by Sam Giancana
At the time, it all went over Chuck’s head. Years later, Mooney would confide that Father Cash, the young priest Mooney used as a courier around Chicago, also served in that capacity for an enormous international money-laundering venture that funneled money all the way to the Vatican. But it was another ambitious young priest, Paul Marcinkus, a big ape of a man born and raised in Capone’s Cicero, whom Mooney had referred to when he spoke of “Chicago guys workin’ in the diocese.” In 1952, Stritch would recommend that Marcinkus be sent to the Vatican, where he would eventually rise to bishop and secretary of the Vatican bank, reaching the highest position of any American in the Church’s history. At that pinnacle, Marcinkus would be accused of international money laundering and subsequently associated with the death of at least one uncooperative man, Pope John Paul I.
Chuck stood up to leave. Like everyone else surrounding Mooney, he would do exactly as he was told—and he wouldn’t complain or ask too many questions. He left Mooney’s office that day, unhappy with Mooney’s order to go to work as a projectionist, but if that’s what Mooney wanted, he’d close down his machines. He had to believe that he’d get his chance sooner or later.
For the remainder of 1949 and throughout 1950, Chuck went to work like most normal people. He missed the action, the hustle of the streets. And it perpetually worried him that the job of motion-picture operator was known to be the final resting place for Syndicate guys’ relatives. “Once a guy gets in the booth, it’s like a fuckin’ coffin—he never gets out,” Chuckie Nicoletti teased.
Fortunately, Mooney gave him a job now and then. The phone would ring and Mooney would deliver a cryptic message: “Go by the Fat Boy’s place and pick up six loaves. Take a short one to the guy out west, a long one to the guy downtown, and bring the other four to me.”
Such coded messages were second nature to a kid from the Patch like Chuck. Anybody who’d grown up on the streets knew that all the gang members talked that way. It wasn’t so much that they were paranoid about phone conversations—often they talked in riddles face-to-face. If you didn’t belong, you didn’t understand.
There were rules, too. You never mentioned a guy’s real name. Instead, you said “that guy out west” or used a nickname. Tony Accardo’s was “J.B.,” Murray Humphreys was Curly, or the Camel. Mooney’s was everything from Mo to “the Cigar” and “the Hoop”—identifying him as the Syndicate’s big wheel. Every place or thing of any importance at all had some sort of code name.
Amused by his young wife’s naïveté, Chuck would repeat it all to her—she had no idea what it meant. “Loaves are money, Babe,” he’d tease. “Short ones are light . . . you know, less. Long ones are nice and fat . . . stacks of cash. The Fat Boy is Fat Leonard and he’ll have it all divided out for me when I get there. So now, all I have to do is deliver.”
He’d pick up a few C notes from Mooney when he made the delivery, and it kept them going. But it was penny-ante stuff. Chuck lay awake nights thinking about how he could possibly provide all the things he wanted for his family. Mooney seemed unconcerned, as if he thought Chuck had a gold mine stashed away somewhere. But the truth was, Chuck had no idea what the hell to do. All he knew was the street, the Syndicate, Mooney’s world. He hated himself for being so dependent on Mooney; it made him just like any other common greaseball soldier.
When Chuck learned they were expecting their first child in the spring, he nearly panicked. His life had become tedious, no longer filled with nightly soirees in ritzy clubs. And when Christmas rolled around, it nearly killed him to tell Anne Marie that they would have to tighten their belts. From Chuck’s perspective, the gin rummy parties at Ange’s that meant their acceptance into the inner circle were a two-edged sword. The women Anne Marie now associated with sported full-length furs and five-carat diamonds. His little Babe probably had expected she’d have the same, which made their financial situation all the more demoralizing.
Anne Marie, too, saw her relationship with the inner circle of Outfit wives as a mixed blessing. She was young enough to be any one of their daughters—her aunts regularly played cards with Ange—which meant she always had to demonstrate respect for their stature and experience. Because of that, she knew she never would be accepted as “one of the girls.”
And she couldn’t turn to the younger Bonnie and Annette for friendship. It had become clear shortly after her marriage to Chuck that Mooney’s daughters would always think of her as the family servant of their childhood; they would always hold her in disdain.
Interestingly, the other Giancana women were not a part of Ange’s exclusive club. Ange was polite but avoided socializing with Josie, Mary, Vicki, Antoinette, and Pepe’s wife, Marie. Accordingly, Anne Marie had felt an initial surge of pride at being singled out by Ange. However, pride soon turned to nagging guilt whenever she found herself faced with Chuck’s sisters. Ange had placed a wall between them that would always serve to separate.
Ironically, even as Anne Marie recognized that her relationship with Ange was the alienating factor in her relationship with Chuck’s sisters, she realized that Ange regularly condescended to her. The condescension made its presence felt in typical female fashion: in a haughty downward glance at Anne Marie’s less expensive dress, in a tiny sniff of amusement at Anne Marie’s youthful faux pas, in the slightly raised eyebrow women use to demonstrate their superiority.
Chuck and Anne Marie were staggeringly well off compared with other American couples in 1949. Still, they both knew that what they had was paltry next to the luxuries enjoyed by other gang members and their wives.
As the holidays drew near, Chuck’s heart sank as he listened to Anne Marie recount stories of her shopping trips with Ange, how Ange was having this dress or that coat specially designed by Georgianna Jordan, Chicago’s reigning fashion maven. He saw her youthful desire for life’s finer things kindled and he couldn’t fault her for thinking she should have the same. After all, he was Mooney’s brother.
The clock was ticking on his life—he forgot the illusion of ever equaling Mooney’s stature in the Syndicate. Now, he only wanted to bask in it, share in the opportunity his brother’s contacts provided. “I think I’ll go into business for myself,” he told Anne Marie. “Maybe Mooney can open a few doors. Maybe I’ll build some six-flat apartments.” It was his secret dream to be a builder and run his own show.
Anne could tell he was discouraged. “Well then, ask Mooney . . . he’ll help . . . your chance will come, Chuck, I’m sure of it,” she’d say cheerfully, still exuberant with the possibilities the future held. Determined to change his situation, he paid his brother a visit.
Mooney’s house was adorned in all its finery for Christmas. A lush, elegantly decorated tree twinkled invitingly in the living room; wreaths of fresh-scented pine sprinkled with sprigs of mistletoe and holly graced the doorways. Mooney greeted him; he was in an unusually festive mood and led him down to the basement, glass of eggnog in hand.
“So, how’s it goin’? Theater job doin’ all right?” he asked as he sat down behind his desk.
“Well,” Chuck began almost haltingly. “That’s why I came over. I’d like to take a shot at starting my own business. Go into construction, build a few apartments, some stores . . . somethin’ like that.” He smiled. “Besides, you always said I did a hell of a job remodeling this house.”
“Yeah, I did say that. You know how to get a job done right. No question about that.” Mooney gazed past him in momentary thought. “I think you’re on to somethin’. It’s a-damn good idea for you to be in business.” He rose from his chair. “I’ll keep my eyes and ears open. If somethin’ comes up”—he rounded the desk and put his arm around Chuck, now standing—“I’ll let you know. For now, keep up the good work at the theater.”
Within moments, Chuck found himself driving back home. He didn’t know what he’d expected, but “keep up the good work” wasn’t it. Mooney obviously wanted him right where he was for now—and had no intention of making a change. If he stru
ck out on his own, without his brother’s permission, he was afraid it would be all over between them. He’d be on his own all right—totally on his own. He guessed nobody in the family or the gang had ever done that. If one of the guys had, he was now safely buried out in the county. As Mooney’s brother, it was unthinkable. It would be a sign of blatant disrespect. But now, the thought fleetingly crossed his mind. He pushed it away; being Mooney’s brother gave him an added responsibility; maybe it was an honor. But whatever it was, it left him with no choice other than to bide his time.
During the winter of 1950, Chuck tried to be patient. He made a point of dropping by to see Mooney two and three times a week. Occasionally, he made some extra money making deliveries for him. And he stopped by the Syndicate bars for a drink every day, knowing it was important to stay on the grapevine. Besides, he didn’t know where else to go, or what else to do. His world revolved around Mooney.
In February, while Chuck was wasting away at the Cosmo theater in a darkened booth, the world continued to turn. People were talking about a Commie-chasing senator named McCarthy, who had put together a list of subversives. Chuck almost gleefully announced to Mooney one day, “Well, I bet McCarthy’s a guy who can’t be bought.”
Mooney snorted and replied, “He sure as hell can be used, though.”
“Used?” Chuck was incredulous. “How can a hardass like McCarthy be used by anybody but Commie-haters?” “Chuck, nothin’s ever what it seems. Chiang Kai-shek? He’s mob. Chinese mob. Goes back to General MacArthur. See, these guys up top know that, in the name of patriotism, Americans will do anything, go anywhere . . . they just gotta have an enemy. Shit, the guys up top’ll make one up if they have to. So now the enemy is communism. This McCarthy guy gets people riled up while our country’s secret agents stir up a supposed Commie threat, people read about it in the newspapers . . . and boom . . . they’ll back a war one hundred percent. Murray Humphreys tells me things you wouldn’t believe.” Mooney was adamant. “Chuck, don’t be a fuckin’ patsy . . . the politicians know what’s goin’ on . . . mostly because half of’em have some investment, just like we do, in countries with names you’ve never even heard of. You watch, this Commie crap will get people up in arms. . . . If anything threatens business as usual over there . . . well, our great and powerful President will do somethin’ about it. All he’s gotta do is yell ‘Commie’ and every red-blooded American will lay down their lives . . . and for what? So a few fat-cat politicians and businessmen . . . and a few guys like me can make a killin’. We all have too big an investment to let some rum-dum slant-eyed bastard overthrow the government and screw it up. And it’s gettin’ to the point that if the guy is already in power and we want him out, we’ll take care of him . . . one way or another. There’s too big an investment.” “What kind of investment?” Chuck had lost his initial bravado and was now captivated by Mooney’s story.
“Well it isn’t fuckin’ steel mills, I’ll tell you that. For some investors, it’s the cheap”—he hesitated—“well, I call it slave labor. For other guys, it’s real estate.” He opened his desk drawer. “See this?”
Chuck nodded. It was the most beautiful square-cut emerald pinky ring he’d ever seen. The stone was huge.
“Twenty-two carats. This could buy a house . . . forty Gs.”
“Jesus Christ.” Chuck whistled. “Forty thousand dollars.”
“Now, this is what I call a fuckin’ present. A real beauty. And you know who gave it to me?”
“No.”
“King Farouk, that’s who. I’m workin’ with him.” He paused to let the implications sink in. “Chuck, all these foreign bastards that are our fuckin’ U.S. allies . . . all they care about is linin’ their own pockets. They get paid off and they make sure things stay nice and quiet. All over the world it’s like that.”
“What about communism? They gotta care about that. I mean, about their people. Right?”
Mooney broke out laughing. “You’re readin’ too many newspapers,” he taunted. “That’s what you’re supposed to think. Nobody in the Syndicate or the government cares what the guy in charge really believes or how oppressed the people there are. Nobody cares about whether or not the people are living in some democracy. The bottom line is money and power. Just like it is here in this country.”
Chuck shook his head.
“Hey, this is business, Chuck. With Farouk, it’s business. There’s oil in the Middle East; I got a piece myself. There’re gambling opportunities in Iran. In Beirut. We keep Farouk happy and he’ll make sure his friends around the desert do the same. Remember the guy I told you about with cigarettes in the Philippines? Well, he’s got a string of contacts lined up for all kinds of shit . . . opium, for one. New York is probably gonna go in on it. Hell, they got more dope-usin’ shines up there than we do in Chicago.”
“Opium? I thought all the guys were against narcotics?”
“In our neighborhoods, sure . . . but shines want it and somebody’s gotta supply it. So it might as well be us. But that’s nothin’. There’s shit they do over in Asia that would make your hair stand on end. Our guy in the Philippines was tellin’ me that in Manila a dollar buys you a blowjob from a two-year-old. Christ Almighty, there are even babies you can screw. Can you believe it? Orientals are fuckin’ animals. Shit, you can buy a girl there and do anything you want with her . . . kill her if you want. . . . Nobody cares in those fuckin’ hellholes. Life is cheap. And where life is cheap, politicians are cheap.”
The image of Cuba flashed through Chuck’s mind. “It sounds worse than Cuba.”
“Cuba?” Mooney cackled. “Things are straight down there. Cuba is heaven compared to some of these other places. You got people eatin’ raw monkey brains and drinkin’ snake blood in Asia. They screw dogs and babies over there. They got a mob, mostly out of Japan, the Yakuza . . . that are some of the meanest motherfuckers I’ve ever seen. They’ll do anything for a buck and they control the governments.”
Mooney sighed; he was obviously tiring of the conversation, but he brightened suddenly and decided to continue. “We’ve got some pretty high hopes for those slant-eyed bastards. If the governments there play ball with our government—and why shouldn’t they?—then we’re in.”
From that point forward, Chuck noticed when Mooney went out of town to Europe or the Middle East. Over the coming years, his sojourns would become more frequent and, Mooney would boast, more profitable than he’d ever dreamed.
The spring and summer of 1950 would prove eventful for Chuck and Anne Marie, as well as the rest of the world. In April, Chuck’s first son was born. They named the frail four-pound premature infant Charles Joseph.
In May, a government committee was formed by a Tennessee upstart senator named Kefauver to investigate organized crime—but Mooney insisted that no matter what the rest of America believed, the guy was still crooked. And sure enough, a little over a year later, it turned out the senator had accepted campaign contributions from a numbers racketeer back in his own hometown. That same May, when the secretary of state announced the United States would back the French in Indochina, Mooney gloated and Chuck was hardly surprised.
When President Truman announced in June that the United States would provide military aid to assist South Korea in their bid for democracy to defeat North Korean Communists, Mooney commented matter-of-factly, “The guy runnin’ the show in South Korea is part of the Oriental mob.”
Thus, Chuck wasn’t amazed when Truman placed “the nation’s most esteemed military hero,” General MacArthur, in charge of the whole mess and it was reported that MacArthur was conferring with Mooney’s Chinese mobster associate, Chiang Kai-shek. Instead, Chuck started to believe Mooney knew what he was talking about.
But the war in Southeast Asia was eclipsed in Chuck’s world by the Kefauver hearings that fall. No matter where he went, the guys were talking about them. And somewhere about this time, they all stopped calling the Syndicate the Syndicate and started calling it the Outfit. It had a n
ice ring to it.
Mooney told him that Meyer Lansky had suggested everybody give their organization a name, that it would improve cooperation and boost morale. The national alliance was called the Combination or Commission. In New York, it was the Mob, in Chicago, the Outfit. New Orleans liked the sound of the Combine or the Mafia.
No wonder Kefauver was so damned confused. Chuck laughed to himself as he watched the hearings on their new RCA television each night before going to work at the theater.
The Kefauver hearings were no laughing matter to New York’s mobsters. Labeled the “prime minister” of organized crime, Mooney’s friend Frank Costello was particularly displeased. His lifestyle, filled with prominent businessmen and political leaders, was laid bare before the American public. And although he gave the committee members no information, the publicity provided his enemies with an opening. The scheming Vito Genovese had especially coveted Luciano’s power, and while Costello’s hands fidgeted on camera during his testimony, the world and Vito Genovese watched. The word in New York was direct and to the point: Costello’s term as boss would soon be over.
Like Costello, Mooney had his share of headaches in 1951. In March, the IRS started nosing around, questioning his income. Additionally, he was indicted on sixty-seven counts of gambling. Shortly thereafter, he had a run-in with his old nemesis Teddy Roe, who continued running his wheels on the south side, in spite of Mooney’s constant threats. Meanwhile, rumors began to fly about his love life. People said he’d gotten a secretary at the Envelope Factory pregnant, which did nothing to help temper Ange’s simmering jealousies.