Joe Adonis

Organized-crime boss Joe Adonis was born Giuseppe Antonio Doto in the small town of Montemarano, Italy, near Naples. In 1915 he sneaked aboard an ocean liner docked in Naples on its way to the US. He hopped off in Brooklyn, where he had relatives (his cousin was a Vito Genovese family capo named Alan Bono). Adonis soon hooked up with a gang of street toughs who would later become major mob leaders, including Lucky Luciano.

Adonis and Luciano formed a strong bond, and in the early 1920s the two borrowed money from fellow gangsters to start their own bootlegging racket. The operation was quite successful, especially in the theater district on and around Broadway, and Adonis soon began associating with some of the theatrical district's most prominent actors, writers and producers. Known to be excessively vain, he soon changed his name from Giuseppe Doto to Joe Adonis, supposedly after the Greek god of love. He became an enforcer for gang boss Frankie Yale and his partner Lucky Luciano became a hitman for Brooklyn mob boss Giuseppe Masseria. When Yale was murdered, Masseria took over his rackets. This soon led to an internecine bloodbath known as the Castellamarese War, with Masseria's gang pitted against that of Salvatore Maranzano. Luciano and Adonis fought on the side of their boss Masseria, but when the tide starting turning against the gang leader, Luciano held secret talks with Maranzano about switching sides. When he did, Adonis went with him.

In April of 1931 Adonis, Bugsy Siegel, Genovese and Albert Anastasia approached Masseria in a restaurant in Coney Island and opened fire, killing him instantly. Maranzano now headed the strongest Italian gang in the city, and organized the other Italian gangs into "families" with himself as the top boss. Luciano and his allies quickly chafed under Maranzano's rule, however, and when Luciano learned that the somewhat paranoid Maranzano had secretly ordered his murder, he decided to return the favor.

On September 10, 1931, several of his gunmen burst into Maranano's Manhattan office and shot him dead. Luciano now was the "top dog" among the Italian gangs, and revamped Masseria's organization into a national crime syndicate (sometimes called The Commission, The Outfit or The Organization), and, as a reward for helping kill Masseria, gave Adonis a seat on the syndicate's "board of directors". His territory now encompassed the prime Broadway and midtown Manhattan areas, and in addition to his bootlegging and gambling rackets he began buying legitimate businesses. He also began acquiring a "stable" of politicians and police officers on his payroll, which he used to protect his rackets and those of his friends and associates, especially Luciano. However, Adonis' and especially Luciano's power and influence did not go unnoticed by state authorities. Thomas E.

Dewey, then a state prosecutor and later New York governor, set his sights on Luciano, and in 1936 obtained a conviction on pandering and pimping charges against Luciano that earned him a 30-year sentence. The imprisoned mob boss left Adonis in charge of the Syndicate, with Frank Costello in charge of Luciano's family.

In 1946 Luciano, in exchange for his helping the US government during World War II, was released from prison and deported to Italy. He sneaked out of Italy to meet in Havana, Cuba, with Adonis and other gang leaders. Unfortunately for him, US authorities found out about the meeting and "persuaded" the Cuban government to throw Luciano out of the country and send him back to Italy. The government also had its eye on Adonis, and when it arrested Abe Reles, a killer for the mob's enforcement arm called Murder Inc. , it persuaded him to give them a wealth of information on Adonis' association with the outfit, although not enough to obtain an indictment against him (Reles couldn't testify, either, having "jumped" out of the window of a hotel room in which a half-dozen police officers were "protecting" him).

During the famous televised 1950 US Senate Kefauver Commission organized-crime hearings chaired by Sen. Estes Kefauver, Adonis, under subpoena, was forced to appear for questioning but refused to testify, repeatedly invoking his Fifth Amendment privileges against self-incrimination.

In 1951 he was indicted on and pleaded guilty to charges of running illegal gambling activities and was sentenced to two years in a New York state prison.

When he got out in 1953 a court declared him an illegal alien and ordered him deported to Italy.

He fought the order in court, but in 1956 finally lost the battle and was deported.

Although both Adonis and Luciano were now living in Italy, reportedly the two never communicated or saw each other until after Luciano died in 1962, at which time Adonis attended his funeral.