Chicago to Springfield:: Crime and Politics in the 1920s (Images of America (Arcadia Publishing)) (2 page)

Bugs Moran was the intended target on St. Valentine’s Day. He might still have been in a prison cell, and no threat to Capone, except he was paroled in 1923 after bribing the men who ran the “pardon mill” in Governor Small’s administration. (KCC.)

While some politicians have always worked cooperatively with mobsters, their partnership sometimes resulted in murder. In 1926, William McSwiggin, an assistant state’s attorney, was gunned down outside a Cicero speakeasy. State senator Albert Prignano (above left), who was allied with Capone in the gambling rackets, had a dispute over payoffs with Frank Nitti, who believed Prignano was trying to organize his own racket. Nitti had assassins shoot and kill Prignano in 1935 at his front door in front of his wife, mother, and eight-year-old son. A few months later, state representative John Bolton (above right) was gunned to death. Suspects in that murder were mobsters Louis “Little New York” Campagna, Angelo Lazzia, Frank Nitti, state representative James Adduci (left), and state senator Daniel Serritella. (All KPL.)

Daniel Serritella was Capone’s man in city hall. Mayor Thompson appointed him city sealer and in charge of regulating merchants. Serritella was convicted in 1932 for taking payoffs from merchants to allow shortchanging of customers. (KPL.)

Daniel Serritella (left), seen here with Ralph Capone, was elected state senator in 1931 and served until 1943. Jake Guzik was arrested in 1944 for election fraud in Serritella’s last campaign. (KCC.)

Al Capone lent money and muscle to his candidates. The campaign for the April 1928 primary election in Chicago was known as the “Pineapple Primary” because gangsters tossed about 60 hand grenades in the campaign. On March 21, Republican committeeman and gangster Giuseppe “Diamond Joe” Esposito was shot dead in front of his wife and daughter. Esposito worked for Sen. Charles Deneen, and a few days later Deneen’s Chicago home was bombed. On Election Day, Octavius Granady, an African American candidate challenging the Mob’s choice for committeeman in the “Bloody 20th” Ward, was gunned down. Twenty-three people were indicted, four policemen and three gangsters went on trial, and yet no one was convicted. (KCC.)

People in Paul Boldt’s store in Chicago drink bootleg beer in front of a portrait of Gov. Len Small just before the 1924 election. (ALPLM.)

Chicago mayor Anton Cermak (seen here) was assassinated while appearing alongside President-elect Franklin Roosevelt in Miami in 1933. The accepted theory is that it was an attempt on Roosevelt’s life by a lone anarchist, yet some historians disagree. Cermak was connected to gangsters who were rivals of Capone. Less than two months before Cermak was killed, Chicago police raided Frank Nitti’s office, shooting and seriously wounding Nitti. (ALPLM.)

Giuseppe Zangara, a Sicilian immigrant, claimed he acted alone because he was an anarchist and Roosevelt was his target. But Zangara didn’t have much time to change his story. He was executed in Florida’s electric chair on March 20, just 32 days after the shooting. People such as columnist Walter Winchell, Judge John Lyle, and Chicago Crime Commission chief Frank Loesch all believed it was a Mob hit ordered by Nitti as revenge. (KPL.)

State representative Peter Granata (seen here) was part of the political-gangster alliance. His brother Bill campaigned against gangster state representative James Adduci and was murdered. William McSwiggen, Paul Labriolia, Octavius Granady, Frank Christensen, Charles Gross, Clem Graver, Bill Drury, Anthony D’Andrea, and Benjamin Lewis (and likely Anton Cermak) are just a few of the better-known politically connected murders by the Mob in Chicago over the years. (KPL.)

Chicago Cubs catcher Gabby Hartnett got in trouble with the major-league baseball commissioner for this picture with Al Capone and son in 1931. Next to Capone’s son is state representative Roland Libonati. This and the St. Valentine’s picture were taken by legendary newspaper photographer Tony Berardi, who died in a Kankakee retirement home in 2005. (KPL.)