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Zusatztext “At least as good as Mario Puzo! with shades of David Mamet or even Arthur Miller.” —New York Daily News “Beautifully done! not only strange and fascinating but even touching.” —Robert Daley! author of Prince of the City Informationen zum Autor Joseph F. O’Brien was a highly decorated special agent of the FBI for nearly twenty years. With his partner Andris Kurins, he led a wiretap and investigation that brought down the infamous Gambino crime family. He is the co-author with Kurins of Boss of Bosses: The FBI and Paul Castellano . Andris Kurins was a special agent in the FBI’s organized crime unit and was a leader in the Gambino crime family’s prosecution and trials. He is currently the owner and CEO of Diversified Investigative Services, LLC. Klappentext "At least as good as Mario Puzo, with shades of David Mamet or even Arthur Miller."-New York Daily News Paul Castellano headed New York's immensely powerful Gambino crime family for more than ten years. On December 16, 1985, he was gunned down in a spectacular shooting on Manhattan's fashionable East Side. At the time of his death, Paul Castellano was under indictment. So were most of the major Mafia figures in New York. Why? Because in 1983 the FBI had hidden a microphone in the kitchen of Castellano's Staten Island mansion. The 600 hours of recorndings led to eight criminal trials. And this book. Agents Joe O'Brien and Andris Kurins planted that mike. They listened to the voices. Now they bring you the most revealing look inside the Mafia ever . . . in the Mafia's own words. "Beautifully done, not only strange and fascinating but even touching."-Robert Daley, author of Prince of the City Leseprobe Introduction On December 16, 1985, at approximately five forty-five in the evening, Paul Castellano, the most powerful gangster in America -- the Mafia's Boss of Bosses -- was gunned down on a busy Manhattan street, along with his driver, bodyguard, and underboss, Thomas Bilotti. The rubout was a classic instance of how the Mob deals with difficult questions of succession, and with qualms about internal security. Castellano had been at the top of the Mafia pyramid for nine years, since the 1976 death of his cousin and brother-in-law, Carlo Gambino. His reign had been a time of prosperity and relative stability for New York racketeers. But now Big Paul was seventy years old, and had diabetes, high blood pressure, and heart trouble. Unprecedented legal pressures were being brought to bear on him. He was a man beset, and he was tired; according to some, his grip on reality was loosening. Some of his associates hated him, and he knew it. Being hated was not in itself a problem. It went with the job. Being hated without being feared, however, was dangerous, and Castellano was coming to realize that some of his young lieutenants -- most especially the cocky and ambitious John Gotti -- no longer feared him. Or rather, they feared not his strength but his possible weakening. At the time of his death, Paul Castellano was on trial for running a stolen car ring and conspiring to commit murder. These charges, while serious enough, said less about the full gamut of Castellano's crimes than about the government's subtle and painstaking strategy of building cases against him piece by piece, one by one. He had already been indicted, arrested, and freed on bail in the famous Commission case, which would come to trial in 1986, and would essentially dismantle the Mob's entire leadership structure. The even more personally damning Castaway case, stemming from the bugging of Castellano's residence, was also being readied. The bottom line was that, win or lose, Big Paul would be in and out of court for years, and this made his underlings very nervous. Unlike younger Mafiosi, whose mettle was...
