1884
March 19, 1943
AKA: The Enforcer
Mobster
A onetime barber, Frank Nitti rose to become an important player in Al Capone’s (see entry in volume 1) mob. An “enforcer” and organizer for the gang’s bootlegging operation, he became a leader of the Chicago mob after Capone was imprisoned for tax evasion in 1931. Nitti’s notoriety grew with the TV series The Untouchables, which fictionalized his role. He survived being shot by his enemies, only to take his own life in 1943 in Chicago. At the time, he faced a prison sentence for racketeering (threatening a business for profit).
Francisco “Frank” Nitti was born in Naples, Italy, in 1884. He arrived in the United States before the era of Prohibition (a period, from 1919 to 1933, when the 18th Amendment outlawed the manufacture and sale of liquor). Nitti settled in Chicago, where he worked as a barber. The cousin of mob leader Al Capone, Nitti’s clients included many criminals. While working as a barber, he traded in stolen goods. In 1920 he joined a bootlegging operation run by Johnny Torrio. Nitti supervised the routing and distribution of alcohol that was smuggled into the United States from Canada.
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