◆ SpookStack

self had put his companions on the spot. At the same time a report was current that King Al, en route to Florida, had dropped in town and was hiding somewhere in Cicero. A choice dab of apple-sauce had it that he lay in deadly fear of assassins. If Capone was afraid of anything it was the great eye of the public. The murder of Tony Lombardo, King of the Mafia, was a great sensation, for at that time it stood out as the most daring crime yet committed in Chicago by gangsters. The Underworld was quiet for a few weeks while Tony was being laid away. To the alky cookers for the Capone gang who lived in the so-called Aiello-Moran district Lom- bardo’s death was a great calamity. Aiello would assume control of the Unione Siciliane, they believed, and he would surely begin a war of extermination among them. And so, while Lombardo’s body lay in its casket, the ter- rified Capone henchmen began a quiet but quick exodus from the district bounded by Division street, Chicago avenue, Sedgwick and Larrabee streets. Signor Nitti, the “enforcer” could not stem the wave of Italians who scurried back to the old Genna district, and Signor Aiello looked upon the spectacle and found it good. The Capone gang held several huddles with the result that further action was ordered on the principle that the best defense ia a swell offence. To the dismay of Signor Aiello he did not become successor to Tony Lombardo as head of the Unione Siciliane. Somehow that coveted position again came into [41] Tony Lombardo, King of the Mafia, and a lieutenant for Alphonse Capone. (Zeft) Madison and Dearborn Streets where Lombardo was assassinated one summer afternoon. the hands of a Capone man—Pasqualino Lolardo, elder brother of Joseph Lolardo, the body guard of Lombardo. At the same time Mr. Nitti, acting under instructions which continually came te him from the roving Rig Fellow, 2 Taso, dispatched more muscle men into the Aiello territory, Some of the men who were immediately under the leader- ship of the new Mafia King were such talented thugs and pistoleers as John Scalice, Albert Anselmi, Claude Maddox, alias Johnny Moore, who had graduated from the Egan Rats mob of St. Louis, Tough Tony Caprezzio, strong- arm artist de luxe, and Murray Humphreys. Headquarters for this dangerous Capone group were in a dingy and squalid little dive, pleasantly known as The Circus, located at 1651 North Avenue. For a long time Pasqualino directed these boys in a campaign of terror. Alky stills were bowled over by the dozen, soft-drink parlors on the Near North Side were bombed with ‘such regularity that it sounded like the Fourth of July in Ankeny, Iowa. Life became a misery for those unfortunates who had aligned themselves under the so-called protection of Joe Aiello, George “Bugs” Moran, Barney Bertsche and Jack Zuta. Pasqualino raised so much general hell on the Near North side that these terrified Italians who had fied the district following Lom- bardo’s death now began moving in again. Well, now what do you think Mr, Aiello did about this? You are right, for on January 2, 1929, a second Mafia King was placed beyond the aid of attorneys and legal writs. WW SLlO lL COTE Sle es BA? daat Gili Lait POW 222, ~ 2