they were often understaffed, inefficient or corrupt. This led to a rash of successful, though clumsily executed, bank robberies. In this city alone, there were 422 robberies in the last year, with 221 casualties. On March 1934, Eliot Ness is meeting with his friend D.A. Beecher Asbury. Ness tells him that until bank robbery becomes a federal offense, there's not much he can about it. Beecher is heading to Washington, D.C., to get the Senate Committee to make bank robbery fall under federal jurisdiction; to help his case, he wants Eliot Ness to go after a big-time professional bank robber: Ace Banner, who just pulled off a $150,000 heist in Kansas City. Finding Banner should be easy: he's right here in Chicago, staying at the swanky Crestmoor Arms. Although pinning something on him would be another matter. At this moment, a dapper Ace Banner walks into
Movie: ""The Gun of Zangara"" Chicago. November 9, 1932. FDR has just been elected president, and the repeal of Prohibition is inevitable. But later that night, Ness and his men smash another of Capone's breweries. Agent Youngfellow asks Eliot, ""Are we going to be out of work?"" But Ness tells him no-- after all, bootleg booze was only a part of the Capone empire: there's still narcotics, gambling, prostitution, protection rackets, etc. Capone may start muscling in on legitimate businesses; in fact, Ness is having a meeting with Mayor Anton Cermak-- they want to ""clean up this town"" before the Chicago World's Fair in the spring of 1933. Miami. Giuseppe ""Joe"" Zangara, a man with homicidal tendencies, decides to kill the president. A newspaper vendor is hawking his papers; Zangara talks to him, and is surprised to learn that Hoover is no longer president. But Zangara sticks to his crazy idea to kill the president, no matter who he is.
Movie: ""The Gun of Zangara"" (continued) Nitti's plenty sore! Mayor Cermak's stepped-up law enforcement has cut deeply into Nitti's operations. In the Montmartre club, Nitti takes a newspaper with a big photo of Cermak on the front page, and tacks it to the wall-- then Nitti takes out his 6-shooter and blasts 7 bullets into the photo. Nitti talks to 4 of his lieutenants. Frank Diamond says they better rub the Mayor out when he's out of town, or Capone won't like it; Louis Campagna knows of a good hitman in Florida: Fred ""the Caddy"" Croner, so-named because he poses as a golfer and keeps his rifle in a golf bag. The Mayor will be in Miami on February 15, the same time President FDR will be visiting there. While Nitti is planning Cermak's hit, in Miami Joe Zangara is planning to shoot the president. In Chicago, as if the Mayor hasn't made Nitti mad enough, he is now having a meeting with some City Council members and Ness.
March 31, 1934; Prohibition is over. Al Capone is still running things from Alcatraz, his new money-maker is ""white slavery"" which refers to prostitution; his main operation is run by a mean gangster named Mig Torrance. Right now, Eliot Ness is conducting his 7th raid since being assigned to closing down the houses. While all the other hookers are escaping through a trap door, one of them, young Mary Sage, lays on a bed-- dead from a drug overdose. She is being mourned by 21-year-old Ernie Torrance; despite being Mig Torrance's younger brother, Ernie is a nice guy. Next day, Ness is talking to some reporters, he wants them to print stories in their newspapers telling how hoods take out ads in magazines: phony acting schools promising to make young women movie stars, phony modeling agencies promising to make young women famous models-- then they get the women hooked on dope, and reeled into prostitution. By day, Ness raids these phony agencies; by night, Ness raids the cathouses. M
September 1932. The Federal Penitentiary in Leavenworth, Kansas, 430 miles west-southwest of Chicago, houses some of the nation's worst criminals. One of them is Nick Segal, who murdered 6 people, but only got convicted for violation of the Volstead Act; he got sentenced to 3 years, and is eligible for parole now after serving only one year. While unloading a truck, inmate Gus Caserta ""accidentally"" drops a 100-pound bag of potatoes on Nick, almost killing him; skinny inmate Phil Thorne sees the whole thing, he is there when it happens. Nick only gets a broken left arm, though. Later he gets worse news: parole denied. Ness gets called to meet with a small-time hood who runs part of the prison grapevine: Ed ""Peanuts"" Kieffer. (who is always eating peanuts, and cheats the peanut vending machines by sticking in a penny attached to a wire, then he retrieves the penny.) Kieffer tells Ness that Nick Segal wants to talk to him; but Ness says he doesn't want to talk to Segal-- who has a
New York City: Yankee Stadium, the Bronx. On the evening of June 8, 1933, Max Baer knocked out Max Schmeling in the 10th round of their scheduled 15-round championship boxing match.* The gate was $240,000. (Since 60,000 fans were there, that means the average ticket price was $4.00) An hour later, one of the Granite Armored Cars, with 4 armed guards, drives off with the receipts. Doreen Maney steps in front of the moving truck; the driver slams on his brakes, but Doreen falls down as if she's been hit. When the driver gets out of the truck and checks on her, she pulls out a gun. Sheik Humphries drops a tear-gas canister through a conveniently-located vent in the armored truck, forcing the other 3 guards out. Jake Logan, a triggerman who was hired just for this job (not a member of the gang), keeps his chopper handy. Then Len Carson, the 3rd member of the gang, drives up with their getaway car; he starts stealing money from the armored car. Everything was going as Doreen wanted
Chicago, 1931. Eliot Ness and his men had cracked the bootleg empire of Al Capone, by smashing his breweries and speakeasies.* But now, thousands of gallons of alcohol were coming into the city from an outside source. Ness meets with D.A. Beecher Asbury; it doesn't take Sherlock Holmes to figure out where the booze is coming from, they've found 5-gallon cans with ""Brawley Mills, Brawley, New York"" stamped on them. Chemical analysis showed the stuff is 190 proof, no doubt produced under U.S. Government permit-- but it contained no denaturant, so it is safe to drink. Ness goes to New York, and takes Enrico Rossi and Cam Allison with him. Ness meets with John Carvell, Federal D.A. in New York. They know Brawley Mills is making the alcohol legally, so now it's a matter of checking out 52 warehouses that store and ship the stuff; that takes 3 days. Rico finds out a lot of the alcohol is shipped by United Trucking Services; Ness says that's owned by Tommy Haynes, a crooked and powerfu
New York City. Saturday, September 23, 1933. Top rackets boss Milo Sullivan is the head of ""Crime, Inc."" He has a meet with 5 other crime lords: Augie Epstein (gambling, Miami); Harold Bishman (political power in Louisiana); Ralph Lucci (rumrunner, Detroit Purple Gang); Dino Monteiro (slots, K.C.); and Arte Martin (numbers, prostitution, Seattle). Their profits from Prohibition had been enormous; with Prohibition ending, they were going to put their money to good use, creating the Underworld Bank. For every $1 they lend out, they'll get $2 back; they will provide the funding for hoods, who are preparing men and materials to pull off big jobs. Milo Sullivan says that right now, their $50,000 funding of a million-dollar fur heist will get them $100,000 in return. The Bank's operations are financed and managed on a business basis.
Chicago. (year?)* The jury had been out for 12 hours, on the case Ness had worked so hard on, trying to get a conviction for top mobster Johnny Fortunato. Now the newspaper reads: Fortunato got off, the chief witness was a ""suicide."" At 9 p.m., Ness decides to get some spaghetti at Socrates Eatery. Ness' old high school buddy, Frank Barber, drops in. They laugh and smile as they recount their glory days at Garfield High, when Barber was the star football quarterback, and Ness was his favorite receiver. Frank Barber is prosperous now, he owns the Chicago Sports Palace. Ness and Barber go to the boxing matches, and Ness is shocked to learn that Johnny Fortunato is one of Barber's ""customers."" Veteran boxer ""Pops"" Gantry is pummeling a green kid named Fabiano. Ness comments to Barber about the 7 empty seats in the front row; Barber tells him Fortunato will show up for the 8th round, when Gantry takes a dive.
1934. Prohibition had been repealed (the Volstead Act ran from January 17, 1920 - April 7, 1933). The syndicate was looking for new sources of revenue. Frank Nitti expands his empire, and goes after small theatres-- with his extortion racket. Late one night, after theatre owner Harold Coldman had refused to pay, Nitti has his triggerman Louie Campagna throw some acid into Coldman's face, blinding him. Eliot Ness and his men are on the case-- this is only the latest in a series of muggings and beatings; even a theatre was burned down. Ness knows if he lets Nitti get away with extorting the small, independent theatre owners, in a few months Nitti will go after the big chains. Ness is determined to stop it now. Frank Nitti is throwing a private party, some of the guests are Sidney Rogers (the glib liaison man in the extortion racket), and his main squeeze Ellie Morley (former showgirl), and crooked lawyer Ramsey Lennox (who used to be the mouthpiece for Al Capone). Frank Nitti's h
Chicago, March 1931. Eliot Ness and his men were doing raid after raid on Capone's speakeasies and breweries; his empire was tottering. Who would take over? A big-time gangster from New York, Charlie ""Pops"" Felcher, had just arrived in Chicago, along with his crooked lawyer Archie Grayson. There's a big party being given for Felcher at Flora's nightclub; she hands Felcher a ribbon which is attached to a 6-foot-tall paper heart that has the words ""Pops, We Love You"" written on it-- Felcher pulls the ribbon, and on the other end, red-haired dancer Rusty Heller jumps out of the heart, she's dressed up like a kitty cat and wearing fishnet stockings. Meow! Just then, Ness and his men raid the place, they're looking for a hood named Augie Kleiner; they don't go away empty-handed, they find and arrest him. Archie Grayson doesn't go away empty-handed either, he starts an affair with Rusty Heller. Rusty and Grayson become a team. At the Club Mademoiselle, Rusty is using her feminine wil
New York, 1931. While many people were unemployed and poor during the Depression, gangster-owned speakeasies and nightclubs created a new mobster aristocracy. One top mobster is Jack ""Legs"" Diamond -- known to the Underworld as ""the Clay Pigeon"" because of the many times he'd been shot at, and survived. Although he's married, Jack Diamond carries on openly with lovely canary Dawn Dolan, who sings at the Hotsey Totsey Club, a nightclub Jack owns; his philandering is in the newspapers all the time. The mob hates all the publicity he is drawing to himself-- and therefore might draw to them. When Jack gets his picture taken for the newspapers once too often, there's another rubout attempt on Jack; again, he survives, but the 19-year-old parking valet standing next to him gets hit by the shotgun blasts.
Chicago. By the middle of 1933, Eliot Ness and his Untouchables had almost checked the manufacture and sale of whiskey in Chicago. But the biggest operator was still in business: Giuseppe Marconi a.k.a. Gus Marco. He was an apparently respectable owner of a garage of taxis by day; but he trafficked in bootleg booze by night, he had a huge distillery underground in which he processed stolen industrial alcohol. Gus Marco is pulling a big job tonight; one of his honest taxi drivers, Mario Bousso (Nicky's father), is going to drive one of the trucks because he needs the money for his 2 kids. Gus' cousin Mike Marconi will be riding with Mario. Gus Marco had schmeared the lone federal guard of a government warehouse; for $2,500 he was assisting in the heist. 2 of Marco's trucks pull into the warehouse. They siphon off thousands of gallons of pure alcohol, worth half a million dollars; they refill the government barrels with water. But Ness and his men raid the place. There is a huge
New Jersey, the night of April 16, 1931. Waxey Gordon, the undisputed beer baron of New York, is muscling in on New Jersey, which is run by Frankie Dunn, ""Bugs"" Donovan and Roger Weiden. Waxey is waging a gang war to eliminate rival gangsters for control of the Jersey beer market. Waxey and his boys smash into a brewery owned and run by Frankie Dunn; they blast with their choppers until the large beer vats, Frankie and his workers are filled with holes. Next day, John Carvell, U.S. Attorney for the southern district of New York, sends for Ness and his men. Ness and Lee Hobson drop in at Waxey's live theatre, where beautiful showgirl Flo Ingalls is doing her act in a sequined one-piece swimsuit. Later, Ness and Hobson go to Waxey's office to arrest him, but Flo (still in costume) provides his alibi, saying she was with Waxey all last night. April 18, in a private office at the swank Nest nightclub, there is a council of war: ""Bugs"" Donovan is convinced the N.Y. Syndicate is behind
Chicago, late Spring 1932. There is public protest about the increase in drug addiction. Charlie Sebastino has amalgamated all the small distributors into one big empire, setting himself up as emperor. Ness and his Untouchables had virtually shut down dope dealings, by nailing the big operators, but this network is run through small-time pushers. One of Charlie's pushers is a park worker known as Ragpicker; right now he's selling some heroin to 19-year-old Carol Royce. Later, Ness visits Carol in the hospital, where she is dying of an overdose; she identifies the Ragpicker, who works at the Williams Street Park. Carol dies. Ness tells the reporters to print the story. At a nightclub, Sticks is playing the drums. Charlie Sebastino is coming on to the beautiful nightclub singer. Ness and Rico and Lee Hobson barge in; Charlie's boy Puffy Oselle says to his boss, ""Sorry, I couldn't stop him."" Ness has a search warrant to look for the Ragpicker, but he's not there. Frank and Joe
Chicago, late Summer 1932. Eliot Ness and his men had stemmed the supply of narcotics coming into the Windy City from Asia and southern Europe. Now the Underworld was using new ways to supply the city's 5,000 dope addicts. The Syndicate was robbing drugstores, doctors' offices, wholesale drug houses-- any place which kept a supply of painkilling drugs.* Ness and his men investigate one such robbery: a clue is a note with a list of items to be stolen (morphine, cocaine, etc.)-- numbered with Roman Numerals, written by an educated man. That man is Victor Bardo, one-time narcotics czar of all eastern Asia; he was imported by the Syndicate in 1931. His headquarters are some offices behind a legit front: an arcade. Crooked Dr. Hallet has just told him about a couple of nursing homes they can knock off. However Dino Patrone (age 46), a contact man for narcotics in Europe, has fallen out of favor with Bardo-- he tells his hitman Willie Dasher to rub Patrone out when he gets back. Ness
Detroit, August 1932. The notorious Purple Gang-- long synonymous with terror in beer, booze, labor and prostitution-- gets into a new racket: kidnapping. They specialize in snatching other members of the underworld, since they can't go to the police for help. So far, they've kidnapped 9 hoods (the latest mug is Rocky Garver), for a total of 100 grand. The Purple Gang's leader is Eddie Fletcher, bank robber and murderer, who always wears gloves so he never leaves any fingerprints. Next on their list of gangsters to be kidnapped is Ian Tornek, who owns a novelty shop along with his brother-in-law Eric Vajda, who arrived from Europe 7 months ago. But Eliot Ness and his Untouchables also have their eye on Tornek: he's a Capone henchman, who makes a weekly pickup of narcotics every Thursday at 5:00 p.m. at the Railway Express Agency. So Ness and Lee Hobson and Enrico Rossi fly to Detroit. Fletcher's boys snatch Tornek just before his weekly pickup; they phone his wife Martha and dem
Chicago, September 8, 1932. That night, a convoy of 4 trucks, which had crossed the Canadian border, are driving towards Chicago; they are hauling 1,000 cases of Canadian scotch, valued at over $100,000. Ness and his Untouchables have set up a roadblock just outside of town. 7-8 miles up ahead of Ness there is another roadblock, set up by gangster Phil Corbin, owner of Chicago's Club Continental; he's waiting with his boys to hijack the convoy. Riding along in the lead truck of the convoy is Whitey Barrows-- ostensibly he's running the whiskey in for his boss, Lou ""The Rooster"" Scalese, but he's actually double-crossing him, Whitey tipped Corbin. Corbin's boys stop the trucks. Whitey tells Corbin they make a good team, and Scalese will blame the feds for the heist. But Corbin doesn't trust double-crossers-- he lines Whitey up with the 4 truck drivers, and then Corbin's boys mow them down with choppers. Corbin and his boys drive the convoy into town via a different route, bypass
New York, April 1931. Gangster Larry Fay, a former student of Al Capone, has his greasy fists firmly in the milk racket: he's organized milk companies into a monopoly. The price of milk was 10 cents a quart* (this was during the Depression when many people made 30 cents an hour); he increases the price 3 cents a quart-- with 2 cents going directly into Larry Fay's pockets. Stores that don't comply are wrecked, or have a hand grenade lobbed through the front window; milk companies get their milk trucks machine-gunned. Fay's partners in crime are Carl D. Arnold and nervous Fred Stegler. And so Eliot Ness and his Untouchables go on assignment to New York. When Wayne Owens, who owns a small but successful milk company, won't cooperate, Larry Fay and his hitman Frankie toss him into an elevator shaft-- from 10 stories up. Ness is on the case. Larry owns a swanky nightclub, the El Fay, and the entertainer is Sally Kansas, the toast of New York. Ness talks to Sally; she has no hard fe
The night of May 3rd, 1934. A traveling carnival is at the Midway, 35 miles outside of Cleveland. There are half a dozen bellydancers on stage, as the barker goes, ""Hurry, hurry, hurry,"" and a sign reads: ""One dime shows you the best hootchy koochy show in the world!"" Hans Eberhardt, twice convicted for armed robbery and dope peddling, spots Ness and his Untouchables and the local police about to pull a raid; he runs to the office trailer of carny Otto Frick. Hans grabs 2 suitcases, then Otto takes a can of gasoline and torches the trailer; they escape in a speeding car before Ness can catch them. It is a minor setback for Ness, who had spent the last 7 months investigating and making raids, and was finally ready to move in on Otto Frick-- whose 37 traveling enterprises were just a cover for his nationwide dope ring. Ness continues with roundups and raids in the following weeks. Suspecting that Frick might be getting his drugs from legitimate manufacturers, Ness and his men go to
May 8, 1931. The special U.S. mail train, coming from Rock Island, is stopped by emergency flares on the tracks in Hillsdale, Illinois. Gangsters wearing Army gas masks lob tear gas grenades into the train; they shoot a postal clerk and make off with a million dollars in negotiable securities. 3 months later, ""Tough"" Tommy Karpeles, former big-time Chicago hoodlum, is arrested for complicity in the case; his 2 accomplices were not caught. With his previous record as an ex-con, who had done 5 years for robbery, he was found guilty and sentenced to life in the State Pen. Since crimes involving the U.S. Postal Service are a federal offense, Eliot Ness and his Untouchables are on the case. Ness thinks Karpeles is innocent; the thought that the real killer is on the loose bothers Ness, so he visits Karpeles in prison. Karpeles tells Ness he was nailed on a bum rap. Karpeles had 3 witnesses who testified he was at Mendy's bar that night; his daughter works there. Ness thinks it's odd
Movie: ""The Alcatraz Express"" (Disclaimer shown on screen) ""The events portrayed in this film are fictitious. The Federal Prison guards portrayed do not represent any actual persons, living or dead. ""Nothing herein is intended to reflect unfavorably on the courageous and responsible prison guards who supervised Capone during his internment in the Federal Penitentiary in Atlanta and during his transfer from Atlanta to Alcatraz."" Chicago, October 17, 1931. The 11-day trial of Al Capone ended, with the judge fining him $56,000 and sentencing him to 11 years in the Federal penitentiaries. On May 3, 1932, Capone is taken from Cook County jail to the Dearborn Station, to take a train to Atlanta. Nitti and his boys are there, as are Ness and his men. There is also a large crowd; to many of them, Al Capone, who had donated a few million dollars (peanuts to him) to support public charities like soup kitchens, he is sort of a hero. One well-wisher yells to Capone (referring to the Atlanta
Movie: ""The Alcatraz Express"" (continued) Sunday, August 19, 1934. At 2:30 a.m., the Big Train is backed into the prison yard of the State Pen in Atlanta. 54 hardened criminals, including Al Capone and Tony Diaz, are handcuffed and loaded onto the train. On board are prison guards armed with machine-guns. Once seated, the prisoners are additionally given leg shackles and told to put them on. Then, at 5:00 a.m., the Big Train pulls out-- right on schedule. Ness and his men fly to Salt Lake City, Utah, and get there 3:00 p.m.; they head straight to the Lone Eagle Flying Service. One of Nitti's boys, Victor Seth Gordon, carrying 300 grand in a suitcase, has just hired Fred Noonan to put his plane ""on hold"" until the 22nd, and then fly a client to Mexico; oddly enough, Seth Gordon never told Noonan to keep his mouth shut-- when Ness and Lee Hobson pose as potential customers, Noonan tells them all about the trip to Mexico, what the guy who hired him (""Mr. Green"") looks like, the ti
Chicago, December 1931. With Al Capone in prison, the bootlegging part of his empire was split in 2. One of Capone's lieutenants, Mayer Wartel, acquired the speakeasies; another lieutenant, Karl Positan, acquired the breweries and distilleries. In an attempt to take over the entire operation, Positan withholds his whiskey and beer; the number of speaks flourishing drops to an all-time Prohibition low. Eliot Ness and his men keep an eye on the situation. Nitti's plenty sore. As collector for Capone, Nitti has a meet with Mayer Wartel. Nitti snaps, ""Candy stores take in more!"" When Wartel says you can't operate speaks without booze, Nitti tells him, ""I don't want to hear no excuses. Excuses ain't money-- only money is money!"" Nitti makes it clear that Wartel's problem with Positan is his business, and he better take care of it and soon. Wartel sends ""Happy"" (so nicknamed because he never smiles) Levinsky and 10 of his boys armed with tommy guns to the Kayope Hotel where Positan
Chicago. November 9, 1932. Al Capone was in prison, and Frank Nitti was running his Organization. But other crime overlords were ready to take over; the biggest was Joe Kulak, from St. Louis. Joe Kulak was called ""The Teacher"" because he had trained so many Underworld bigshots, and given them their start. Eliot Ness and his men keep tabs on Kulak from the moment he arrives in the Windy City. Kulak goes to the Westside Athletic Club, a front for crime boss Arnie Seeger. In his office, Seegar talks to Kulak and lays out his plans for the whole country: gambling, whiskey, houses (of prostitution), dope. Seegar figures to assign territories: Bouchard in New Orleans, Nicholson in K.C., Danny Kurtz (his lieutenant, sitting right next to him) for Pittsburgh... Kulak interrupts him, saying he already has Malone for Pittsburgh. Kurtz loses his temper over being cut out; (so Seeger decides to have Kurtz rubbed out that night). Seegar desperately wants Kulak to attend his upcoming meet
On the night of May 25, 1931, 2 trucks are rolling into K.C., carrying $1-million worth of Jamaica Ginger rotgut, also known as ""Ginger Jake."" The trucks are owned by Rafael Torrez, gangster and race horse trainer, who has a monopoly on the Jamaica Ginger. Rival crime boss Jerry LaCarver, wanting in on the enormous profits, is ready to hijack the trucks, along with his gang of 5 hoods: the 2 notorious Roth brothers, Andy Bello (alias Louis Belmont), Richie Peters and Wally Heilman. They hijack the trucks with dynamite and shotguns. Ness and his men are on the case. Jamaica Ginger is made by cheap labor in Santo Domingo, then smuggled into the U.S. in New Orleans, and then shipped to K.C. Rafael Torrez has a meet with Jerry LaCarver and his 5 hoods, they come over to Torrez's ranch where he trains racehorses. Torrez says the 2 hijacked trucks are just a small part of the stuff he's got; he's willing to cut LaCarver in for 10%. But when LaCarver wants to go 50/50, the meet is adjo
Summer 1931, Chicago. Eliot Ness and his Untouchables had smashed most of the big breweries owned by the mobsters. But racketeers, taking advantage of the poverty and desperation of many immigrants, forced them to make a gallon of whiskey a day in small stills in their homes-- makeshift stills which could be put together for less than $3. The absolute boss of Little Italy is Augie ""The Banker"" Ciamino, and with whiskey pouring out of 1,000 tenement stills, he was cancelling the gains that Ness had made. August 16, 1931. That night, at a street festival, Giovanni gets a hold of some bad whiskey at Raineri's bakery, and is sped to a hospital in an ambulance. Ciamino wants to find out who is responsible; he says to Raineri, ""You tell me where Giovanni got the bad stuff, I buy all your sfogliatelle.""* Uncooperative Raineri says, ""I don't make sfogliatelle."" (even though we see a sign in his bakery: Special Today: Sfogliatelle.) When Ciamino finds out it was Stefano-- and twice he'd
September 8, 1934. A cruise ship from Cuba to New Jersey has caught fire. There are over 300 passengers on board; some of the passengers and crew are jumping overboard to avoid the flames. Ness and his men, on assignment in New Jersey, speed to get there when the ship docks; Ness has an arrest warrant for Valentine Ferrar, racketeer and founder of the Big Syndicate. Valentine Ferrar had been in Cuba, picking up a million bucks collection money for the Syndicate. Ness is told by a ship's official that Ferrar has drowned-- but the eyewitness was not reliable, it was his sidekick Inky Beggs, who has just left for New York. Actually, Inky is being taken for a ride by 2 hoods to deliver him to The Underground Court in Manhattan. Inky tells his story to Judge Foley and the other members of the court. He tells them truthfully that Ferrar jumped into the water with a million bucks in his money belt; but he lies about Ferrar drowning. Judge Foley lets Inky go, but has him tailed. Inky
1932. Just 3 weeks after Al Capone was convicted on the ironic charge of income tax evasion, the Justice Department in Washington, D.C. was calling its leading law enforcement agents from all over the country to fly to the nation's capital to testify and get a new Anti-Racketeering Bill passed. Back in Chicago, 4 of Capone's bigshots who ran his bootlegging empire had skipped town, like rats deserting a sinking ship: only Frank Nitti ""the Enforcer"" had the guts to remain in the Windy City, as did Nick Moses. With the gang bosses assembling again, Ness can't leave Chicago. Ness says, ""It looks like you'll be going to Washington without me,"" and he shakes District Attorney Asbury's hand, ""bring us back a law, Beecher."" At the Club Montmartre, Nitti presides over a meet. Overlord Vinnie is grousing that Nick Moses muscled in on his territory while he was in Miami; Nick counters that Vinnie ran out, so his district was up for grabs. Nitti tells them to settle this ""peaceful."" That ni
Mid-October 1932. The nation's attention is on the election campaign between incumbent president Herbert Hoover and his opponent Franklin D. Roosevelt, who is crippled by polio. With Prohibition still the law of the land, the government is looking for ways to denature alcohol, which legitimate manufactures need for industrial purposes (making perfumes, etc). Should the alcohol fall into the wrong hands, if it was denatured, it would be useless to bootleggers. Eliot Ness and his Untouchables, along with top Federal agents from all over the country, attend an important meeting in Washington, DC. The Speaker says that since the beginning of Prohibition, all alcohol produced under government license has had one of various denaturants added to it: pyridine, methanol, etc. But the Underworld has always found a way to renature the alcohol. The Speaker is happy to announce that the government chemists in his Department have finally come up with a denaturant for which there is no Antidote
April 11, 1932. Millionaire building contractor Thomas B. Randall is the target of a kidnapping; he is throwing a party right now. Intruding on his estate that night are: ex-bootlegger and now gang leader George ""Blackie"" Dallas, Pete Appleby (former torpedo for the Purple Gang), Marty Stoke (bank heist expert) and Jiggs (ex-heavyweight boxer and now strongarm man). The gang kills a security guard, and kidnaps Randall-- and they warn his family and guests not to call the police, or he gets it. They drive away. The mastermind behind this is George Dallas' ambitious wife, Lily Dallas; she pushed the small-time hood into committing ever more dangerous crimes-- with bigger takes and bigger risks. Lily is only recently out of prison, where she served 5 years for armed robbery-- Lily masterminded bank jobs which netted over $1-million, long since spent. Lily had a good teacher: Jack ""Legs"" Diamond. Ness and his men are on the case. They find the abandoned getaway car; the crooks obvi
November 1932. FDR was moving to end Prohibition, and the crime syndicate was already shifting away from booze to narcotics. In the next few months, the narcotic supply is running low. February 20, 1933, Frank Nitti and his lieutenant Pete Konitz fly down to New Orleans, where the Mardi Gras will be taking place. Bouchard is busy having Sully fit his car with bulletproof glass. Later, Nitti is demanding a drug shipment from Bouchard. On being told the stuff is coming in the next day, Nitti flies back to Chicago, leaving Konitz in New Orleans to get the narcotics. The next day, Ness and his men arrive in New Orleans. That night, Bouchard tells Konitz that he is sending his ""two best men,"" Gil Haller and Hugger Davis, to pick up the heroin: a 3-pound shipment, worth several million dollars. But when they pick up the heroin, Gil shoots Hugger and steals the stuff. Then Gil goes back to Konitz and Bouchard with a phony story that he and Hugger were ""attacked by 5 or 6 guys"" who sto
October 11, 1932. Chicago. Less than one month before the elections, David Mantley, running for State's Attorney on the Reform ticket, is making speeches: he says the power behind his opponent, Jeremiah Down, is mobster Bryan O'Malley. At the same time, across town, O'Malley is being feted at a testimonial dinner-- even though a week from now he'll have to stand trial for murder and income tax evasion. After Mantley's speech, and the small crowd has left, a speeding car goes by, and a chopper riddles Mantley full of bullets. Ness and his men are on the case. Henry Weiser is meeting with his boss Bryan O'Malley; it was Weiser who had Mantley rubbed out. O'Malley's murder trial (for the contract killing of Rocky Marlos) is in 4 days, and Ness will help the prosecutors; there are 2 witnesses who could get him convicted: George Davas and Stan Willinski, former associates of Weiser. O'Malley thinks they can scare Davas into not testifying, by getting to his girlfriend Julie Duvall.
Ring of Terror-- Boxing ring, that is. July 1931, the Chicago Sports Arena was like a hundred other boxing rings across America-- a place where young toughs from reform schools and rotting tenements, willing to sacrifice their blood, could try to rise above the oppression of poverty. But the young men with the boxing gloves only got a small amount of the money; the big payoffs went to the gangsters. Joey McGrath is an up-and-coming young fighter, 23 KOs in 25 fights, and the sports writers have him tagged as the next light-Heavyweight Champ. However, tonight, Joey is having such a bad boxing match that his manager, Barney Jarreau, smells a ""fix."" When Joey is being pummeled by ""Rocky"" Pearson in the 9th round, Barney throws in the towel. Joey collapses. After Joey dies, Barney confronts gangster Acropolis, who was up to something. Fights fall under the jurisdiction of the State Athletic Commission, but when the coroner finds morphine in the dead boxer's body, it becomes a job fo
Autumn 1934. An armored truck, loaded with the special paper used in printing U.S. currency, is headed for the Bureau of Engraving in Washington, D.C. The truck is hijacked, and the 3 armed guards are tommy-gunned. Since counterfeiting will be on a national level, it's a federal offense, and so Eliot Ness and 5 other federal agents from around the country convene in Washington, D.C., and are briefed on the situation. When Ness gets back to Chicago, the Untouchables go through a large list of forgers. They determine that the top man is Hans Dreiser, doing 20-to-life in Leavenworth Prison in Kansas. One night, there's an explosion in the high-voltage power transformer next to Leavenworth Prison. During the brief power blackout, Dreiser escapes over the 20-foot-high wall with a rope; 2 of Mr. Moon's men are in a waiting car. Next day, Ness is in Leavenworth County, and talking to the Power Company managers. Benny Joplin had been the inspector for the transformer, it turns out he's
Chicago, last week of April 1933. Frank Nitti is offered a huge quantity of Chinese opium. Ever since the government had established the Bureau of Narcotics in 1930, the flow of opium from China to the USA had slowed to a trickle, and by 1932 the flow had almost ceased; now, with the end of Prohibition seeming imminent, the Syndicate is ready to deal in opium again. Late on the night of May 4, Nitti sends one of his top lieutenants, Ed Getty, to pick up some opium from Art Rele and his thug Cliff Anders. But Ness and Lee Hobson show up, too; in the shootout, only Art Rele escapes. On Getty, Ness finds some raw opium wrapped in a sheet of paper in an envelope. Later at Ness' office, the other hood is identified as Cliff Anders, who used to work for Phil Melnick, the one-time ""king of opium."" And so Eliot Ness and his Untouchables head to New York (on a train, not a plane as they usually do). Their only lead is the expensive bond paper that the opium was wrapped in; it was manufac
New York, 1933. Racketeers are poking their greasy fists into every corner of the nation's business. The Fulton fish market in New York supplies fish on the East Coast to as far west as the Mississippi; they supply 700-million pounds of fish a year, worth $200-million. When Captain Joe McGonigle, owner of the fishing boat the Margie Mac, won't pay protection money, 2 of Frank Mercouris' hoods, Lenny Shore and Swede Kelso, drown his deck hand, and it makes the newspapers; it's only the beginning of trouble with the Syndicate moving in-- and so Eliot Ness and his men fly to New York. Dutch Schultz, speaking for the Syndicate, tells Frank Mercouris: ""no more rough stuff."" Meanwhile, Ness is talking to Capt. Joe McGonigle; Ness wants him to testify in front of the grand jury. Ness tells him he knows how the mob operates: a fee to tie up a boat at the city dock, a fee to buy ice, a fee to unload; and the wholesalers are being charged protection money, too. Ness tells McGonigle that h
September 16, 1933. Although Eliot Ness had successfully destroyed The Underground Court (episode # 46), he had not smashed its parent organization, the big Syndicate, in control of over 50% of the nation's crime. With the death of Judge Foley, who was the chairman of the Syndicate, 5 top-ranking members are now assembling at a roadhouse on the outskirts of Chicago-- to vote on whether or not to appoint Nero Rankin as the new chairman; Nero had been designated by Foley to be his successor, in the event of his death. The 5 voting members are: Murray Brigger (boss of the Southwest), Lou Hyndorf (East Coast), Huey Barker (Midwest), Pat Polofski (Detroit), and Cy Brenner (New Orleans). Nero Rankin goes to his office. There is a secret vote. Huey Barker, Murray Brigger and another vote ""No."" Lou Hyndorf votes ""Yes"" and says ""because there's no one else""; one other member votes with him. 2 for, 3 against; Huey says, ""He don't make it."" But then Murray Brigger changes his vote, noting
Chicago, April 25, 1932. With Capone in prison doing his rap for income tax evasion, his 8 lieutenants are running things; their HQ is the Montmartre Club, in Cicero, 4 miles west of Chicago. Capone's booze trucks are being hijacked, his speaks are tommy-gunned; Capone's breweries are being smashed, and not just by Eliot Ness, but by rival gangs. Right now, the 8 overlords running the Syndicate are deadlocked over how to run things-- on one side are Frank ""The Enforcer"" Nitti, Brenner, Urcel and another lieutenant; on the other are Jake ""Greasy Thumb"" Guzik, Levinsky, Grecko and another lieutenant. A gang war is raging. Nitti's plenty sore. He slams his fist on the table and growls, ""6 breweries in 2 weeks, at 100 grand each!"" Guzik says he's not worried; booze is going out because Prohibition will be repealed soon. Nitti says at $60-million a year, booze is in. Guzik says that they should increase their narcotics racket: no breweries, no warehouses, no trucks-- only small pack
Chicago, the 3rd week of November 1932. Working on an anonymous tip, Eliot Ness and his men raid a warehouse; all the crates are filled with champagne bottles, it was a shipment for the New Year's celebrations. Ness has the landlord who owns the warehouse, Michel (french for Michael) Viton, arrested; but he's released. Birdie, a deaf-mute, takes Viton to his boss, Edmund Wald, a bottle manufacturer (he's also the one who tipped Ness, to get rid of the competition). Edmund Wald is secretly making champagne bottles; he also has a man in Indiana making a brew of spiced cider and sugar cane that can pass for champagne. Wald can get all the bogus champagne he needs for $2 a quart-bottle, and then he wants to sell it for $10 a bottle. Wald needs Viton for a capital investment: $100,000 to buy the bogus champagne, and $100,000 to have a bottle-corking machine smuggled in from Europe. Viton says they can steal the corking machine from the Industrial Museum; and Edmund will have to go to
Chicago, Summer 1931. Nick Acropolis is the new bookmaker in town, his territory is Illinois and the 6 surrounding states; he covers bets on horse racing, boxing matches, ball games, everything. By August, his operation is $2-million per month. And so Eliot Ness and his Untouchables are on the case; Enrico Rossi has a wiretap on one of Nick's betting parlors, run by Sully Hinds. Nick and his boys pay a visit to their bookkeeper, Louis Manzak, who is Nick's brother-in-law. Louis embezzled 200 grand of Nick's money, to make a side-bet on a boxing match, and lost. Nick roughs him up, and Louis' only excuse is, ""Who would have thought that Locks would lose a decision to Max Baer?""* Nick tells Louis to replace the dough, and fast-- or else! Nick demands the 200 grand in one month, and the usual gangster interest of 25% per month; but Nick wants the 50 grand interest payable in 48 hours. Louis tries to beg and borrow the 50 Gs; his sister Stella offers to come up with half of the 50
Chicago, April 1932. The city is ruled by underworld czars, one of the toughest of which is Nate Kester, former henchman for the Capone mob. To put up a pretense of legality, he owns and runs the Odeon Theatre, which specializes in Burlesque, but his real operation is bootleg booze. Kester has his boys drag in Henry Bogar, who has a 5-6 state territory selling imported brandy. Kester tells him that from now on he will carry his stuff-- cheap rotgut with forged ""de Bouverais"" cognac labels. Bogar tastes the stuff, and calls it slop; he says brandy drinkers will never buy it as long as the real stuff is available. So Kester decides to eliminate the competition, he destroys 200 cases of the good 90-proof stuff that Bogar has stashed in an old church. Next day, in retaliation, Bogar phones Ness and is about to blow the whistle on Kester: his booze, houses and dope operations. But Bogar is rubbed out by Kester before he can finish talking; luckily, Lee Hobson managed to have the call
In the summer of 1934, a new gambling device was sweeping the nation: the punchboards. Even though they were nickel-and-dime games, it added up-- they made more money for the mob than the numbers racket. After Ness and his men smash some of the punchboard manufacturing sites, the 5 members of the syndicate running the punchboards hold a meet at a building by the freight yards: the top mobsters from Chicago (Jake ""Joe"" Petrie), Cincinnati, St. Louis, Detroit and New York (Max Riegel). Petrie says he can sum up all their problems in 2 words: Eliot Ness. Max says in New York, they aren't losing so much-- they have Nate Selko the Trouble Shooter to make sure money goes to all the right places: police, judges, the legislature. Nate Selko walks into the room, to offer his services to the Chicago boss. Later, in a private room at a restaurant, Selko tries to bribe Ness, with a Swiss bank account with $500,000 in it (the deposit in the bank book is dated Feb. 26).* Selko says it would ta
By the Summer of 1933, a new wave of crime has engulfed Chicago. Due to a public outcry for action, Willard Thornton is appointed as a new commissioner to clean up the town. At a press conference, Thornton arrogantly says his office does not publicly constitute criticism of any law enforcement agency-- while his tone of voice implies he privately does criticize them. Eliot Ness is standing right next to him, looking more dour than usual. Ness and his men go on a raid, they find a shipment of heroin in a hideout. Then small-time dope-pusher (and junkie himself) Joey Loomis shows up, sees the Feds, and runs. Loomis gets captured. After interrogating him, and getting nowhere, Ness releases him. Rico asks, ""I know he's a small fish, but you just gonna throw him back?"" Ness reveals his strategy: he's going to let the big fish find him. Willard Thornton is really a crook, in cohoots with lawyer Barney Lubin (czar of the enormous Chicago bail bond racket), Felix Varsack (representing t
August 28, 1933. That night, Eliot Ness and his Untouchables, and some undercover plainclothes police, are staking out an amusement pier on the Chicago lakefront; they are tailing Alexander Raeder-- owner of the pier, and the source of the new narcotics flooding the Windy City. Ness had received an anonymous tip that Raeder was delivering 15 pounds of heroin, half a million dollars' worth, to a syndicate contact. The drop-off point being the Tunnel of Horrors, a carnival ride which sends small boats through dark tunnels, operated by Johnny Selkirk, who works for Raeder. On the Midway, Ness spots a hood named Marty Mattern along with Arnold Justin, former cop, who now handles the graft for Nitti; if Justin sees the undercover cops (his former colleagues), he'll recognize them and their cover will be blown. Justin does; Mattern panics and makes a run for it, then fires at Ness' men, and Enrico Rossi shoots him. Ness and his men storm into the Tunnel, and find a back room. While Rae
In the years following WWI, there was a flood of European immigrants into the USA. In the early 1920s, the 6 Genna brothers, place of origin Sicily, were headed to Chicago. The Genna brothers are nothing but a gang of bullies, and in a few short years they are the ruling lords of Little Italy, an Italian neighborhood in Chicago. One night, as the 6 Gennas are beating up a street vendor, Agent Enrico Rossi whales into them. The leader, Mike Genna, asks if he knows who they are; Rossi says, ""Yeah, the Genna brothers-- one rat with 6 heads!"" Mike Genna says that Enrico Rossi is Italian, just like them; Rossi says he's ashamed. There are many illegal immigrants in Little Italy, and over 1,300 of them were smuggled in by the Genna brothers, who force them to make booze in small stills in their homes, to supply Capone-- over 1,300 cookers, each making a gallon a day; 40,000 gallons a month; almost half a million gallons a year for Capone. Many's the time that Eliot Ness and Rossi and L
In mid-June 1932, Eliot Ness, having compiled a list of Frank Nitti's breweries & distilleries, began a series of raids designed to break the back of the Capone empire. This puts the pressure on Frank Nitti, Capone's lieutenant. Nitti calls a meet with Seth Otis and Phil Grier, who jointly own the biggest speakeasy in Chicago, the Hotsy Totsy Club. Nitti tells them he's going to build new breweries and distilleries outside of town, where Ness can't find them, and have the liquor delivered by trucks. It'll take about a month, maybe 6 weeks. The speak owners are shocked, they can't go that long without beer and booze. Nitti tells them nobody better buy booze from out of state and have it hustled in-- and he's going to make sure the 2 speak owners ""set a good example"" for everybody else to obey his orders. In the meantime, at the State Pen, 2 cons cook up a scheme: the brains is Jason Fiddler, an engineer who will be sprung in a month, and his partner is Matt Bass, who is being paro
Chicago, January 1933. Ness and his men raid a speakeasy owned by gangster Mikhail ""Red Mike"" Probich, and run by Connie LaVerne. At the trial, Probich is represented by his crooked lawyer Morton Halas, who grew up in poverty. The trial drags on for 5 days. Finally, Ness is ready to call the last prosecution witness, Connie LaVerne, who ""is 80% of their case."" Morton Halas objects, on the grounds that a wife cannot be forced to testify against her husband. How long have Probich and Connie been married? About a week. Morton Halas specialized in getting crooks off on a legal technicality, a loophole-- chalk another one up for the shyster. Ness tells Halas he'll lock him up someday. Just then Whitey Metz tells Halas that bootlegger Larry Coombs wants to see him, pronto. Over at his place, Coombs shows Halas a bottle of Gray Stag booze, the Capone label; Coombs is building a plant to supply Nitti with all he needs. Coombs wants Halas to work for him exclusively; Halas says he al
September 14, 1932. At 11:30 p.m., Eliot Ness goes to the Odeon movie theatre (not the Odeon Burlesque theatre used in several episodes); he gives stoolie Marty Wilger an envelope with cash for his tips. Those tips had led to successful raids by Ness against Nitti's speaks: booze, girls, gambling tables; also 2 warehouses and a distillery in the last week. Nitti's plenty sore. At an Organization meet at the club Montmartre, Nitti grouses, ""The boys in New York are screamin', Cleveland's screamin', and I'm screamin'! Those raids cost us 200,000 bucks in the last 3 months."" A lieutenant, Charlie Banion, brings up that Capone used to have Walter Trager to keep an eye on everything, he even had a tap on the feds. Council member Harry Mailer points out that his wife Billie is married to Trager. And so, later, Trager has a meet with Nitti in his private office; Nitti's getting a rubdown from his masseur and Nitti quips, ""Hey, take it easy-- I wanna get knocked around, I don't hafta pa
Chicago, July 1934. Anonymous phone calls have been tipping off Ness and his men to narcotics activities; they do a bunch of raids. On August 4, even though sales have fallen off, Frank Nitti is ordering 15 kilos of heroin*, the biggest single shipment ever. That night, one of Nitti's boys makes the trade: dough for the H. He gets into a car driven by another of Nitti's boys, Manny Kravitz. But next to him in the back-seat is Maxie, who pumps him full of lead. They dump his body from a speeding car. Next morning, Ness gets another of the regular anonymous tips; on another line, Enrico and an operator are slowly tracing it. (no Caller I.D. back then.) Ness doesn't know it yet, but the call was made from a phone booth by Nick Dolov; he walks to the Windy City Cab Co., which he owns along with his estranged wife, Georgiana Drake (around age 40, she could be attractive but has a harsh facial expression). In Dolov's office, there is a suitcase with the 15 kilos of heroin on his des
1933. Violence and corruption were at an all-time high in Chicago, New York, St. Louis, Detroit, Kansas City-- virtually every city in the U.S. The lone exception is an Eastern seaboard metropolis, referred to as City Without a Name, in which the voters had used the ballot box to vote corruption out of public office. And Federal agent Arnold Wainwright had kept organized crime out-- but on October 22, he is blasted by machine-guns while in a coffee shop. Eliot Ness and his men are called to the case. Ness goes to the hospital and talks to Wainwright's assistant, Gilbert Burke, who was injured in the attack; Gilbert tells Ness the hit was the work of Lou Mungo. Chicago. At the Montmartre club, Nitti is having a meet. Nitti decides that since Lou Mungo's done the groundwork, it's time for him to take over half of Mungo's action. Nitti sends for Sebastian, who specializes in such acquisitions without using muscle. Sebastian wins a high stakes poker game by bluffing. Nitti tells
New York, middle of 1932. The Syndicate-- headed by Joe Kulak, Louis ""Lepke"" Buchalter and Dutch Schultz-- has the city's huge garment industry organized and under control. Now they are setting their sights on bakeries; there are 500 independent wholesale bakers in the city. They give Bull Hanlon the word: get the biggest independent baker, Adam Stone, to sign up and all the rest will fall in line. Hanlon is to use any means at his disposal. And so Eliot Ness and his Untouchables arrive in New York. Ness wants to fight fire with fire: just as the Syndicate is trying to force all the truck drivers to join their crooked United Bakers Trucking Association, Ness wants honest Adam Stone to organize all the independent bakers into a legit union. Mr. Stone wants no part of it, he is independent, and says he can fight the hoods on his own; he's been fighting to keep his business going for 30 years, just him and his business partner, his life-long friend Max Turkin. When Ness says they m
November 1932. Big-time gangster Joe Palakopolous is playing a dangerous game-- he just had his hitman rub out Danny Kugan, the biggest supplier of Canadian whiskey that Frank Nitti had. And Nitti's plenty sore. Kugan was the only guy who could import Canadian Gold for Nitti. The phony stuff is no good; Nitti quips that bottled rotgut is so bad, ""it peels off the labels from the inside."" Eliot Ness and his men investigate Kugan's killing, and try to find out who will take over the operation. Joe Palakopolous personally settles into a small village of fishermen by Lake Michigan, about a 2 hours' drive from Chicago; it's a perfect spot for having his Canadian supplier delivery booze by boat. He even comes across as a benefactor to the small community, giving the parish priest, Fr. Francis Gregory, money to set up a soup kitchen.
October 1932, Chicago. With Capone in the slammer, other bosses are biting off chunks of Capone's empire. One boss is Frankie Gruder, head of a group that is the forerunner of Murder, Inc.; Gruder wants control of all the Canadian imports and exports. Gruder and his boys go to a warehouse, Gruder shoots a longshoreman. Ness and his men show up and start blasting. There's a shoot-out. Gruder manages to escape. Another gangster is using a different approach: Julius Vernon, the bookkeeper, is trying to beat the stock market; he keeps long hours, working well after midnight. Around 1 a.m., Vernon gets a surprise visit from Gruder; since Vernon owes him one for a hit Gruder did 4 years ago, Vernon gives him 10-grand for on-the-lam money. Then Vernon goes to Janos ""Willie"" Willinski; he's a fixer, a contact man. His office hours are 12 midnight till 3 a.m.; his ""office"" is a table in an all-night diner. Willinski fixes an arsonist up with a 5-grand torch job, for $500. Vernon's tu
1932. Chicago is a thirsty town, consuming 86,000 gallons of booze a day; that's 32-million gallons a year. Almost all this booze is beer and rotgut, but 1% is the finest Canadian scotch. Nitti's boys, armed with tommy guns, shoot up a rival speak, the Blue Lion, that's serving the Canadian scotch. Ness and his men investigate; 2 people dead, 3 critically injured. Nitti's plenty sore; there are half a dozen clubs, roadhouses just outside of Cook County, serving Canadian scotch. Where are they getting it? Just then, a bomb goes off in the Montmartre Club; Nitti and his boys are unhurt, but 6 pedestrians and a taxi driver are injured. Nitti orders in 100 hitmen from Detroit. It's a Gang War! To prevent further killings, Ness arrests Nitti and confiscates his gun. Although Nitti is sprung within the hour, Ness blackmails him: Ness tells Nitti, if one more person is killed in the gang war, ""Lee Hobson's gonna put a bullet in me with your gun."" (In the arm or leg, I suppose. Thi
Chicago, March 2, 1932. The hottest nightspot in town is the Club Tunisian, owned by gangster Pete Kalik, who built it up from a small speak. Ness and Lee Hobson show up, but not to see gorgeous singer Mavis Carroll-- they had gotten an anonymous phone tip earlier. Lee Hobson is tired, he is due to take his vacation leave starting Friday. Ness and Hobson get contacted by the club comedian Eddie Paris, he is the one who phoned them. After his show, he meets with Ness and Hobson at the Denton Street wharf; Eddie wants Pete Kalik put away behind bars, he says Kalik is working out a big alcohol deal with the Partner, the mysterious man who had backed Torrio and Capone. That's all that Ness and Hobson find out; later, Eddie is taken for the infamous ""one way ride"" by one of Kalik's boys, Woody Lubek. In the wee hours of March 6 (Walter Winchell means March 3), a caravan of 16 trucks, carrying 8,000 gallons of whiskey, paid for by the Partner, head from the Midwest to Pete Kalik's club
New York City. July 23, 1934. The Underworld, which had long made big money by covering bets on horse races, wants to get their hands on a new invention-- the racewire, which can speed the results of horse races to bookmakers everywhere. That rainy night, Michael Barrigan and Frederic Withers (who, along with their partner Douglas Barrows, own and run the Trans-Pacific News Service) receive an urgent call from Barrows-- but Barrigan finds Barrows dead in a bookie joint (the back room of Hayes florists) when he gets there. Joker takes Barrigan to Joe Kulak's car; they all take a short ride. Kulak makes it simple: he wants Barrigan's racewire. Barrigan has until tomorrow at midnight. 3 hours later, Barrigan goes to his office; the names Barrigan, Withers and Barrows are on the door, but the bottom name has been ominously crossed out. Barrigan notices someone is inside, and he pulls out his gun; but the surprise intruder is Eliot Ness-- who already knows about Barrows' murder, and
Early November 1931. On West Madison Street, there is a wonderfully diverse neighborhood made up of gypsies of Romanian, Hungarian and Czech descent. The area is flooded with Capone's rotgut, being distributed by Janos Colescu. There are many colorful characters, including the chestnut vendor with his singsong voice: ""Get your red-hot che-e-estnuts, the wind is cold."" When the rotgut leads to a drunken knife-fight that leaves a gypsy dead, the 8-member gypsy Senate, headed by Victor Bartok, with his brother Fedor Bartok, convenes. Eliot Ness shows up to offer his help to end the bootleg booze; they decline his help, saying they will handle matters themselves. At night, they set one of Colescu's booze trucks on fire, and give the warning to his boys Alex and Benno. Colescu decides to retaliate. November 12, late at night. There is an old, almost dead poplar tree on the street, it is called the Death Tree; the chestnut vendor, under orders from Colescu, puts a sheet of paper with
Chicago, October 1932. The only ""beer"" allowed to be served during Prohibition is ""near-beer"" or ""Near-O""-- which is 0.5% alcohol, as opposed to real beer which is 4.0% alcohol. And so, a lot of legitimate beer producers wind up ""spiking"" the barrels of near-beer with pure alcohol, to get it up to strength. A northside brewer named Woody O'Mara wants to smash all his competition; he tells his girlfriend Amy Gratzner, a rather plain-looking 23-year-old secretary for rival brewer Franz Koenig, to blow the whistle on her boss. Herr Koenig is a kindly boss who refers to Amy as ""mein liebes Kind"" (my dear child). Ness and his men drop in on Franz Koenig; he claims all his beer is de-alcoholized, as prescribed by law. But when Ness gets through a false wall, he finds a truck loaded with beer barrels. Lee Hobson sticks a hydrometer in a barrel: 4.0%. Koenig says he was shipping the beer to a plant to be de-alcoholized, but can't answer Ness when he asks: where is it? Who runs it? Koe
March 3, 1932. It's the great train robbery, on the southbound express headed for Chicago. The Stryker brothers steal mail sacks containing 750 grand in payroll money. During the robbery, a baggage man and Lippy Carson (an associate of the Stryker brothers, who had worked as a mail clerk) are killed, and thrown from the speeding train. Since mail robbery is a federal offense, Eliot Ness and his Untouchables are called in. Morton Stryker is the eldest, and leader of the 4 brothers; then there's Alvin and Nate, and Benny Stryker, the youngest. Benny Stryker is an arsonist (former student of Mr. Jaeger), and their file keeper. When the 4 brothers were released from Leavenworth, Al Capone gave them permission to rebuild their empire-- if they had the cash to pay his tab. They are all going through the stolen money. Benny Stryker finds some registered mail; they tell him to keep the dough and burn the rest. They can't even keep the checks, even one letter traced back to them would
Chicago, August 29, 1934. That night, in the Haymarket district, special agent Daniel Gosden, a policeman on loan to the Untouchables, goes through a skylight and finds an opium laboratory in the top floor of a rundown tenement hotel. Just then, drug lord Victor Rait and 4 hoods (Gus, Sully, Max, and Trapp) show up, carrying crates of supplies into the place. Rait spots Gosden and gives chase; just as Gosden phones Ness for back-up, Rait blows him away with a shotgun. Then Rait blasts 6 bullets from his gun to disperse the crowd of tenants investigating the noise. Somebody phones the cops, because within minutes Eliot Ness and his men and some policemen are on the scene. Outside, Victor Rait and his boys are calmly loading the crates of narcotics onto their truck. When a policeman asks them what they're doing, Rait shoots the cop. Ness and his men come running; Rait tells his boys to drive off in the truck, fast. Then, Rait puts on a show for Ness: Rait stays behind, and fires h
Chicago, after the Repeal of Prohibition; (so this would be around 1934). With booze legal, the racket czars step up their dealings in narcotics. Ness and Lee Hobson are chasing 2 dope-pushers, one of them is Benny Rivas. After the shootout, one hood is dead; Benny moans, ""Get me a priest."" Ness finds heroin on him; wanting to die with a clear conscience, Benny says, ""808"" and dies. That leads Ness to Maggie Storm's 808 Club. Maggie runs the 808 Club, and she's the featured entertainer; Ness had raided her during Prohibition. Maggie-- who bears no grudge against Ness, in fact she likes him-- tells Ness she is running the club for a Mr. Charles Banner; Maggie says soon she will be Mrs. Charles Banner. Ness points out to Lee Hobson that half of the big-time operators in town are in the crowd, and there are a lot of out-of-town bigshots, too. After Ness leaves, the waiters mingle with the customers and read off some interesting items on the menu: 10 kilos of heroin, $110,000 in co
November 7, 1933. Slot machines are big business; 2,000 of the one-armed bandits rake in $100,000 per week; ($50 per machine). One night, ""Moose"" Tobin and 3 other Bomer hoods drop in on Porker Davis' upstairs gambling joint. Tobin tells Davis that Bomer wants to teach him a lesson; the hoods chase everybody out of the joint. Then they start throwing the slot machines out the 2nd story window; when one of Davis' employees tries to stop them, the hoods throw him out the window. Ness and his men are on the case. 2 years ago, Ness had run the slot machines out of Chicago; now the slots are back. Joe Bomer, former kingpin in Capone's booze operation, now the czar of the multi-million dollar slot machine racket, calls Davis in for a meet. Bomer gives him a ""take it or leave it"" offer: from now on, Bomer is his 50/50 partner. Bomer also warns Davis: the machines take 30%; don't rig the machines so they take 50% or more, or the customers will stop playing. Bomer will supply 40 of his
Chicago. Pete ""The Persuader"" Kalmisky, former bodyguard of Al Capone, accompanied by Syndicate business manager Alan Sitkin, have a meeting with Joey December, president of the debt-ridden Great Lakes Pacific Railroad. They form a crooked alliance; Joey agrees to transport their illegal liquor on his trains, in exchange for ""20% off the top."" After Kalmisky leaves, Sitkin talks privately with Joey. Sitkin gives Joey $100,000 for 10,000 shares of Canada Central stock, now worth $10 a share; Joey says they will be worth $50 a share in 3 weeks. Sitkin says he has incriminating evidence against Kalmisky, to ""keep him in line""; Sitkin carries a key to a safety deposit box with him wherever he goes. And so, within 2 weeks, Canadian whiskey (the good stuff) is loaded into boxcars in Manitoba, where it's later shunted onto the main routes by Lake Superior, to be distributed throughout 5 states; the boxcars are labeled Retail Milk Co. February 16, 1930. An elderly railroad man stumbles
March 4, 1933. The Windy City is getting ready for the Chicago World's Fair, also known as the ""Century of Progress"" Exposition. The 3 wealthy Endicott brothers, who jointly owned franchises at the upcoming Fair, are all rubbed out in short order. Restaurant owner Gus Dmytryk goes to the Licensing Committee, and it seems he will get the former Endicott franchises: 3 nightclubs at the Midway, and 5 other concessions. It will mean big bucks, since the Chicago World's Fair is expected to draw 50-million visitors. Ness knows that Dmytryk has been on the fringes of the rackets for years, and then District Attorney Beecher Asbury assigns Ness and his men to the case. Meanwhile, when ex-alderman Mitchell Grandin tells the Committee that Dmytryk is a bootlegger; it seems the Committee will give the lucrative franchise to Grandin instead. Later, Grandin gives Dmytryk some payoff money. Ness and Lee Hobson, trying to clean up the town, drop in on one of the hoods who has showed up (and is
May 17, 1932. There are many free soup kitchens in Chicago, but one of them in the skid row section is really a front; upstairs, gangster Chiz Gosher, twice convicted of white slavery, has his office. His partners in crime are the powerful, nationwide vice ring known as The Group, represented by hood Vic Cassandros. Chiz's niece is Ginnie Littlesmith, who runs the soup kitchen, and she is not involved in the rackets. Downstairs, Enrico Rossi is working undercover-- he's dressed in dirty old clothes, and phones Ness; Eliot tells him the raid is set for 12:45.* But Vic is soon tipped of Ness' impending raid; Vic goes upstairs and demands the ledger books from Gosher. But Gosher only wants to escape via the trapdoor, and tells Vic he'll never get the books. Vic shoots him, leaving him fatally wounded; but the tough old guy doesn't die right away-- before he croaks he turns the ledgers over to his niece, Ginnie Littlesmith, and tells her they'd be worth $100,000 to the Group. Anxious
New York City; February 4, 1934. 3 months of intensive investigation is paying off for Ness and his Untouchables; they have ""Smiley"" Barris cornered in an upper floor of an Eastside tenement. With the aid of local police, and some tear gas, Smiley is apprehended. But somebody wants Smiley dead; a sniper with a high-powered rifle, on the roof of a building, shoots at Smiley-- he accidentally kills the cop beside Smiley. Ness shoots and kills the sniper. When the sniper is identified as Marco Robles, it is obvious who wants Smiley dead: N.Y. Syndicate overlord Joe Kulak. Joe Kulak is ruthless; on the phone he says, ""Robles got what he deserved. If the cops wouldn't have got him, I would have got him. Sorry -- no tears."" So now Kulak turns The Contract over to his Enforcer: Ray Quist. (a Contract means: kill the guy who's been fingered, or get rubbed out yourself.) Smiley was just a schlep, an errand boy, in the Organization; but what he knows could put Kulak in the electric cha
Chicago, April 16, 1934. Prohibition is over, the main racket is now narcotics. The New York Syndicate, the ""Big 6"" send their representative Wally Corbin to Chicago, to pick up a shipment of heroin from Louie ""The Bear"" Madikoff-- he's the top dealer in the Midwest and the chief supplier of the NY Syndicate. Ness has already picked off 2 of Madikoff's runners. Wally picks up 1-1/2 kilos of the junk, worth $200,000. But Wally gets picked off too, he gets gunned down in a shootout with Ness and Lee Hobson and Enrico Rossi. And so Charles ""Lucky"" Luciano, the big boss in New York, phones Madikoff. Luciano says maybe this deal is too big for Madikoff, and he might have to deal with Mike Pavanos instead. Madikoff says he'll run Pavanos into the lake if he tries to take over; he also suspects Pavanos has been tipping Ness. Madikoff sets up a meet with Ness one night; Ness is riding in Madikoff's car, with Hobson and Rossi following behind in their car. Madikoff blatantly tells Ness
January 1929. Gangster Matt Malloy walks into a sporting goods store; he can't buy an automatic pistol without a police permit, however anyone with $150 can buy a machine-gun. Later, at the Club Montmartre, half a dozen choppers are laid out on Nitti's table. The Council says that now they can move in on the Northside and Bugs Moran. Nitti picks up a chopper and says, ""You got 'em-- use 'em!"" Gang war! The following weeks are the bloodiest in Chicago history; Nitti's gang strikes again and again with choppers at the Bugs Moran mob. The climax is the St. Valentine's Day massacre, Feb. 14, 1929. An immediate ban on machine-guns goes into effect. Feb. 16, Enrico Rossi and Jack Rossman are confiscating choppers from the sporting goods store; Ness and Lee Hobson, with a search-and-seizure warrant, raid Nitti's Montmartre club. Nitti tells Ness he'll get more choppers; Ness tells him there won't be a single one left in town. Nitti sneers, ""A lot of punks have tried to buck the Orga
March 2, 1933. The remote section of the northern Michigan Lake front, 180 miles northeast of Chicago. The Chicago Syndicate, to improve the quality of their booze, is now smuggling in master brewers from Germany; the illegal immigrants had come 6,000 miles to the new country. Tonight, 8 new immigrants are brought in. One of them looks at the sign: ""Welcome to Chippewa Landing, Michigan""-- Bernd asks, ""Chippewa? What does that mean? But this is America, yes?"" Max Kerner tells him to move on. Meanwhile, in Chicago, Eliot Ness and his Untouchables are using their armored truck with the V-wedge on the grill to smash through the large metal doors of a brewery; they shut down yet another bootleg operation. March 22. Another raid by Ness and the police. No one is killed since the brewers surrender peacefully, but then one of the mobsters shoots Bernd in the back, fatally wounding him. Lee Hobson and the police chase the hitman, but he gets away. They find out Bernd was the maste
December 24, 1930. That evening, small-time mug Hap Levinson is playing Santa Claus at the Sackman Orphan Home. Santa brings toys and ice cream to all the waifs. He walks outside, waves good-bye, and is promptly machine-gunned to death by hoods in a speeding car. Quite a shock for all the kiddies. Killing Santa is not a federal crime, but Eliot Ness investigates. Hap was a friend of Ness' for 10 years; they had sort of a truce. If Ness was on official business, they were on opposite sides of the law; unofficially, they were pals. Hap was a frontman for Mike Volney who owns the Criss Cross Club; Volney trusted him, and Hap also kept his books and records for him. It doesn't figure that anyone would rub out a small potatoes guy like Hap, especially since almost everyone liked him. The only motive could be because a month ago, Volney had shot another hood named Augie over some silly bet; there were 4 witnesses counting Hap. 2 of the witnesses had been killed. Now, with Hap rubb
Joe Lassiter is the greatest inside man in the bootlegging racket. He and his sidekick, Nick Karabinos, have just arrived in Chicago by train; Lassiter traveled 1,000 miles because of a 250 grand deal: build a Ness-proof brewery. At the closed Bell Club (which Ness took apart last week), Lassiter meets with bootleg czar Louis Tully and his associates. 7 breweries have been wrecked by Ness and the Untouchables. Ness can always smell a brewery a mile away, because of the fumes they give off. So Joe Lassiter decides to build a brewery on the 6th story of a building-- the Cooker in the Sky; Lassiter leases the 6th story of an abandoned warehouse building. But Harry Gordon, who had been Tully's inside man, is worried for his job-- and his life. He tips Eliot Ness off to Lassiter's brewery. That night, Ness and Lee Hobson secretly check out the place; the brewery would be the largest ever constructed, when completed it'll be able to make 10,000 gallons of booze a day. Ness makes a ri
By mid-June 1932, Eliot Ness and his Untouchables had uncovered and shut down every champagne-producing operation in the city. 4 months later, however, champagne appears again in the fashionable Westside nightclubs. Ness is about to raid the swankiest speak, the Silver Canary. At the club, Marty Baltin is paying Charley Mailer for the last champagne shipment: $86,000 for 350 cases (that comes out to about $245 per case of 12, about $20 a bottle). Ness and his men raid the place; as Charley Mailer exits quickly, he accidentally leaves his small ledger book on Marty Baltin's desk. Ness and Hobson find a dozen bottles in the bar area, wherein the champagne is frozen solid, the bottles must have accidentally arrived in a refrigerated shipment. Enrico Rossi checks with the railroads, and finds out 4 refrigerated freight cars had arrived from the Marblehead Seafood & Ice Company in Boston; the Untouchables fly to Boston. Next day, Mailer is meeting with Baltin again. Baltin found out M
Chicago, the Summer of 1932. There are 12-million unemployed in the U.S.; with less money to spend, the price of booze goes down. The whiskey Syndicate is meeting; the chairman is the powerful gangster Vincent Tunis who runs the town. His 3 lieutenants suggest they hit the speaks. To make a point, Tunis demands a toothpick from his underling Charlie Grach; Tunis roughs him up, bloodies his nose, and points a gun at Charlie*-- demanding a toothpick. Charlie pleads, ""I can't give ya what I haven't got."" Tunis quips, ""Neither can the speak operators."" Vincent Tunis is The Economist: he explains the law of supply-and-demand to the Syndicate. The speak owners get 15 cents a shot for booze, that's $3 a bottle, that's $36 a case-- and the Syndicate wants $75 a case; the speak owners can't give the Syndicate what they don't have. So, Tunis will dry up the market, sending the price of booze way up-- he says, to ""20 cents, 30 cents, 50 cents: where it belongs""** Vincent Tunis reads to t
Chicago, December 18, 1930. On the southside of town, Herbie Catcher is playing 8-ball for 50 cents a game, in a dilapidated pool joint. Herbie, not being much of a pool player, gets cleaned out by Cooker. Herbie's best friend is Josh, a nice black man who happens to be blind, who is the employee working in the pool hall. Josh tells him, ""You'd be surprised at the things I can see, I'm an owl in the dark."" (""Owl"" is his nickname.) Since Herbie can't make money shooting pool, and only has a job working as a busboy, he is in the habit of getting a few bucks by giving Eliot Ness tips. However, today his tips are all stale. Herbie tells Ness that Wally Marcos is back in town; Ness says he already left again. Herbie has info on Angel Podaris; Ness says he sold out to Martin Rawlings. Herbie relates that there's a new place on Maple Street making bottles for imported Scotch; Ness says, ""We knocked it over last week."" Even though all the ""hot tips"" are useless, Ness slips him a fin
December 12, 1929. That night, gangster Arnie Kurtz is in a car, watching a hit he ordered. Another car, speeding along and with a chopper blasting, guns down a pedestrian; but the victim pulls a gun and fires back, his bullet goes through the windshield. The car crashes; the driver is dead, but the hitman escapes. Arnie Kurtz goes to establish his alibi; at 10:35, his wife Stella drops in on her brother Benno Fisk, who owns a pawn shop. Stella has a job for him: deliver a payment of 100 Gs to a gangster in Washington, DC, for her hubby Arnie. Benno will be gone for 3-4 days, so Stella takes his 2 pet birds with her; Stella and Arnie are permanent guests at the swanky Lakeview Hotel. A newspaper headline reads: ""Parrot Fever Kills 2 More."" Ness and his men investigate the shooting of the pedestrian; Rico finds the driver's license of the dead driver of the getaway car: he was a New York hood named McHuey. It seems the New York Syndicate figures into Arnie Kurtz's trying to take
Chicago. Right after the St. Valentine's Day Massacre. (February 14, 1929.) Ness and his men are scouring Chicago, looking for Bugs Moran. Ness says there used to be 2 gangs in town, now there's just one. Ness figures if they get to Moran first, maybe he'll talk-- he might just be mad enough to give them the information they need. Someone else looking for Moran is Eddie O'Gara, a small-time hood who has been on the run for the past 3 years; he's decided to come home. Eddie's brother Vince, a trolley driver, isn't happy to see him; but Eddie's mom welcomes him back with open arms. Eddie finds Moran at his old hideout: a big storage room in the lakefront Midway. But Moran is ready to blast him; O'Gara was a punk until Moran made him a highly-paid gangster, and 3 years ago Eddie double-crossed him. Eddie fast-talks his way out of it. Moran has lots of money, but no gang; Eddie can get him a new gang, but he'll need lots of money. So they decide to work together-- but Moran warns
1929.* Notorious gangster boss Charlie Radick is dying of leukemia; there'll be no mourning for him, the other overlords will be vying for his throne. All Radick wants to do is see his long-lost daughter before he dies. Ness visits Radick; Ness is afraid a gang war might break out, as rival gangs scramble to take over. Ness says, ""Turn over your books to me; names of the people in your organization, distribution points, contacts in City Hall."" Radick says while he was in prison, he left his daughter with a couple; 3 years ago she ran away. Radick tells Ness, ""Find Margaret, and I'll give you everything you ask for."" Ness never makes deals with hoods; but this time the gangster isn't asking for a break, or to plea bargain: he only wants Ness to find his daughter. Ness doesn't promise him anything, but he starts the search. Eliot Ness is getting help from Lt. Agatha Stewart and Frank-- they do some legwork, and find out Margaret Radick is now going by the name Margaret Wilson. T
July 4, 1930. 40,000 horse racing fans fill Arlington Park. Ness and his men have Arnold ""Spats"" Vincent under surveillance; they will close in on him as soon as he gets a piece of paper: a list with the names of officials in high places who are ready to do business with the crime cartel. 2 hoods (one tall, one short), apparently associates of Spats, approach him. The tall hood sits next to him and whispers something to him; then he stabs Spats. The hoods take off running; Ness and his men and some cops chase them. They arrest the tall hood, but the short one gets shot by a cop. Ness figures that top gangster Nate Stryker had put a contract on Spats; Ness and his men grill the tall hood, but he's not talking, he won't even give his name. Ness has Stryker hauled in, but the tall hood won't squeal on him. Later, Stryker meets with Dexter Lloyd Bayless-- he runs a school where he trains assassins; Bayless had provided the 2 hoods for this hit. Stryker is worried the hood might si
Chicago, 1929. Mike Brannon's been a cop for 15 years, but now he's being suspended for hospitalizing ""one of Tony Lamberto's dope-pushing punks."" Mike thinks Captain Bellows is corrupt for not going to bat for him. There is a tense moment when the Captain asks for Mike's gun-- Mike points it at him. But then, Mike turns the gun over and leaves. The dollar value of the city's wholesale industrial trade is $6-billion; the revenue of organized crime is $200-million. ""Tough Tony"" Lamberto's Market Street Produce Co. is just a legit façade; it takes in a percentage off the top-- from every racket dollar in the Southside of Chicago. Tony Lamberto is often the target of rival gangsters, so he rides around in a steel-plated limo with bulletproof glass; it cost $30,000. (this is a time when most people make $600 to $1,000 a year, and cars cost $500.) Right now Tony has another problem: a visit from Eliot Ness and his men. One of Tony's boys, Max Templar, is eating a honeydew melon; bu
Chicago, October 1932. Within minutes of the time the Globe's top reporter Carlton Edmunds was shot, Eliot Ness and his men are on the scene. Ostensibly it appears a stray bullet in a gunfight hit Edmunds; he was just a passerby in the wrong place at the wrong time. But Lee Hobson picks up 4-5 pieces of cotton batting-- the gunmen were firing blanks: except for the one bullet that hit Edmunds, who was 30 feet away. The ""gunfight"" was staged to fool the sole witness to the shooting: newsman Barney Rusch. Ness tells Barney that earlier, Edmunds had said he was working on a story about scrap metal-- a story that would tear this town wide open. Just then, a cross-country flight, from East coast to West, has a stopover in Chicago; reporter Floyd Gibbons gets out at the terminal to make some phone calls. Globe-trotting reporter Floyd Gibbons is a fast-talking, straight-shooting whirlwind of activity; not even losing his left eye in World War I slowed him down-- for more than the past do
June 1930. Speak owner Louie Akers-- about to go dry and out of business because Guzik couldn't supply him with hooch for that last 3 weeks-- buys his booze from another supplier. Akers pays Johnny $1,142 for barrels of beer and crates of whiskey, that some deliverymen just dropped off. Just then, a couple of Guzik's boys (Sully and Mac) drive up; they start blasting at the delivery truck (which still has plenty more booze in back), just as it's pulling away. Once the delivery truck is at a safe distance, Johnny gets out and hands the dough over to the booze supplier-- Eliot Ness! (Johnny is an undercover cop.) A short time later, Akers gets a visit from Jake ""Greasy Thumb"" Guzik and a few of his boys.
June 1929.* A body is dumped into Lake Michigan; when it's fished out 3-4 weeks later, on July 10, the Bureau of Missing Persons has a John Doe on its hands. And so, Lt. Agatha Stewart and her sidekick Frank Benson are on the case. At the City Morgue, all the coroner can tell about the decomposed body is the approximate age, 50, and that the deceased might have had a bad heart. Outside, Lt. Stewart runs into Eliot Ness, who came down to do an I.D. on a Joe Fuselli. (not the Joe Fuselli from ""The Scarface Mob."") The morgue will keep the body for 10 days. July 20, in Potter's Field, the John Doe is buried in the rain; there are no mourners, only Lt. Stewart and reporter Walter Rimer attend. But then a clue-- a huge wreath is delivered by O'Banion florists; the delivery man doesn't know who ordered it, so Lt. Stewart goes to the flower shop. It had been owned by the notorious gangster Dion O'Banion (1892-1924), until he was rubbed out 5 years ago by Johnny Torrio. Now, the shop is
1929. Eliot Ness gets another anonymous phone tip: a big meet at a warehouse on Grover Street, Nitti and all the boys will be there. At the warehouse, about 20 hoods are putting their record books into a huge trunk. Since Al Capone got nailed because of bookkeeping, from now on nobody is to keep any written records; there will only be one central file, and the bookkeeper will be Leo Stazak. Leo tells the boys that records, with notes on accounts receivable, would tip the Feds as to how the speak owners do business. Leo will run the central file, everybody else is just to use the phone and deal in cash. Then Nitti gives a little talk: they all know what happened to Artie Graff, he ran a good speak-- but he got busted because Ness got a hold of his records. Nitti adds laconically, ""The Organization has voted to give his widow a few bucks in memory of her departed husband."" (and the guy's not even dead yet-- enough said.) Ness and his men use their cars to crash through the wareho
October 16, 1930. Jackson Parker is a small-time bootlegger, he has his henchman Benny deliver bottles of booze to places on a college campus: student unions, fraternity houses. Parker is arrogant, he tells Benny he could ""throw him out with the rest of the garbage."" Parker has big plans: he thinks he's meeting with Frank Nitti. At the Montmartre club, Nitti is telling his assembled lieutenants, ""And after we get that pipeline set up, the feds will have to dig up every street in Chicago to find it."" A round of laughter. Harry, who is guarding the door, tells Nitti that the punk is here; Nitti says to throw him out, but then decides to let him in for amusement. When they laugh at Parker's small-time bootlegging operation on a college campus, arrogant Parker says, "I thought I'd be talking to a more intelligent group of men", " Nitti warns him" and "One more like that, and the ice is gonna crack right out from under you".
Late Summer 1930. It started in Wichita, Kansas: a staggering gait called the Jake Dance. (we see a man staggering along using a cane in each hand.) There are many different kinds of alcohol, but the only kind that is safe to drink is ethyl alcohol; many people had been drinking Ginger Jake, which is contaminated with methyl alcohol, also called ""wood alcky."" And people who drank a lot of it often suffered permanent loss of muscle coordination, and developed a staggering gait called the Jake Dance. Many died. In Wichita, 1% of the adult population was stricken. So the U.S. Health Department calls for its top guns: Associate Surgeon General Dr. Victor Garr (about age 50, with a lot of experience and a deep care for patients), and his assistant, Dr. Daniel Gifford (about age 30, inexperienced and has a habit of always doing things by the book). Right now, they are swamped with hundreds of patients in the hospital. Dr. Garr sees his sidekick going over some notes. Dr. Garr snaps
Jazz was born in the Roaring Twenties. It's now 1930, and on Chicago's Gold Coast there's a nightspot called ""Goose Gander's Golden Egg"" jazz club. Blues player Eddie Moon is blowing his hot cornet with the jazz band. But then mobster Lucky talks to Ray ""Goose"" Gander; Lucky wants him to carry Lou Cagan's hooch in his joint. Ray refuses, the strongest drink he serves in his place is coffee. Then Lucky's hitman plays some music of his own-- with his tommy gun; he shoots up the joint. But tonight Lucky isn't so lucky; an hour later, Eliot Ness and Lee Hobson and Enrico Rossi grab him. This is the 3rd little, independent club he's shot up; the previous 2 were the Whoopee Club and the Lion's Den. Ness runs him in. Meanwhile Lou Cagan (Mr. Big of the Chicago northside), who owns the lavish gambling resort the Parthenon Hotel, is getting some bad news from Louis ""Lepke"" Buchalter. Lepke, representing the New York syndicate, tells Cagan they sent him 700 cases of booze, but he hasn't
1933. Prohibition ends. But that doesn't mean the war on crime is over for Eliot Ness and his Untouchables. The syndicate has already moved on to a more profitable-- and more deadly-- source of income: narcotics. By September, Ness and his men had found and destroyed every major source of narcotics. By early October, the price of a bindle of heroin jumps from $20 to $50. Nitti and his boys want to take advantage of this seller's market. Nitti has a dope smuggler named Yang brought in from Shanghai. At the Montmartre Club, 5 lieutenants put their money on the table: elderly Tony, 350 Gs; Mike, 275; ailing Sam Weidman, 600; Kurt Koenig, 350; and Larry Bass, 425. Nitti quips, ""Two million bucks-- there ain't been that much dough on this table since we bought the Southside."" When Sam Weidman asks how can they be sure Yang will deliver, Nitti snaps, ""Whatta ya think we're dealin' with, some 2-bit punk?"" He walks over to a huge globe, a yard in diameter. ""He's got poppy fields in
Chicago, Spring 1931. That night, Ness and his men are in their car; it's an 80 mph chase to catch a guy running whiskey for Solly Girsch. The 19-year-old driver has a high-speed accident; his car overturns and explodes in flames. Solly Girsch is the king of bootleg whiskey; he has 500 ""mom & pop"" stores pushing his hooch-- all together, they form the biggest single outlet of whiskey in Chicago. Next night, top boss Harry Mastrogeorge-- along with Solly's crooked lawyer Billy Baron and about half a dozen of Mastrogeorge's lieutenants-- are throwing a party for Solly, celebrating his getting his 500th outlet. They bring in a 2-foot-high cake. Solly quips he wishes a blonde would jump out of the cake. (she'd be pretty short.) But Solly has an announcement; he's buying 1,000 gallons of whiskey a day from them, and he wants to cut the price he pays from $8 a gallon to $4. They all balk, and Pete Topchinski is vocal about it. Big bucks are involved-- it's a $2-million a year busine
Chicago, 1931. On the Southside, on a dead end street, there is a junkyard-- but it's really a front for a narcotics empire, run by gangster Victor Salazar. Ness and his men are on the case; they keep intercepting his trucks, carrying shipments of narcotics. Barney Howe tells his boss Salazar that his problem is the operation's too spread out; but one big shipment will give him the Northside, too-- Barney says he will ""put Chicago in his pocket."" Late at night, they get a call from a hood named Kierson who has info in his briefcase: the time and route of a $2-million commercial shipment of morphine crystals to a medical research center; he's to meet them at the corner of Mohawk and 23rd in 10 minutes. But rival hood Steve Ballard takes out his silencer, and pumps Kierson full of lead, and makes off with the briefcase. Around midnight, Salazar orders all his boys to find Kierson; ironically, one of Salazar's ""Enforcers"" is Steve Ballard, the guy who bumped Kierson off! But it seem
January 1932. Smalltime bootlegger Al Remp is serving 3-5 years in prison; he's done 3 years and is up for parole next week, but it seems he won't get it. The guards put him in solitary, and Remp has a visitor: Eliot Ness. Remp tells him, ""I got nothing to say to you."" But Ness tells him that if he agrees to help him nail bigtime bootlegger ""Fat"" Augie Strom, his former boss, he'll get that parole; or else 2 more years is a long time. Remp is married to a good woman; the whole time he's been in prison, she did ""stand by her man."" Remp agrees to help Ness. ""Fat"" Augie Strom is a very heavyset man who perspires even in winter, his operation is at a meat packing plant by the Chicago stockyards; he likes the large refrigeration section where the meat is prepared, it's nice and cool in there-- he's the Man in the Cooler. A big man with a big temper, he has ""Bitsy"" Whyller rub out Pete Laffey for bungling a job. Remp is reunited with his faithful wife Marcie; but he also has to meet
Racketeer Gus Ducek is fingered to be knocked off. But when the car with the hitmen drives towards him, Ducek's boys fire back with machine guns, turning the tables; one hitman dies, Boley Davis escapes. Watching the botched rubout attempt are Lt. Philip Hedden and Sgt. Davey McCain. Eliot Ness and his men are out to pin the murder attempt on Hedden, since the hitmen were driving one of his cars. November 11, 1931; a group of about 2 dozen Army buddies, who were all in B-Company, 431st Infantry, in WWI, are celebrating the 13th anniversary of Armistice Day. It is their annual reunion, and their host as usual is Lt. Philip Hedden; and beside him, as always, is his sidekick Sgt. Davey McCain. Lt. Philip Hedden regales the men, again, with the story of how he won his medal, the Croix De Guerre; and then he proposes a toast to Sgt. Davey-- ""To the best topkick who ever did a shavetail's job for him.""* Hedden and Davey are a team-- but whereas these former soldiers served their countr
New Jersey waterfront, 1933. Johnny Mizo had been marked for death by the American crime cartel; he had fled to Brazil. Now, he has returned to America to get the $200,000 he had hastily stashed in a hideout before fleeing. The Captain tells Mizo he has exactly 11 days, and then the ship sails back to Rio de Janeiro, with or without him. It's a foggy night; a Brazilian sailor gets off the ship before Mizo, and 4 Chicago hoods mistake him for Mizo. They shoot the sailor; a policeman shoots one of the hoods, Paul Santos. Back in Chicago, the 3 remaining hoods report to their boss, top gangster Vince Majesky-- who makes his dough off of protection, prostitution and narcotics. He owns a nightclub called the Silken Trap; his office is upstairs. Majesky is plenty sore about the botched job; he gives Denny Cole one more chance to get Johnny Mizo, or he'll be dumped in the river! Meanwhile, in the nightclub, beautiful Claire Vale is doing a dance number for the customers. Eliot Ness a
February 1, 1933. Late that night, John ""The Cropper"" Cropsie, the Enforcer for Jules Flack (boss of the Westside combine), stood in the back alley behind the Lido Burlesque house, by the stagedoor entrance-- and pumped some slugs into David Alpine, the key booze supplier for the combine (because he was also selling to the competition). On the night of February 2, Eliot Ness is having Cropsie reenact the crime in front of an eyewitness to the shooting: Belle Alpine, David Alpine's widow. Ness asks her if she can identify him as the man who shot her husband. Belle walks up to Cropsie, slaps him across the face, and then blatantly lies to Ness that she never saw him before in her life. Meanwhile, with Repeal of Prohibition just around the corner, Jules Flack is getting ready for the big switch, he is going to concentrate on narcotics. Flack wants to convert his assets into a couple of million bucks, so he can throw in with Luciano. Cropsie, who had been Flack's Enforcer for 13 years
April 28, 1932. Chicago. 3,500 fans are at the arena, watching the end of a 7-day bicycle race. But Ed ""Duke"" Monte is there to make a drop-off. Ness and Lee Hobson catch him, with a quarter of a million dollars in counterfeit bills in his leather bag. On May 25, Monte is sentenced to 10-15 years in the State Pen. That same day, at Monte's old headquarters (the Odeon Theatre which specializes in Burlesque), his former lieutenant, Lou Sultan, is having the guy he accuses of being the stoolie, Parrot Krebs, worked over by his thugs. Lou tells Janos Dalker (Monte's bodyguard) to rub the stoolie out. Next day, Ness and Lee Hobson pay Lou Sultan a visit at the theatre; they know he had Parrot knocked off, but can't prove it yet. When they leave, Barbara Sultan, dressed to the nines, talks to her hubby. Lou tells her, ""Don't give me that jealous wife routine,"" and she snaps back that he should stop fooling around with all the strippers. Ed Monte busts out of prison, and as Janos is
June 25, 1933. Ness and Lee Hobson are called to the Castle, a baronial estate just outside of Chicago, which is both the headquarters and home of the underworld's notorious ""King"" Frank Argos; he is one of Ness' old foes. Argos' attorney Eli Halstead explains that wealthy Frank Argos is about to die; he wants to leave his $5-million in bonds to his long-lost son. And he wants Eliot Ness to be the executor of the will, because he doesn't trust any of his crooked associates. When Halstead says that Argos' wife left him many years ago, the feisty Frank Argos interjects he kicked his wife out! But she took their 7-year-old son with her; all Frank Argos wants to do is see his son once again before he dies. The King offers Ness 100 grand for his services, but Ness turns him down; he figures it's dirty money, a pay-off for protecting his organization. As Ness is leaving, one of the King's hoods, Arno Beale, tells Ness that the son, Charlie Argos, died in WWI anyway. The King dies. An
During the blistering summer of 1931, Ness and his men are working tirelessly against both the illicit whiskey and the narcotics that are flooding the city. One morning, a despondent Capt. Jim Johnson visits Ness in his office; Capt. Johnson had been on a raid that netted 50 dope addicts-- one of them was his son Buz. Ness talks to Buz behind bars. Buz cooperates, and says he got the powder from a pusher named Peepers (so-named because he always wears shades); Ness gets Buz released. Peepers, meanwhile, is awaiting a big shipment of narcotics from Sal Rudin, alias ""Mr. Big."" Later, Agent Lee Hobson traces Peepers to where he's staying, at the Viking Hotel. Ness and Lee see Peepers carrying a small case of dope-- Peepers fires his gun at them; Ness shoots back, killing him. Searching Peepers' apartment, they find out that Artie Tresh, a bass violin player working at the Club 88, also lives there. They go to the Club 88, and meet the owner, Sal Rudin. When Ness says he wants to t
April 3, 1931. Vic's Diner, near the Chicago railroad yards; on the surface, no different than a hundred other diners. The blue plate special is 35 cents; a nickel would buy either a hamburger, or a cup of Joe and a sinker. The backroom is the headquarters of Victor Kurtz, bootleg czar of the Chicago southside. Right now he, along with his enforcer Holly Kester, The Torpedo, are having a meet with the boss of the northside, Monk Lyselle and his lieutenant Carl Danzig. Victor Kurtz uses a knife to draw a line bisecting a map of Chicago, then he says, ""Cross that line and you get cut down,"" and then jams the knife through the map and into the table, making his point. No more knocking off each other's speaks, warehouses and booze trucks. Everything's quiet until the night of September 3rd. A 3-truck convoy carrying Canadian whiskey to Chicago is hijacked. One of the masked bandits is Enrico Rossi; Eliot Ness and Lee Hobson and the rest of the Untouchables are there, too. Since th
Chicago, January 1933. Danceland has a big sign, ""30 girls, open until 2 a.m."" Inside, customers mingle with the dime-a-dance girls. Hoofer Ellie Haskell says goodnight to the owner, Marty Pulaski; outside, she is immediately shot by a sniper on the roof of a building across the street-- the sniper is Herbie Pulaski, Marty's mentally disturbed brother. Lt. Roy Gunther is on the case, he questions Marty, who has 20% of the dancing racket. However, Marty is sure his main competitor, Vince Bogan who owns 80% of the dance racket, is responsible for the killing; Marty phones Bogan and threatens to rub him out. Back at Ness' office, Lt. Roy Gunther discusses the case with Eliot. Ness has to go to New York to testify before a grand jury, he'll be gone a week-- he puts Lee Hobson in charge. Marty has his brother Herbie drive him over to Bogan's place; inside, Marty shoots Bogan. Outside, when Herbie hears the shots, he reaches for his rifle in the trunk of the car-- and has a flashback
May 14, 1931. Eliot Ness and his men notice that the top bosses are leaving Chicago: Frank Nitti has gone to Atlantic City; Bugs Moran and Jack Diamond have left, too. As Ness puts it, ""The rats are leaving the ship."" Obviously, they want to be out of town when someone important is hit. What Eliot doesn't know is that he is the target. The Syndicate has imported Elroy Dahlgren, a veteran of WWI-- he was an expert at lobbing hand grenades, as they put it, he had A Taste for Pineapple; in the 13 years since the war, he has practiced his craft a lot. Syndicate boss Danny Mundt is paying Dahlgren 10 grand to rub out Eliot Ness-- as soon as Mundt leaves town, too. Elroy Dahlgren gets in his car and drives up next to Ness' car; Elroy lobs a pineapple into Ness' car. Ness crashes his car and jumps out before the grenade explodes. In the hospital, Eliot Ness can't see anything-- even though Dr. Samuels says there is nothing physically wrong with his eyes; the stress of almost being blo
Detective Eliot Ness comes back to town to fight corruption and avenge a former partner's murder with the help of the son.
Federal agent Stack discovers that Lucy is a dead ringer for gangster Gordon's moll and gets her to go undercover in order to recover missing bank robbery loot. This episode was a spoof of the classic crime drama The Untouchables which was produced and filmed at Desilu Studios.
