Everything Everywhere Daily: History, Science, Geography & More - Al Capone

Starting point is 00:00:00 Alphonse Gabriel Capone, aka Al Capone, aka Scarface, is one of the most notorious gangsters in American history. Known for dominating Chicago's underworld during Prohibition, he gained fame and notoriety throughout the United States. Capone cultivated a celebrity image all the while participating in violent criminal activities. Yet despite his wealth and fame, in the end, he wound up in prison and died in early death. Learn more about the life and criminal exploits of Al Capone. On this episode, of everything everywhere daily. Fear is the virus is trending on TikTok.

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Starting point is 00:01:07 family, and wellness gurus down the right-wing cult spiral in a search for salvation. Alvats Gabriel Capone was born in Brooklyn, New York to Italian immigrant parents on January 17, 1899. He was one of nine children and spent much of his childhood working odd jobs. Capone was considered a promising student as a child. However, he struggled to follow the rules on a strict Catholic school. He was eventually kicked out for hitting a teacher in the face.

Starting point is 00:01:41 In his youth, Capone actively participated in New York's Five Points gang. This gang mainly included younger Italian Americans and helped launch several of America's most prominent gangsters' careers. During his time with the Five Points Gang, Capone met Johnny Torrio. Torrio mastermited many of the Five Point Gang's operations, overseeing drug trafficking, prostitution, and loan sharking. After meeting Capone, Torillo recognized his potential in organized crime and mentored him. Even after Torrio moved to Chicago in 1909, they maintained their connection.

Starting point is 00:02:14 It was Torrio who taught Capone everything he knew about the organized crime business. Capone mostly stayed out of trouble until 1917 when Torrio helped him get a job under gangster Frankie Yale. Yale hired Capone as a bartender and bouncer at the Harvard Inn in Brooklyn. During one shift, Capone insulted a woman. Her brother retaliated leaving Capone with a massive superficial facial scar. It was this incident that earned him the nickname Scarface. In December 1918, at the age of 19, Capone married May Josephine Coughlin, Their son, Albert Francis Capone, was born the month before.

Starting point is 00:02:52 Capone named Torrio the godfather. Although Capone still had illegal connections, he reportedly wanted to provide for his family honestly. Capone moved May and Albert to Baltimore and worked as a bookkeeper for a construction company. Capone held this position for only about a year until 1920, when two key events occurred, his father's death, and Torrio's invitation for Capone and his family to move to Chicago. An opportunity Capone jumped at. In Chicago, Capone worked as an enforcer for crime boss, James Big Jim Colossimo. Enforcers mainly ensured that rules are followed, debts are collected, and that threats are addressed.

Starting point is 00:03:32 Capone started as a bouncer at one of Big Jim's brothels. Just before Capone arrived in Chicago, however, the government passed the 18th Amendment, which banned the sale of alcohol and ushered in the era of prohibition, which, in turn, created a lucrative black market for alcohol sales. Big Jim reportedly refused to join the bootlegging business, choosing instead to focus on gambling and prostitution. Many people suspect Torrio ordered Big Jim's murder as a result. Big Jim Colossimo was killed by a gunman at a cafe on May 11, 1920. The assassin was allegedly none other than Frankie Yale, who was brought in from New York to do the hit.

Starting point is 00:04:13 With Big Jim gone, Torrio took over his gang, which became known as the outfit. He quickly expanded into bootlegging. Torrio's leadership was brief, however. After a rival gang shot an intergem in 1925, police arrested him for operating a distillery. Torrio's departure left Capone as the new leader of the outfit. Capone immediately made himself a public figure disregarding his mentor's advice. He moved the gang's base into the heart of Chicago and lived last, savishly in the public eye. As the leader of the outfit, Capone became the most visible

Starting point is 00:04:47 mobster in the United States. Capone wore custom suits and flashy jewelry. He drank gourmet beverages, dined on fine food, and smoked fancy cigars, making himself a celebrity across the country. He regularly appeared in local media and collaborated with politicians to cultivate his public persona. Capone projected the image of a generous businessman who cared for Chicago's residents, not a violent mobster. Many saw him as a Robin Hood figure, especially by those who resented Prohibition. Capone maintained strong ties with local politicians and law enforcement during a time of escalating gang warfare. These connections enabled him to expand his criminal empire and make bold, calculated moves through violence. Capone's primary revenue sources were bootlegging,

Starting point is 00:05:33 prostitution, and gambling. To bring alcohol into Chicago, Capone partnered with Canadian bootleggers, Despite denying these ties, he worked with Rocco Perry, known as the King of Canadian Bootleggers. Capone used transportation networks and illegal distilleries to keep Chicago supplied with alcohol. To make sure that customers were buying alcohol from him, Capone employed a policy of blowing up the establishments of anyone who purchased booze from his competitors. This helped ensure establishments would only buy alcohol from the outfit. An estimated 100 people died from these businesses. bombings. However, business was not completely smooth sailing. The outfit was not the only gang in

Starting point is 00:06:16 Chicago, and Capone had plenty of enemies. When Capone moved to a home in Cicero, Illinois, he protected his property using threats of violence and bribery to ensure his safety and that of his family. In April 1926, Capone ordered his men to gun down some of the North Sider spotted in Cicero. Unbeknownst to him, public prosecutor William McSwiggin was among the them. McSwiggin died in the shooting, drawing more public scrutiny to the lawlessness in Chicago. The public demanded justice prompting police to search Capone's home for murder evidence. While they found nothing, they did collect financial documents that would become highly relevant later on. Violence in Chicago escalated further when the Northsiders tried to kill Capone in September

Starting point is 00:07:02 that year. Hit men lured Capone to the windows of his headquarters and shot at him with shotguns and submachine guns. Though unharmed, Capone responded to public pressure and the attempt on his life by calling for a gang truce. The peace lasted only two months before violence resumed. During the period from 1926 to 1929, Capone operated in a similar manner to his early years as a mob boss. He maintained a public-facing role, led through violence, and expanded his criminal empire. There were numerous incidents of violence, corruption, and criminal activity during this period, which are far too numerous to list here. But the most notorious act of violence during this period was the St. Valentine's Day Massacre, which I covered in detail in a previous episode. The St. Valentine's Day

Starting point is 00:07:49 Massacre is widely assumed to have been ordered by Capone, but his alibi is that he was in Florida when it occurred. This event saw Capone target one of his longtime rivals, Bugs Moran. Moran was the head of Chicago's Northside gang and one of the main figures preventing Capone from achieving complete domination of the Chicago bootlegging business. Moran had ordered hits on Capone, Torreou, and other top members of the outfit. He also ordered a hit on Capone's top man, machine gun Jack McGern. It's believed that McGern and Capone plotted to kill Moran in retaliation. On February 14, 1929, Capone's men rented an apartment near Moran's headquarters.

Starting point is 00:08:29 Lookouts gave a signal to armed men dressed as police officers to begin a fake raid of the establishment. Capone's men entered Moran's headquarters dressed as cops. They lined seven men up against the wall and shot them in cold blood. Moran was not among the victims. The shocking images from the massacre disgusted the public. Authorities tried to bring Capone in to testify, but he claimed illness. Capone then tried to improve his image by donating to charities and sponsoring soup kitchens. But despite his efforts to improve his image,

Starting point is 00:09:02 Capone was widely blamed and labeled a public enemy by the media. Federal pressure on Capone started to intensify. The public outcry from the St. Valentine's Day massacre led to President Herbert Hoover becoming directly involved in solving Chicago's crime problem. Hoover ordered federal agencies, including the Prohibition Bureau, the Treasury and the Justice Departments, to target Capone. The first arrest came on March 27, 1929. The FBI arrested him for contempt of court for faking an illness to avoid an earlier court appearance. He was arrested again in Philadelphia on May 17, 1929 for carrying a concealed weapon. Capone pleaded guilty to carrying a weapon and was sentenced to prison for a year, although he only served nine months for good behavior.

Starting point is 00:09:47 Capone was released in March of 1930, but was arrested again in April in Miami, Florida. This time he was charged with vagrancy charges, which essentially means being charged for being homeless and participating in behaviors like loitering. After this arrest, Capone claimed that Miami's police threatened to arrest his family and refused to give him food and water. These claims led Miami police to charge him with perjury. He was later acquitted of all charges. Capone continued to be pulled into court case after court case

Starting point is 00:10:17 until he was ultimately defeated by the IRS. In 1929, the United States v. Sullivan case held that illegally earned income was still subject to income tax. This ruling gave the government a way to tax wealthy criminal figures for tax evasion given their luxurious lifestyles. Capone obviously had income he was not declaring honest taxes, as evidenced by his lifestyle, allowing the prosecution to develop a pretty slam-dung case against the mobster.

Starting point is 00:10:46 Capone attempted to avoid the tax evasion charges by drafting a letter with his attorney, outlining the amount he owed the IRS and stating that he was willing to pay taxes for previous years. However, this backfired horribly, as the IRS now had a letter of how much Capone owed them without needing to fully investigate. He essentially handed them over a confession to committing tax evasion.

Starting point is 00:11:09 Capone was indicted on 22 counts of income tax evasion and 5,000 violations of the Volstead Act for trafficking alcohol. He was convicted of five counts of tax evasion and sentenced to 11 years in federal prison, fined thousands of dollars, and held liable for hundreds of thousands more. Capone was first sent to the Atlanta Federal Penitentiary in 1932 and was later transferred to Alcatraz in 1934. Capone's time in Alcatraz wasn't great. He was stabbed by a fellow inmate and began to mentally decline from neuropsychilis, which completely eroded his mental faculties. During his final years in prison, he was reportedly disorientated and confused, spending most of his

Starting point is 00:11:51 time in the prison hospital. Capone was moved from Alcatraz to the Federal Correctional Institute at Terminal Island in Los Angeles in January of 1939. In November of the same year, he was was paroled because of his reduced mental capabilities. Putting Al Capone behind bars did not solve Chicago's gang problems. Despite Capone's arrest being portrayed as undermining organized crime, the reality of the situation was that the outfit and other gangs were still functioning, just with less visible violence. As for Capone, he spent the rest of his life battling syphilitic paris,

Starting point is 00:12:25 which is essentially dementia caused by syphilis. He suffered from the illness until his death on January 25, 1946. Despite his death, Al Capone's legacy as a notorious mobster has lived on. He has become the subject of multiple books and movies. The 1983 movie Scarface starring Al Pacino is actually a remake of the 1932 movie Scarface starring James Cagney, which was based on Al Capone. In the 1987 film The Untouchables, Al Capone is portrayed by Robert De Niro. El Capone has become a larger-than-life figure, hero to some and villain to others.

Starting point is 00:13:02 There are dozens of Al Capone-related historic sites around the country, all related to places that he visited. Even almost 80 years after his death, he is still one of the most notorious mobsters in American history. The executive producer of Everything Everywhere Daily is Charles Daniel. The associate producers are Austin Otkin and Cameron Kiefer. Research and writing for the episode was provided by the Olivia Ash. I'm getting way behind on my reviews, so I'm going to start reading several of them each

Starting point is 00:13:34 episode and try to catch up. And I have a couple of international ones today. The first comes from Stewie X on Apple Podcasts from the United Kingdom. They write, complete, but not replete. I'm now fully up to date since my mate Tim recommended the pod to me back in November of 24. Long car journeys and spare chunks of 10 minutes have kept my knowledge wide and shallow, just how I like it. Thanks, Gary, and looking forward to more. The next review comes from listener Michael Bormeman in Germany. He writes, excellent podcast series concise, informative, interesting as well as entertaining. Recommended to either freshen up past slash forgotten knowledge or to learn new facts and insights. Thank you.

Starting point is 00:14:13 The final review comes from listener Canadian Canada from Canada who writes, Best Pod. Gary just completed the Alberta Canada chapter of the Completionist Club. Thanks, I love bugging the family, little snippets of info from the pod, highly recommended. By the way, if you're ever down here, we'll be sure to have a stampede breakfast and some brisket Poutin waiting for you. Thanks again. Well, thanks to all of you for your reviews. Remember, if you leave a review of the podcast on any of the major podcasting apps, you too can have it read on the show.

Everything Everywhere Daily: History, Science, Geography & More - Al Capone

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