legend who helped create the modern American Mafia—one body at a time—featuring shocking eyewitness accounts . . . Umberto “Albert” Anastasia was born in Italy at the turn of the century. Five decades later, he would be gunned down in a barber shop in New York City. What happened in the years in between-- and why every crime family had reason to want him dead-- is one of the most brutal and fascinating stories in the history of American organized crime. This in-depth account of the man who became one of the most powerful and homicidal crime bosses of the twentieth century from Mafia insider Frank Dimatteo is the first full-length book to chronicle Anastasia’s bloody rise from fresh-off-the-boat immigrant to founder of the notorious killer’s club Murder, Inc.—featuring never-before-told accounts from those who feared him most . . . They called him “The One Man Army.” “Mad Hatter.” “Lord High Executioner.” Albert Anastasia came to America mean and became a prolific killer. His merciless assassination of Mafia godfather Vincent Mangano is recounted here in chilling first-hand detail. He set the record: the first man in the history of American justice to be charged with four separate murders—and walk free after each one. But in the end, he was the last obstacle in rival Mafia hoodlum Vito Genovese’s dream of becoming the boss of bosses—and paid the ultimate price . . .

    The following winter, her dismembered remains were found buried in a seaside cave. The seven months in between had seen a massive search for the missing girl, involving Japanese policemen; British private detectives; Australian dowsers; and Lucie's desperate, but bitterly divided, parents. As the case unfolded, it drew the attention of prime ministers and sado-masochists, ambassadors and con-men, and reporters from across the world. Had Lucie been abducted by a religious cult, or snatched by human traffickers? Who was the mysterious man she had gone to meet? And what did her work, as a "hostess" in the notorious Roppongi district of Tokyo, really involve?Richard Lloyd Parry, an award-winning foreign correspondent, followed the case since Lucie's disappearance. Over the course of a decade, he traveled to four continents to interview those caught up in the story, fought off a legal attack in the Japanese courts, and worked undercover as a bartender in a Roppongi strip club. He talked exhaustively with Lucie's friends and family and won unique access to the Japanese detectives who investigated the case. And he delved into the mind and background of the man accused of the crime--Joji Obara, described by the judge as "unprecedented and extremely evil." With the finesse of a novelist, he reveals the astonishing truth about Lucie and her fate. People Who Eat Darkness is, by turns, a non-fiction thriller, a courtroom drama, and the biography of both a victim and a killer. It is the story of a young woman who fell prey to unspeakable evil, and of a loving family torn apart by grief. And it is a fascinating insight into one of the world's most baffling and mysterious societies, a light shone into dark corners of Japan that the rest of the world has never glimpsed before.

    This exhaustively researched book covers the entire period from 1920 to 1933. Author John J. Binder, a recognized authority on the history of organized crime in Chicago, discusses all the important bootlegging gangs in the city and the suburbs and also examines the other major rackets, such as prostitution, gambling, labor and business racketeering, and narcotics. A major focus is how the Capone gang -- one of twelve major bootlegging mobs in Chicago at the start of Prohibition--gained a virtual monopoly over organized crime in northern Illinois and beyond. Binder also describes the fight by federal and local authorities, as well as citizens' groups, against organized crime. In the process, he refutes numerous myths and misconceptions related to the Capone gang, other criminal groups, the St. Valentine's Day Massacre, and gangland killings. What emerges is a big picture of how Chicago's underworld evolved during this period. This broad perspective goes well beyond Capone and specific acts of violence and brings to light what was happening elsewhere in Chicagoland and after Capone went to jail. Based on 25 years of research and using many previously unexplored sources, this fascinating account of a bloody and colorful era in Chicago history will become the definitive work on the subject.

    I became a normal citizen. I became Joe Schmoe,' says Henry Hill, author of GANGSTERS AND GOODFELLAS and subject of WISEGUY, which was the inspiration for the blockbuster film GOODFELLAS.After a quarter of a century of silence, Hill can finally tell us the rest of the story, Gangsters and Goodfellas picks up where Wiseguy left off, taking readers on the crazy ride of Henry's life - hiding out in the Witness Protection Programme, doing prison time for drug charges, testifying in high-profile, heavily guarded mafia trials, leaving his wife and children and eventually ending up in the entertainment business. Including an exclusive selection of photographs from Henry's personal collection, Gangsters and Goodfellas also reveals Henry's lifelong struggle with addiction, his 'business' relationships that have ranged from mob bosses to movie producers and how, through everything, he survived: ' Its been a hell of a journey, and if I hadn't lived it myself, I would never believe it. I survived the mob. I survived the government, now I'm trying to survive Hollywood.

    Perhaps no man alive knows the inner workings and lifestyle of wiseguys better than Pistone does, having spent six years infiltrating the Mafia as an undercover FBI agent. Now, years later, Pistone reassesses what the underworld was really about. Occasionally poignant, always in shocking detail, The Way of the Wiseguy gives readers a first-hand look at the thinking, psychology, and customs that make wiseguys a unique breed. The book is divided into anecdotes that reveal key principles of wiseguy life, including "Don't Volunteer You Don't Know Something," "Be a Good Earner," "Look Like You Mean Business," "It's Your Best Friend Who Will Kill You," and much more. The stories-more than 80 of them-are spellbinding, and the insights into this lawless realm of badguys are often uncannily relevant to the workings of the legitimate world of big business and everyday social discourses. Includes CD with shocking undercover surveillance audio from the Donnie Brasco operation (with commentary by author Joe Pistone).

    Decades later, in the mid 1970's, they would meet again. By then, Connolly was a major figure in the FBI's Boston office and Whitey had become godfather of the Irish Mob. What happened next -- a dirty deal to being down the Italian mob in exchange for protection for Bulger -- would spiral out of control, leading to murders, drug dealing, racketeering indictments, and, ultimately, the biggest informant scandal in the history of the FBI.Compellingly told by two Boston Globe reporters who were on the case from the beginning, Black Mass is at once a riveting crime story, a cautionary tale about the abuse of power, and a penetrating look at Boston and its Irish population.

    His decision to flip prompted many others to make the same choice, including John Gotti's top aide, Salvatore "Sammy the Bull" Gravano, and his testimony sent more than fifty mobsters to prison.In Mob Boss, award-winning news reporters Jerry Capeci and Tom Robbins team up for this unparalleled account of D'Arco's life and the New York mob scene that he embraced for four decades.Until the day he switched sides, D'Arco lived and breathed the old-school gangster lessons he learned growing up in Brooklyn and fine-tuned on the mean streets of Little Italy. But when he learned he was marked to be whacked, D'Arco quit the mob. His defection decimated his crime family and opened a window on mob secrets going back a hundred years.After speaking with D'Arco, the authors reveal unprecedented insights, exposing shocking secrets and troublesome truths about a city where a famous pizza parlor doubled as a Mafia center for multi-million-dollar heroin deals, where hit men carried out murders dressed as women, and where kidnapping a celebrity newsman's son was deemed appropriate revenge for the father's satirical novel.Capeci and Robbins spent hundreds of hours in conversation with D'Arco, and exhausted many hours more fleshing out his stories in this riveting narrative that takes readers behind the famous witness testimony for a comprehensive look at the Mafia in New York City.

     In trunks, under floorboards, in remote ravines — even in their own beds — the bodies of those for whom their lovers’ passion proved fatal have been found, and often through the stench of decay. One ingenious killer boiled down his wife’s remains in a vat at his sausage factory. Another throttled and incinerated a perfect stranger in order to stage his own death and thus escape the charge of bigamy. Then there were the lesbian schoolgirls who bludgeoned to death the mother of one of them with a brick in a stocking. Her crime: she had tried to keep them apart. Whilst one woman kept her lover in a secret attic for years until he shot her husband dead. A dark narrative, Adrian Vincent expertly brings together some of the world’s most notorious killer. In sixteen fascinating case histories, Fatal Passions tells the true stories of those who have literally loved someone to death. Praise for Adrian Vincent ‘A skilfully written account’ – Kirkus Reviews. Adrian Vincent worked in Fleet Street for twenty-seven years, becoming managing editor of IPC’s educational magazines. He is the author of many books on art and antiques, novels and true crime.

    Now a journalist is following them.When Stieg Larsson died, the author of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo had been working on a true mystery that out-twisted his Millennium novels: the assassination on February 28, 1986, of Olof Palme, the Swedish prime minister. It was the first time in history that a head of state had been murdered without a clue who’d done it—and on a Stockholm street at point-blank range.Internationally known for his fictional far-right villains, Larsson was well acquainted with their real-life counterparts and documented extremist activities throughout the world. For years he’d been amassing evidence that linked their terrorist acts to what he called “one of the most astounding murder cases” he’d ever covered. Larsson’s archive was forgotten until journalist Jan Stocklassa was given exclusive access to the author’s secret project.In The Man Who Played with Fire, Stocklassa collects the pieces of Larsson’s true-crime puzzle to follow the trail of intrigue, espionage, and conspiracy begun by one of the world’s most famous thriller writers. Together they set out to solve a mystery that no one else could.

    Henry Holmes, one of the most notorious serial killers of all time, who in the late 1800's, murdered no less than 133 people. A fascinating view of this highly dangerous person from the time of his first murder, when he is only 12 years old, to his adult years when he built a huge, 105-room mansion in Chicago, with most of the space devoted to chambers for torture and death. But then an incredible chase begins, involving kidnapping and more murders when a detective gets on his trail.

    Felber (a doctoral candidate at Drew U.) recounts the doctor's early ties to criminals during his childhood in the Bronx, his participation in a

    We all famously recall where we were and what we were doing when JFK was assassinated, as well as the moments Elvis, Princess Diana, and Michael Jackson died. As for Marilyn Monroe, the candle flickered out long ago, but only now can the truth be told about how—and why—she died. After combing through thousands of recently declassified FBI files and interviewing key witnesses, crime analysts, and forensic experts during years of research, investigative writer David Gardner has unearthed new information that will transform the way we look at these iconic tragedies that have long fascinated and intrigued the general public. Legends: Murder, Lies, and Cover-Ups reveals that Elvis Presley died not as a self-obsessed caricature but as a genuine hero who may have signed his death warrant going undercover for the FBI; how Marilyn Monroe's secret affairs with JFK and his brother, Robert, left her in the crosshairs of a lethal conspiracy; why Princess Diana's death was no accident; who ordered President John F. Kennedy's assassination; and how on three occasions Michael Jackson “died” of painkiller drug overdoses in the months before his death. In the wake of new evidence and testimonies, Legends: Murder, Lies, and Cover-Ups provides many of the answers that have been elusive for so long, while explaining what it was about these enduring legends that made their legacies burn so bright.

    But when Mae’s beaten and mutilated corpse was found the next day in an abandoned house, her throat slashed and her face battered beyond recognition, the small town of Vandling was thrust into one of the most intensive police investigations in the history of Pennsylvania.The murder sent shock waves through the small town and surrounding area, holding residents hostage in the grips of a paralyzing fear. Who could have committed such a brutal crime against a child who was walking home from church? What kind of animal would discard a little girl like nothing more than trash?As police doggedly investigated the horrific murder, long before the use of DNA, computers, or modern forensic science, one key piece of evidence would lead them to 13-year-old Myron Semunchick. Brilliant, good looking, and extremely popular, Myron projected the image of the all American boy. He was also a cunning killer who murdered sadistically and almost got away with it.Little Girl Lost is the true story of one of the most notorious crimes in history. A case that made headlines across the United States and into Canada, it is also the story of the youngest person ever charged with 1st degree murder and sentenced to life in prison in the state of Pennsylvania.

    Now William F. Roemer, Jr., veteran FBI agent and scourge of the Cosa Nostra, tells the shocking story of how a teenage wiseguy grew up to become "the man" in Vegas. From the gritty streets of Chicago to the neon-lit Nevada wonderland, Roemer assembles a rogue's gallery of the highest-ranking capos and the lowest creeps of organized crime. As incredible as any work of fiction -- but it's all fact!

    Vinnie "Chin" Gigante displayed signs of insanity that stunned the public, stymied the police and the FBI, and secured his power for decades. Was he really crazy? Or crazy like a fox?Vincent "Chin" Gigante. He started out as a professional boxer--until he found his true calling as a ruthless contract killer. His doting mother's pet name for the boy evolved into his famous alias, "Chin," a nickname that struck fear throughout organized crime as he routinely ordered the murders of mobsters who violated the Mafia code--including a contract put out on Gambino family boss John Gotti. Vincent Gigante was hand-picked by Vito Genovese to run the Genovese Family when Vito was sent to prison. Chin raked in more than $100 million for the Genovese family, all while evading federal investigators. At the height of his power, he controlled an underworld empire of close to three hundred made men, extending from New York's Little Italy to the docks of Miami to the streets of Philadelphia--making the Genovese Family the most powerful in the U.S. And yet Vincent "Chin" Gigante was, to all outside appearances, certifiably crazy. A serial psychiatric hospital outpatient, he wandered the streets of Greenwich Village in a ratty bathrobe and slippers, sometimes adding a floppy cap to complete the ensemble. He urinated in public, played pinochle in storefronts, and hid a second family from his wife. On twenty-two occasions, he admitted himself to a mental hospital--evading criminal prosecution while insuring his continued reign as "The Oddfather." It took nearly thirty years of endless psychiatric evaluations by a parade of puzzled doctors for federal authorities to finally bring him down.This is an American Mafia story unlike any other--a strange and shocking account of one man's rise to power that's as every bit as colorful and bizarre as the man himself.