Giuseppe “Joe the Boss” Masseria
In 1931, after the
Castellammarese War had been going on eighteen months, Luciano, who was one of
Masseria's top lieutenants at the time decided to double-cross Masseria. At a
meeting with Maranzano Luciano proposed to end the bloodshed. Luciano offered to
get rid of Masseria and take control of his gang. In exchange he wanted
Maranzano to call of his gun men, accept him as an equal boss and keep peace
between the two factions.
On April 15, 1931, Giuseppe “Joe
the Boss” Masseria was invited to one of his favorite restaurants, the Nuova
Villa Tammaro, located in Coney Island by Lucky Luciano. The meeting was
supposedly to find a way to ambush Maranzano, but Luciano had his own agenda
for the meeting, he had made arrangements to get rid of Masseria at this
meeting. Masseria arrived at the meeting, with three bodyguards, in his
personal armored car, which had one-inch think bulletproof windows. The
mobsters had a extravagant lobster lunch, played a card game and conferred over
how to get rid of Maranzano. At 3 pm, an hour after Masseria had arrived at the
restaurant and just before desert arrived, Luciano left for the toilet,
Masseria’s bodyguards vanished from the restaurant and four of Luciano’s gunmen
appeared in the restaurant and pumped Masseria full with an array of bullets.
The New York Daily News reported melodramatically that Masseria died “with the
ace of spades, the death card, clutched in a bejeweled paw"
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| Giuseppe Masseria's Dead Body |
Salvatore Maranzano
In 1931, after Giuseppe “Joe
the Boss” had been murdered on Luciano’s command, Salvatore Maranzano, Masseria’s
rival believed it was his turn to be the King of the American Underworld. So in
a meeting of Bosses from all over the country Maranzano announced that he was
now “Capo di Tutti Capi”, Boss of all Bosses. In order to remain the most powerful
man in American Underworld, Maranzano had to get rid of some threats to him and
his power, the biggest one being Luciano. Maranzano marked Luciano for a
machine gun assassination by Irish cutthroat gangster Vincent “Mad Dog” Coll. Tommy
“Three Finger Brown” Lucchese, who was a loyal associate and a good friend to
Luciano got wind of this news and tipped Luciano off. Luciano knew he had to
act quickly, since he had been marked for death.
On September 10, 1931, Lucchese paid
Maranzano a surprise visit at his office. Minutes after Lucchese arrived, a
group of men came in stating they were IRS agents. The men were actually
Luciano’s hit men but none of them were Sicilian or Italian. Neither Maranzano
nor his bodyguards had any clue that they were hit men and none of them even
suspected that the men were not IRS agents. The hit men pulled their guns out
and lined everyone up against the wall. Lucchese identified Maranzano with a
head movement and one of the gunmen forced Maranzano into his private office.
Sounds which came from the office indicated Maranzano initially put up a
struggle, but was ultimately killed with a volley of gun fire. Maranzano’s body
was full of bullets and stab wounds.
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| Salvatore Maranzano's Dead Body |
