The rise and fall of Scarface

Hole of Justice
by Peter G. Jimenea


(Warlords' Chronicle of Crime)


The Rise and Fall of Scarface


He has three heavy scars on the left jaw inflicted by a teenage guy in a quarrel over a girl and hates this nickname dubbed on him by the press. His criminal career started in his native Brooklyn when he joined a teenage gang managed by an adult mob named Johnny "The Brain" Torrio.


Torrio brought him to Chicago, considered a peaceful city of criminal organization that eventually became a byword for the worst excesses of gangland warfare. During the Prohibition in the sale of alcoholic beverages, the enterprise of Torrio's uncle being managed by him, collapsed.


But it did not stop him from operation of prostitution houses, gambling dens and the production of alcoholic beverages. During the "Beer Wars" he made Scarface his business partner. This propelled the latter to earn the title "Public Enemy No. One." Scarface is Al Capone.


In 1924, Dion O' Bannion, head of the North Side Irish mob, double crossed Torrio and Capone. He sold them his brewery and announced his retirement. On the night of the transfer, police swooped down and closed the brewery.


Capone learned that O'Bannion deliberately arranged the fiasco and still, continued doing business. O'Bannion was advised to make peace with Scarface but the Irishman merely responded; "Oh, to hell with the Sicilian." For that as widely believed in the underworld, he signed his death warrant.


Later, two of Capone's hit men Albert Anselmi and John Scalise assassinated O'Bannion in the back room of his own florist shop. O'Bannion's friend, a certain Hymie Weiss then commanded the gang. Weis and his mob planned to retaliate by killing Capone and Torrio.


In 1925, Torrio was shot as he stepped out of his car. He survived but immediately went back to Italy. Capone now "The Big Man" headed the biggest mob in Chicago on his own. The Weiss gang tried a new technique by George "Bugs" Moran, cruising slowly past Capone's car in their own limousine and rocked it with machine pistol and shotgun fire.


His driver died but Capone survived. In 1926 a convoy of eleven cars drove past Capone headquarters at Hawthorne Inn in Cicero, poured over 1,000 bullets from machine guns. Only one gangster and a woman passerby died but Capone again survived.


A month later, his men eliminated Weiss from the windows of two rented rooms across the latter's doorway. War raged on with Moran now leading the Northsiders. They didn't have the faintest idea that Capone's men have already hatched the "St. Valentine's Day Massacre" plan.


Disguised as raiding police officers, Capone's mob wiped out five of Moran's men, a mechanic and an optometrist who just like to hang out with crooks in their garage. Although Moran threatened a fearful revenge, the brutal slaying ended his effectiveness.


Capone's worst atrocity was seen in the killing of his own men John Scalise and Albert Anselmi after he learned of their treacherously planned to betray him. He gave them superb banquet and proposed a loving toast. But when the meal was over, he had their arms pinned and seizing a baseball bat, he broke every bone in their bodies he can reached.


He then threw his guns on the mayoral election of Republican "Big Bill" Thompson, who eventually let the mobsters give order to the City Hall. But in 1928, Capone had overplayed their electioneering with threats, intimidation and bomb-throwing. The electors revolted. There was twice the normal turn-out of voters and the Republicans were badly routed.


From 1930, Capone was targetted by a team of Inland Revenue agents who disregarded his no-income claim to evade payments totalling millions. They attempted to disrupt the course of justice by putting their own selected people in the jury.


But Federal Judge Wilkerson is wise if not clever. He repaced the jurymen with his own at the last minute. Capone was finally convicted of tax evasion. Slapped with eleven years imprisonment and payment of $80,000 in fines and cost, Capone got the heaviest ever handed down for tax offender. Secured in Alcatraz prison, his reign in Chicago finally ended.