Bestselling New Yorker staff writer Grann ( The Devil and Sherlock Holmes: Tales of Murder, Madness, and Obsession, 2010, etc.) follows Special Agent Tom White and his assistants as they track the killers of one extended Osage family through a closed local culture of greed, bigotry, and lies in pursuit of protection for the survivors and justice for the dead. Edgar Hoover saw cracking these cases as a means of burnishing the reputation of the newly professionalized FBI. For some, however, these deceptive tactics were not enough, and a plague of violent death-by shooting, poison, orchestrated automobile accident, and bombing-began to decimate the Osage in what they came to call the "Reign of Terror." Corrupt and incompetent law enforcement and judicial systems ensured that the perpetrators were never found or punished until the young J. This vast wealth attracted the attention of unscrupulous whites who found ways to divert it to themselves by marrying Osage women or by having Osage declared legally incompetent so the whites could fleece them through the administration of their estates. The rich oil fields beneath their reservation brought millions of dollars into the tribe annually, distributed to tribal members holding "headrights" that could not be bought or sold but only inherited. Greed, depravity, and serial murder in 1920s Oklahoma.ĭuring that time, enrolled members of the Osage Indian nation were among the wealthiest people per capita in the world. Still, this is an undeniably engaging tale, capturing the nitty-gritty of daily life in the “crews” of the Outfit.Ī useful and readable addition to Mob Lit. performs exculpatory gymnastics in order to blur the extent of the narrator’s criminal involvement, and the writing is workmanlike, if wry at times. The author still seems bewildered by his father’s ability to be simultaneously a loving patriarch, a ruthless Outfit boss and a cold-blooded killer. particularly regrets the involvement of his uncle, Nick, a quiet Vietnam veteran who became ensnared in his brother’s business, ultimately transforming into a hit man (Nick also turned state’s witness and testified). Amazingly, the younger Calabrese recorded conversations with his father in prison, and the surveillance provided the core of the prosecution’s case. The book offers a startling narrative of Outfit mayhem-the Calabrese crew was involved in a long string of killings, some notorious, like that of Tony Spilotro (fictionalized in Martin Scorsese’s Casino). contacted the FBI, wishing to cooperate in order to prevent his also-jailed father’s return to his crooked ways: “I feel I have to help you keep this sick man locked up forever.” Both Calabreses had pled guilty to federal racketeering charges in 1997, having run a successful “juice loan” business for years. Improbably, the process began when imprisoned Outfit member Frank Calabrese Jr. In 2007, prosecutors scored a huge coup in the “Family Secrets” trial, sentencing several key mobsters to long sentences for racketeering and numerous old murders. The inside story of a notable organized-crime prosecution, in which a son turned on his ferocious father.įor decades, organized crime in Chicago-the so-called “Outfit”-remained a feared and mysterious cabal.
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