A GANGSTERS WHO'S WHO

Bay of Plenty Times, Volume LXIII, Issue 11785, 1 August 1935, Page 4

A GANGSTERS WHO'S WHO

One of the strangest documents in the history of American crime, the official police list of leading, members of New York’s seven most powerful gangs, was made public recently. This action is a prelude to a campaign against racketeering which is expected to result in hundreds of arrests. Never before has such a “Who’s Who” of gangsterdom been published. Its appearance shocked residents, for it demonstrates the elaborate ramifications of the various “rackets.”

These rackets are classified as fol-< lows:—-Shapiro and Buckhouse’s gang, specialising in strike-breaking, fomenting union disputes,. and supplying “strong men” to commit crimes. Herbert brothers, a gang said to control 90 per cent, of the poultry business in New York. They force tradesmen to contribute £2,000,000 a year for “protection”; those who refuse are driven out of business; fake enterprises gang, specialising in the sale of valueless stocks and bonds; produce markets gang, controlling markets and manipulating food prices; Owney Madden’s gang, living on gambling and extortion. Madden was born in England. Little Augie Pisano’s gang, engaged in the laundry racket, run od similar lines to those of poultry and produce, and enjoying great political power; and “Dutch” Schlutz’s gang, for the exploitation of vice. Every name on the list is that of a racketeer or gangster known to the police for years.