Joe Bruno's Mobsters - Six Volume Set (24 page)

At Sing
Sing, Appo was reunited with his father, who went in and out of lucidity. The senior Appo was normal on most days, but on his bad days, he was delirious and said things like “I am King of the World.”

In Sing
Sing, Appo was given a job in the laundry room as a “presser” of shirts. After Appo accidentally burned one of the shirts, Appo's teeth were knocked out by one of the guards. Then three guards took Appo to the guard room, handcuffed him from behind and forced him to lay face down on a paddleboard table. There Appo was given nine sharp lashes with an oar on his back and spine, rendering him unconscious.

When
Appo regained consciousness, the head keeper said to him, “Do you think you can go back and do your work all right now? If you don't, we have a way to make you.”

Appo told the keeper, “You punished me for nothing, and the next time I am brought here you will punish me for something.”

Appo stumbled back to the laundry shop. He immediately took the shirts that were on his table waiting to be ironed, and he put them in a hot stove where they soon were reduced to ashes. After his dirty deed was discovered, Appo was brought back to the guard room. When he was asked why he did what he had done, Appo refused to answer. Appo was immediately taken to one of the “dark cells,” where he was imprisoned for 14 days. During those 14 days, Appo was given two ounces of bread and a glass of water every 24 hours.

After serving 30 months in Sing
Sing, Appo was released on April 2, 1876. He immediately went back to picking pockets.

During the next eight years, Appo was arrest
ed twice more for pickpocketing. Both times he was convicted and returned to prison; the last time on Blackwell's Island.

Appo escaped from B
lackwell's Island by shimmying down a rope from the ship where he was working to the water down below. Appo jumped into a small rowboat, and he rowed until he docked in downtown Manhattan. Appo immediately sunk the boat, and he made his way to Mulberry Street where he was able to borrow some clothes.

The next day Appo absconded to Philadelphia.

Appo did very well picking pockets in Philadelphia. But the lure of his old haunts in downtown Manhattan, especially the opium dens, was too much to resist. Back in the Sixth Ward, Appo decided to deviate from his usual pickpocketing and engage himself in the flimflam business. Appo's chief swindle was giving store owners the wrong change for a $10 or $20 bill. This racket went fine for a while, until Appo was caught in a jewelry shop shorting the owner. However, through the machinations of the nefarious law firm of Howe and Hummel, Appo was somehow able to escape prison time.             

In the early 1890's, catching pickpockets and flimflam men became the favorite pastime of the New York City police. So A
ppo decided to try a new scheme, a scheme in which he was less likely to be arrested. This scheme was called “The Green Goods Swindle.”

The Green Goods Swindle was a three-pronged operation. It started with the “operators,” or the bosses, who hired “writers,” who wrote circulars to be sent to all parts of the country. The basis of these circulars was to entice people to agree to purchase counterfeit money. The green goods circular contained wording something similar to this:

“I am dealing in articles, paper goods – ones, twos, fives, 10's, and 20's – (do you understand?). I cannot be plainer until I know your heart is true to me. Then I will satisfy you that I can furnish you with a fine, safe, and profitable article that can be used in any manner and for all purposes, and no danger.”

The writers would also include in the circular the prices for their goods. A typical price list read:

For $1,200 in my goods (Assorted) I charge $100. For $2,500 in my goods (Assorted) I charge $200. For $5,000 in my goods (Assorted) I charge $350. For $10,000 in my goods (Assorted) I charge $600.”

These circulars were sent to people from around the country who had invested in various lotteries. The feeling of the operators was that these were the types of people who most likely would do something illegal for monetary profit.

Confederate soldiers were also sent circulars. New York City assistant district attorney Ambrose Purdy explained why.

“Former Confederates were so emotionally embittered and economically indebted, that they viewed green goods as a
good way to hurt the government,” Purdy said.

Once communication had been established between the “marks” and the operator, the marks were directed to take a train to New York City, or to the nearby suburbs. There the marks would meet the third cog in the Green Goods Swindle, who was called the “steerer.”

The steerer, one of whom was George Appo, would meet the marks at the railroad station and take them to the operator, or the “turning point,” who was waiting for the mark, either at a bogus storefront, or in a hotel room. The operator would show the marks a sample of his “counterfeit” money, which was actually legal tender. The mark, being satisfied that the money certainly looked legal, would give the operator the money that had been agreed upon to purchase the “queer bills.”

The operator would then put the bogus counterfeit money into a cheap suitcase. A diversion would then occur, temporarily deflecting the mark's attention. During this diversion, the operator would switch the suitcase and replace it with an identical one given to him by one of his confederates. Of course, the second suitcase was f
illed with plain ordinary paper and sometimes even sand.

At this point, the job of the steerer was to get the mark quickly out of town, before the mark realized he had been swindled. As added insurance, the operator sometimes emplo
yed the services of a local cop or a detective, and sometimes even several local cops or detectives.

If the steerer had a problem with the marks, either on the way to the train station, or on the train before it le
ft the station, the crooked lawman would jump in and threaten the mark with arrest if the mark didn't leave town immediately. The mark would have no recourse, since he had been attempting an illegal transaction in the first place.             

One such green goods swindle almost cost George Appo his life.

In February 1893, Appo was working a green goods swindle with Jim McNally as his operator. Appo was directed by McNally to meet two men at a hotel in Poughkeepsie, New York. Appo went to the New York Hotel in Poughkeepsie, and he entered the room of two men named Hiram Cassel and Ira Hogshead, both shady entrepreneurs from North Carolina.

Appo gave the men a letter identifying Appo as the connection between the Old Gentleman (the operator) and the two men. Appo said that he would take the two men to the train station to board a train for Mott Haven, where they would see the counterfeit money they were purchasing. After the transaction was completed, Appo said he would take the men directly to th
e train station, pay their fare and send them on their way back home. Appo told the men that on the way to the train station, they must walk 10 feet behind Appo, and they must speak to no one, including Appo.

Appo arrived at the train station first, soon followed by Hiram Cassel. However, Ira Hogshead had stopped
just short of the train station and was talking to a policeman; the same policeman who recently had a fallout with Jim McNally over his cut in a previous swindle.

Appo approached Hogshead and asked him why he was speaking to the policeman.

Hogshead said, “I don't care to do business. I've changed my mind.”

Appo walked the men back to their hotel room, where Hogshead insisted the deal was done. Hogshead demanded that Appo leave the hotel room immediat
ely, or there would be trouble.

Appo said he would do what Hogshead had requested, and as Appo was shaking Cassel's hand, Hogshead shot Appo in the right temple. Appo was taken to the hospital in critical condition. In a few days, Appo's right eye became infected and
it had to be removed.

Cassel and Hogshead went on trial for
the shooting of Appo. However, since Appo, true to the code of a “good fellow,” refused to testify against the two men, which prompted the judge to release Cassel and Hogshead with a simple $50 fine. Appo, however, was arrested for running the green goods swindle, and he was sentenced to three years and two months at hard labor. In addition, Appo was fined $250.

Luckily for Appo, after spending only a few months in Clinton Prison, on November 28, 1893, the New York Court of Appeals overturned Appo's conviction.

Feeling betrayed by Jim McNally and by green goods operators in general, Appo agreed to testify before the Lexow Committee, which was looking into police corruption and police involvement in the green goods swindle in particular.

Appo didn't tell the committee anything they didn't already know, but he was branded a rat on the streets of New York City. As a result, Appo was shunned by the very people he had done business with for many years.

George Appo caught a break, when in September of 1894, he was approached by George W. Lederer, a renowned theater producer. Lederer offered Appo a part in his new play entitled “In the Tenderloin,” in which Appo was to simply play himself, in a play about New York City's underbelly.

Appo toured the country in this play for several years, but when the play's run ended, Appo was stiffed by Lederer for $15,000 in unpaid salary. Although he tried for several years, Appo never did collect his money.

At the start of the 20
th
century, George Appo decided to live free of crime. He worked as a car cleaner at Grand Central Terminal, and also as a handyman at Calvary Church, the Sallade dress factory, and in the home of millionaire reformer Alexander Hadden.

In 1915, during the government's investigations of opium dens, Appo began
secretly working for the government. Appo received a salary of six dollars a month, in addition to another six dollars a month for rent for his apartment. Soon, Appo's salary was increased to $10 a month.

In his final years, little was heard about George Appo. What is known, is that Appo lived in a sm
all apartment in Hell's Kitchen on the west side of Manhattan.

On August 10, 1929, George Appo was admitted to the Manhattan State Hospital on Wards Island. By
that time, Appo was nearly deaf and almost blind.

On May 17, 1930, even though he had been shot four times, sta
bbed twice (once in the throat) and brutally beaten in prison, George Appo died at the age of 73 from nothing more than old age.

B
onanno, Joseph – The Youngest American Mafia Boss Ever

Joseph Charles Bonanno was
born on January 18, 1905, in Castellammare del Golfo, a small town on the West Coast of Sicily. When he was three years old, his father, Salvatore Bonanno, moved his family to the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn. They lived in Brooklyn for about 10 years, but then Salvatore, caught in a jam with the cops, was forced to move his family back to Sicily.

In Sicily, Salvatore Bonanno was said to have been involved in Mafia activities. His son Joseph fol
lowed in his father's footsteps and was also heavily involved with the Mafia. In 1924, to avoid Mussolini's attack on the Mafia, Joseph Bonanno escaped from Sicily by taking a boat to Havana, Cuba. In Havana, Bonanno stowed away on a Cuban fishing boat, which landed him illegally in Tampa, Florida.

Now in America, Bonanno headed north. He had a scare in Jacksonville, Florida, where he was briefly detained by immigration officials. Bonanno somehow talked his way out of this jam, and he traveled as quickly as he could to New York City.

In New York City, Bonanno quickly hooked up with other mobsters from Castellammare del Golfo, who had already established an illegal foothold in America. True or not, Bonanno told the people from his hometown that his father, Salvatore, was a big Mafioso in Sicily. This eased Bonanno's move into the bootlegging business.

Bonanno moved quickly up the ranks, and soon he became the boss of his own small crime family. Another Italian mobster tried to move into Bonanno's territory, necessitating a sitdown, which was presided over by three powerful mob bosses, including Bonanno's cousin
, Stefano Magaddino - the Mafia boss in upstate Buffalo, and Salvatore Maranzano, the highest-ranking Mafioso, who was from Bonanno's hometown of Castellammare del Golfo. Having the deck stacked in his favor, Bonanno won the sitdown, and he was allowed to keep control of his family, in addition to gaining control of the opposing gangster's family.

In 1927, Maranzano became involved in a bloody all-out Mafia war
against Joe “The Boss” Masseria for control of all the rackets on the East Coast of the United States. This was known as the “Castellammarese War.” By this time, Bonanno had risen to the rank of Maranzano's right-hand man, or captain. Charles “Lucky” Luciano occupied the same position with Masseria's crew.

Maranzano approached Luciano wit
h the offer of leaving Masseria and joining Maranzano's forces. Luciano, seeing the writing on the wall and also because Masseria frowned on Luciano's alliances with non-Sicilians like Meyer Lansky and Bugsy Siegel, agreed to kill Masseria so that Maranzano would now be the No. 1 Mafia boss in America.

Luciano lured Masseria to a little Italian restaurant
on Coney Island. There, while Luciano was relieving himself in the men's room, Bugsy Siegel, along with three of his best killers, burst in and shot Masseria dead.