while permitting the boys to soak up the sun. Although most of Al Capone's wealth reverted to the Mafia, Al was nonetheless well provided for.
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Ralph lived well, so much so that during the Kefauver hearings he was grilled at great length. He really had few facts to contribute on organized crime, never having achieved anywhere near the status of a Lucky Luciano, Meyer Lansky or Al Capone, or the then active leadership of the Chicago Outfit, including Jake Guzik, Tony Accardo, Paul Ricca and Sam Giancana.
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Although Bottles Capone prospered because of his Capone relationship, his son, Ralph Jr. did not. Through his school years and college, his marriage and fatherhood, and a depressing series of jobs he abandoned once his true identity was established, young Ralph struggled to escape the Capone name. About a month after his father appeared before the Kefauver Committee in 1950, the son washed down a fatal number of cold tablets with a half quart of scotch.
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Ralph Sr. lived until 1974. Although long retired, he was still described in his eighties as a powerhouse in the mob. He wasn't, but he did die rich.
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Cardinella, Salvatore "Sam" (18801921): Black Hand murderer
Within Chicago's Little Italy, Salvatore Cardinella was better known as Il Diavolo, or "the Devil." An obese, violent criminal, Cardinella and his Black Hand gang were so feared by other mafiosi that it was said many paid him Black Hand extortion. The great bootleg gangs that sprang up immediately with the onset of Prohibition also were terrified of Cardinella and made certain not to cross him. It was estimated that the Cardinella mob killed at least 20 people who failed to meet their "pay or die'' extortion demands.
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Like other Black Handers, Cardinella operated with relative immunity from the Chicago police but, as the federal government began to prosecute extortionists for misuse of the United States mail, Cardinella shifted his operations more to holdups. Bolstering Il Diavolo's effort was his top triggerman, Nicholas Viana, nicknamed "the Choir Boy," a practiced if angelic-looking murderer at the age of 18.
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In 1921, after a long reign of terror, Cardinella and Viana along with Frank Campione, another of Il Diavolo's lieutenants, were convicted of murder. Considered a "live cannon" in the underworld, one who attracted too much heat, Cardinella's demise was met with nothing less than joy by the underworldhe was in short, too violent even for deadly Chicago gangsters.
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In his death cell, Cardinella plotted ways to survive and came up with an incredible plan for self-resuscitation. He went on a hunger strike, declaring the food at the Cook County Jail was slop. By the date of his execution he had dropped 40 pounds. Just minutes before Cardinella mounted the scaffold, police Lieutenant John Norton, the officer who had apprehended him, got an anonymous telephone call saying that Cardinella's allies "are going to revive him after the execution."
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Norton and a squad of detectives rushed to the jail and stopped a hearse which had arrived at a rear entrance to pick up Cardinella's body. Norton opened the back door of the hearse and found a white-clad doctor and nurse. There was also what could only be described as unusual contents for a hearse: a rubber mattress filled with hot water and heated with hotwater bottles; an oxygen tank; and a shelfful of syringes and stimulants.
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Norton rushed to the prison where he found Cardinella's corpse laid out on a slab while his relatives were hurriedly signing forms to take possession of the body. The police officer broke off the procedure, declaring the corpse would not be released for 24 hours. Cardinella's relatives broke into wild screaming and curses but could do nothing.
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Later, examination of the corpse by doctors indicated Cardinella's hunger strike had had the desired effect. Cardinella's neck had not been broken due to the lightness of his body. He had died of strangulation. The medical men agreed that if the body had received sufficient heat quickly after the execution, it was possible that Cardinella might have been revived.
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There was considerable speculation on the source of the tip to Lieutenant Norton. It was almost certain to have come from underworld elements who didn't want Cardinella back in circulation. Those who learned of the bizarre plot evidently did not feel that omerta, the Mafia code of silence, applied.
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Carfano, Anthony: See Pisano, Little Augie.
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Carolla, Sylvestro "Sam" (18961972): Early New Orleans Mafia boss
New Orleans has been described by crime historians as having the oldest and least harassed Mafia family in the United States. It has also been called the most restrictive, the least hospitable to uninvited incursions. The boss who really established this tradition was Sylvestro "Sam" Carolla, who succeeded the man often described as the first real Mafia boss, Charley Matranga.
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Sam Carolla set the pattern for the tough New Orleans mafioso type, a trait well demonstrated when in 1929 Al Caponeunhappy because Carolla would not supply his Chicago operation with imported booze, instead favoring a rival Chicago mafioso named Joey
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