Al Capone Biography
by Krysta CardinaleAl Capone was an infamous American gangster in the 1920’s and 30’s also known by the name “Scarface”. Born in Brooklyn, New York was where he started his career as a so called “used furniture dealer.” Capone then moved to Chicago, Illinois where he became the city’s most notorious mafia figure. By the end of the 1920’s he was placed on the FBI’s “Most Wanted List.” Capone’s activities helped Chicago gain the reputation of a “lawless city” during the Prohibition Era.
The Al Capone history dates back to January 17, 1899 when Gabriel Capone and his wife Teresina Raiola gave birth to their son Alphonsus Capone in Brooklyn, New York. Al Capone was one of seven sons and also had two sisters. The Al Capone biography of crime began at an early age. During his teen years Capone was involved in 2 different gangs, the “Brooklyn Rippers” and the “Forty Thieves Juniors.” After getting in a fight with his teacher at 14 years old, Capone quit school and began picking up odd jobs around town including a candy store clerk and a bowling alley pin boy. After his stint with petty crimes, Capone takes a serious turn deep into crime as he joined the “Five Points Gang” of Manhattan headed by Frankie Yale. As part of Yale’s gang, Capone worked as a bartender and bouncer for the Harvard Inn. At this time, he got into a knife fight with Frank Gallucio after making advances toward his sister. During this fight Capone suffered a slash to his right cheek; this scar gave him the infamous nickname “Scarface.” In 1918 Al Capone met and married his wife, Mary “Mae” Coughlin a young Irish girl. That year they also gave birth to their son Albert “Sonny” Francis Capone.
Capone continued working for Yale, where he is believed to have committed his first two homicides. He also had his first arrest around this time for disorderly conduct. After Capone sent a rival gangster to the hospital, Frankie Yale sent his protégé to Chicago to cool down for a bit. In 1919 the Capone’s moved to Chicago where Al began working for Yale’s mentor, Joe Torrio. Noticing Capone’s potential, Torrio had him assist in his bootlegging business. By 1922, Scarface was Torrio’s number two man and a full partner in his gambling houses, saloons, and prostitution rackets.
In 1925 Joe Torrio was severely injured in an assassination attempt. Torrio not only moved back to Italy all together, but he also gave Capone his “business.” This is when the Al Capon history as a boss began. Even though new, Capone had the trust and respect of his men, known to them as “the Big Fellow.” Now, Al Capone became a folk hero, as according to the legend, when he came into power. He put the Black Hand out of business; his troops by murders, threats and violence, and being stronger put them out of business. And then of course Capone became the big man in prohibition. To Al Capone prohibition was just something else to make him money. He controlled the booze, he controlled the cops, he controlled the Mayor, and he controlled a lot of politicians. Capone said it out that there was no doubt that he was going to be the king of prohibition and he did. He was going to get rid of anybody who tried to get in this business. In 1928 Capone bought himself and his family a retreat in Palm Springs, Florida.
There were many attempts at Al Capone’s life, but none of them were ever even close to a success. The Al Capone history of his spy network ran too deep and too loyal consisting of newspaper boys to policemen. Another reason would be that he never let anyone get too powerful. If Scarface began noticing the success of another “boss” he either had him killed or did it himself carefully staked out and never caught.
Al Capone St. Valentine’s Day Massacre
The year 1929 holds place to seven of the most notorious gang-related killings ever. The Al Capone history highlights the Al Capone St. Valentine’s Day Massacre as his best. Four of Capone’s henchmen walked into the building headquarters of rival gang leader George “Bugs” Moran. The Al Capone prohibition left no room for rival liquor sellers. Moran’s men believed the incident to be a police raid because Capone had two of his men dressed in police uniforms. After the men dropped their weapons and faced the wall, a stream of 150 bullets was placed into 7 men. The intended Bugs was across the street at the time of the event and stayed clear after seeing the police uniforms. No one was ever charged with these 7 murders, and Capone of course had an alibi since he was said to be at his new Palm Springs home.
There wasn’t just the Al Capone St. Valentine’s Day Massacre side to the infamous mobster; there was also a more generous side. Al Capone was considered to some as the Prohibition Era’s Robin Hood. After the collapse of the stock market crash in 1929, Capone opened numbers of soup kitchens and ordered merchants to give clothes to the poor and needy at his own expense.
The Collapse of the Notorious Al Capone
Due to gangland tradition, Al Capone could never be prosecuted for most of his crimes. In 1926 he was arrested for the murder of three people but could not be held for more than a day due to insufficient evidence. However, Capone eventually had to serve a short sentence for having a gun in 1929. In 1930, the Al Capone biography came to a peak. He was in the prime of his power, headed a list of the world’s 28 worst criminals, and became “Public Enemy Number 1.”
A popular belief of the 20’s and 30’s was that any income from gambling was thought to be excluded from income tax; however in 1927 the Sullivan ruling stated that it was. Capone continued to avoid the federal income tax by doing everything through his front men without putting his name on anything. The government continued their attempt to indict Al Capone on tax evasion charges. The IRS ordered their own Frank Wilson to focus on the Capone case. Wilson accidentally came across a cash receipt that happened to have Al Capone’s name on it. In addition to this Capone’s own tax lawyer, Lawrence P. Mattingly wrote a letter to the government stating Capone had an income.
In 1931, Capone was indicted for income tax evasion for the years 1925 through 1929 and was also charged with the misdemeanor of failing to file tax returns for the years 1928 and 1929. A third charge of conspiracy to violate Prohibition laws from 1922 to 1931 was added. Capone initially pleased guilty of all three charges in belief he would be able to plea bargain out of it. The judge refused to do nothing of the sort, so Capone changed his plea to not guilty and attempted to bribe the jury. The jury panel however was changed at the very last minute before the trial. Al Capone was convicted of only five of his twenty-three counts, and the judge sentenced him to ten years in federal prison and one year in county jail.
In Al Capone’s last days, before he was convicted and sent to prison, he was more or less a front man for the mob and there were other leaders that called the shots. Now, he had Paul DeLucia, we call him Paul "the Waiter" Ricca. Ricca was probably the most powerful gangster we’ve ever had in the history of this nation. And Frank Nitti was another; these were the two that really controlled Al Capone’s business once he was gone. Jack Guzick, who was Jewish, was the brain behind Al Capone. Then he had Murray Humphreys, a Welshman, who died, when he was being arrested, of a heart attack after being indicted in the 1950’s. These were the ones, they wind up becoming more or less like a Board of Directors after Al Capone went to prison, but before he went to prison he still made sure he was controlling things.
In May 1932 Capone was sent to the toughest known federal prison located in Atlanta. Even here Capone was able to take control and make friends. Capone’s cell was furnished with such things as a mirror, rugs, and a type-writer. Once the word spread, Capone was moved to Alcatraz, a maximum security prison off the coast of San Francisco. In Chicago they never really believed that Capone would do any time at all after he was convicted on the income tax fraud. There was a big show of taking Capone to prison; they had guards all around him, heavy security. They got him out of San Francisco, and then he had to take a boat from San Francisco out to an island in the middle of San Francisco Bay called Alcatraz. At that time, Alcatraz was the maximum-security prison. They sent only the hardest, toughest criminals in the United States to that prison. And of course, in no time at all Al Capone was the great godfather of the prison. He had much respect from all the other prisoners, and he was sort of like folk hero to them. They looked at him as modern Robin Hood, and he became a tourist attraction in San Francisco.
By his fifth year in prison, Al Capone’s mind started to come apart. They said he had a disease and his brain was affected by the disease. However, he also was going crazy from being locked up and it’s called “stir-crazy” among the prisoners. After Capone began to show this signs of dementia he was moved to a hospital were he spent the rest of his felony sentence. Once his prison time expired on January 6, 1939 he served his misdemeanor charge at a Federal Correctional Facility in California. Al Capone was finally release on November 16, 1939. He looked like he had aged 50 years, and he was incoherent. They took Capone down to the airport, put him on a plane and sent him back to his home in Florida. He spent the rest of his life in Florida. His body and his mind continued to deteriorate and the Al Capone history ends on January 25, 1947. He first suffered from a stroke on the 21st, and began to recover but then fail sick to pneumonia and died to a heart attack only four days later.
Al Capone was buried in Mount Olivet Cemetery between the graves of his father, Gabriel, and brother, Frank, on Chicago’s far South Side. However, the remains of the family were moved to Mount Carmel Cemetery in March 1950 in Hillside, Illinois just west of Chicago.
