Homer:
Thanks for the 70 year-old crime beat. Having been a prosecutor for 18 years and now doing defense work, I like reading the old crime stories. Thanks for the change of pace today.
Reles was a thug, and a low-level one at that. Meyer Lansky would never go to Temple with him. The popular image of the “gangster” of this era is of a person of Italian extraction wearing suits with loud pin-striping, but the “Jewish Mafia” was always part of the game, from all the way at th top like Lansky who ran the high-level operations such as the docks, casinos, etc.... It went all the way down to the low-level fish-market stuff with losers like Reles. I’m sure there was a “cut” for Luciano and Lansky in Reles’ business, and Reles would sometimes be tapped for “jobs.” Thug and criminal as he was, Reles was still a punk.
Here in Indianapolis we had our own Jewish Mafia run by “Tuffy” Mitchell. Tuffy ran most of the “pea shake” houses down in the black part of town. Tuffy’s nephew was one of my best friends in high school. I always wondered what his dad (Tuffy’s brother) did, but his dad went nuts if I ever went near his “office” in the home. Ahhh...maybe it was just concern about the “office in the home” for tax reasons....
Detroit had its Jewish Mafia too, run by Abe Berstein.
At its peak the Purple Gang was believed responsible for 500 homocides in one year alone.
Bernstein, the chief supplier of Canadian whiskey to Al Capone, is suspected to have been involved in the St. Valentine's Day Massacre.
Reles and Maione and the Brownsville crew were paid a retainer, and so much per contract. Carrying out murders was their primary activity in the Luciano organized world of crime. Additionally, they got the rackets in Brownsville/ East New York.
They killed people all over the country. Contracts were issued by the commission [in New york that meant, primarily, Lucky Luciano and Lepke Buckhalter] Murder Inc.s liaison was Albert Anastasia. Reles was in on some 26 murders.
As Jewish mobsters went they were minor league. Top dogs included the Purple Gang in Detroit, the Mayfield Road Gang in K.C, Longy Zwillman in Jersey, Meyer Lansky [and Bugsy Siegel] in N.Y, and Dutch Schultz.
“Kid Twist” Reles- the Canary that couldn’t fly.