La Cosa Nostra
The Notorious La Cosa Nostra and Organized Crime
Abstract
When the term family business is named, you might think of a farming business, or maybe selling certain products, but the words prostitution, loan-sharking, narcotics, and racketeering are not the first things to come to mind. La Cosa Nostra is what family business was about during the 1920’s and early 1940’s. La Cosa Nostra, a criminal organization from Sicily, Italy, began terrorizing the U.S by threatening the cities of New York, Chicago, and many others. During the 1920’s is when America began noticing that organized crime was occurring. Organized crime, the unlawful activity of members of a highly organized association engage in supplying illegal goods and services, was beginning to grow in a rapid pace. Around the 1960’s is when the crime families of La Cosa Nostra, began to deteriorate with either inside informants like Joseph Valachi. The law enforcement also had to do with the capturing of many mob bosses , because of their determination and of their persistence for justice. Although there are not as many mob families today, the organized crimes is still a problem in the U.S.
Origins
La Cosa Nostra, meaning “our thing” in Italian, is a group of Italian immigrant organized
crime families in which have been operating and committing crimes since 1920’s. People seem to have the idea that the Italian mobs were the first crime families in America, but the first organized crime families in the U.S, were actually the Irish and the Jewish ever since the 1800’s. According to Schmalleger(2012), “throughout the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, Jewish gangsters like Meyer Lansky, Benjamin “Bugy” Siegel, “Dutch” Schultz, and Lepke Buchalter ran many of the rackets in New York City, only to have their places taken by the Italian immigrants who arrived a few weeks later” (p.319). The Italian crime families began in Italy. The
Abstract
When the term family business is named, you might think of a farming business, or maybe selling certain products, but the words prostitution, loan-sharking, narcotics, and racketeering are not the first things to come to mind. La Cosa Nostra is what family business was about during the 1920’s and early 1940’s. La Cosa Nostra, a criminal organization from Sicily, Italy, began terrorizing the U.S by threatening the cities of New York, Chicago, and many others. During the 1920’s is when America began noticing that organized crime was occurring. Organized crime, the unlawful activity of members of a highly organized association engage in supplying illegal goods and services, was beginning to grow in a rapid pace. Around the 1960’s is when the crime families of La Cosa Nostra, began to deteriorate with either inside informants like Joseph Valachi. The law enforcement also had to do with the capturing of many mob bosses , because of their determination and of their persistence for justice. Although there are not as many mob families today, the organized crimes is still a problem in the U.S.
Origins
La Cosa Nostra, meaning “our thing” in Italian, is a group of Italian immigrant organized
crime families in which have been operating and committing crimes since 1920’s. People seem to have the idea that the Italian mobs were the first crime families in America, but the first organized crime families in the U.S, were actually the Irish and the Jewish ever since the 1800’s. According to Schmalleger(2012), “throughout the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, Jewish gangsters like Meyer Lansky, Benjamin “Bugy” Siegel, “Dutch” Schultz, and Lepke Buchalter ran many of the rackets in New York City, only to have their places taken by the Italian immigrants who arrived a few weeks later” (p.319). The Italian crime families began in Italy. The