Family Secrets: The Case That Crippled the Chicago Mob

by Jeff Coen

Even in Chicago, a city steeped in mob history and legend, the Family Secrets case was a true spectacle when it made it to court in 2007. A top mob boss, a reputed consigliere, and other high-profile members of the Chicago Outfit were accused in a total of eighteen gangland killings, revealing organized crime’s ruthless grip on the city throughout the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s.            Painting a vivid picture of murder, courtroom drama, family loyalties and disloyalties, journalist Jeff Coen accurately portrays the Chicago Outfit’s cold-blooded--and sometimes incompetent--killers and their crimes in the case that brought them down. In 1998 Frank Calabrese Jr. volunteered to wear a wire to gather evidence against his father, a vicious loan shark who strangled most of his victims with a rope before slitting their throats to ensure they were dead. Frank Jr. went after his uncle Nick as well, a calculating but sometimes bumbling hit man who would become one of the highest-ranking turncoats in mob history, admitting he helped strangle, stab, shoot, and bomb victims who got in the mob’s way, and turning evidence against his brother Frank.            The Chicago courtroom took on the look and feel of a movie set as Chicago’s most colorful mobsters and their equally flamboyant attorneys paraded through and performed: James “Jimmy Light” Marcello, the acting head of the Chicago mob; Joey “the Clown” Lombardo, one of Chicago’s most eccentric mobsters; Paul “the Indian” Schiro; and a former Chicago police officer, Anthony “Twan” Doyle, among others.            Re-creating events from court transcripts, police records, interviews, and notes taken day after day as the story unfolded in court, Coen provides a riveting wide-angle view and one of the best accounts on record of the inner workings of the Chicago syndicate and its control over the city’s streets.

Genres: True Crime, Crime, History, Nonfiction, Audiobook, American History

400 pages, Hardcover

Published April 1, 2009

About the author

Jeff Coen is a reporter for the Chicago Tribune, covering federal trials and investigations from the Dirksen U.S. Courthouse in downtown Chicago. He was present in the courtroom throughout the Family Secrets trial, and his pieces on the case were featured in a popular series in the Chicago Tribune."

Reviews

[Jeanette · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5 stars rounded up for the accuracy of the facts toward this extremely difficult context and case reporting. He's not a highly organized writer or is the prose always smooth and easy to understand. But neither is anything about these groups of criminals either. Nor the teams of lawful side that fingered so many.

Brutal and dominating to all others lives. And outfits intertwined or of high complexity even to each other. With roles, once formed or played out- there was no refusals or going "away" from any compliances within any time limits of afterwards. Including murdering and dumping best friends as a required task.

Knowing all the spots as they were then in the locales in which they most occurred- it was more interesting to me than it would be for the common reader. The sheer numbers of names with association are hard to convey. In comic portrayals or in photo- dozens and dozens.

In this exact era I had read and heard 1st hand from witness about the numbers of bodies being dumped in Chinatown or close to what was then Comiskey Park(or at least the wider area around it beyond the projects and into Bridgeport). And because I had heard I always asked people (numbers of them) not to go to eat in Chinatown at night. And I remember clearly one friend getting very hostile and losing that friend. I knew how dangerous it would be to be witness or just be at the wrong place at the wrong time. I was right and at one time it was the most dangerous area in Chicago- without exception. Not now. At all. That area has been gentrified quite far all around and way into Canaryville. Far worse areas exist presently. For murders and crime both. The last time I looked there were 154 gangs listed within the Chicagoland area. With 100's and 100's of murders on their plates. Mostly to each other but more often than in this Chicago Mob epoch, against innocent bystanders or just people who saw too much. The area where I was born and where I lived my early life is one of them- Englewood.

I would not recommend this book unless you are in perceptions of law and highly intersected methods of these criminal practices- as a Criminal Justice or Law student. It's nearly impossible to read for those who have little context. It was a most difficult read for me in just the various two, three or four names each of dozens of players had/have.

Now with phone calls and location tracings- quite apart from all the forensics biologic proofs, I do believe it is easier to prosecute/indict. Not easier to keep any murderer in prison so it doesn't go into multiple repeats of the crimes though. Harder now. It isn't at all unusual. Nor for the 3 or 5 time murderer to be murdered himself or herself in eventual releases.

There are worse cities for this. Hard to believe? But true.

[Robyn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very interesting walk through how this crime family was taken down. But I'll say this, you might be tempted to try to remember every new mobster by name. You might even look back when new ones are introduced to try to decipher who is who. There are too many. Don't bother. Let all those names just wash over you and move on. As long as you can remember who the brothers are, you'll be able to follow.

[catechism · Rating 2 out of 5]

it takes a writer and storyteller of considerable skill to write about one of these cases -- very complicated, involving tons of people and conspiracies spanning multiple years -- in a way that's interesting and easy to follow. Coen is not that writer. It's easy to see he's a fine reporter, but that's a different animal. When will my mob kick be over, guys? All these books are bad. >:(

[Kate · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just like you can't take a bad picture of the Himalayas, you just can't write a bad book about the Family Secrets trial that took place in Chicago back in 2007. The subject was just too fascinating. Let me begin by saying everything I know about the mob comes from the old Matthew Broderick movie, The Freshman--a comedy in which Burt Parks sings the virtues of the Komodo Dragon. In other words, I know nothing about the mob but that they're bad people with no conscience.

Coen spells out, in reality, just how bad they are. I grew up in the Chicago area, and some of the names are familiar--Calabrese, LaPietra, Joey "the Clown" Lombardo. And we all know that certain areas of the city produce some people who tend to be crooked-- Cicero, Lyons, Chinatown, Rosemont, to name a few. Well, here they are, in all their viciousness. Coen outlines murder after murder, taken from transcripts and papers involved in the trial in which Frank Calabrese, Sr's son and brother rat out him and the rest of their mob friends and associates. What results is a rare look inside the Chicago Outfit. A lot of effort, artfulness and creativity go into each hit. So sad that the result is death, cruelty and loss. Some of these men are sociopaths to the core. Others seem to have been caught up in the outfit as youngsters and kill because they fear for their lives if they don't.

The lawyers in the case are also a feature of the book, the lowbrow antics of Lopez, a defense attorney, and the solid, righteous efforts of Attorney Mars are characterized in intricate detail by Coen. Mars and his colleague on the bench, John Scully, ultimately triumph in taking down the core players in the Chicago Outfit in this historic trial. This is the remarkable story of how they did it.

While I gave the book five stars, this kind of stuff is really not my thing. I picked up this book to find out about a mob associate who was once a board member at an organization where I worked. While I learned a lot about him, and thought the book was well-written and absolutely fascinating, this is probably the only book of the mob genre that I will ever read.

[Alex W. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Don't believe any of the poor reviews! Coen's book is an incredibly in-depth look at the Chicago Outfit's operations in the latter half of the 20th century and the sweeping Family Secrets trial that ensued. A bit dry and lengthy at times, the book notes many historical mob waypoints around the Chicago area. Very interesting for any Chicago resident or mob buff.

[Natalie]

I just couldn't finish this one. Coen clearly did his research, he just needed to do a little more work in crafting it. Instead of taking us through the story in a linear fashion, Coen jumps all around with his time frames. This causes a tremendous amount of confusion when guys who were dead in one chapter came back to life in another. In addition, a lot of the players in this story have very Italian names and very similar ones. There are a fair amount of Franks, Johns, Joes, etc. It gets even more complicated when you add their mob nicknames. I have nothing against the nicknames, in fact, I love them. However, in addition to often including nicknames, he mentioned jail house recordings in which the mobsters used code names to talk about people. It would have been sufficient to just mention that they used codes and then use their real name. But when Coen insists on telling you code names for guys who already have names like John "No Nose" DiFronzo (who might I add was called something different than No Nose before adopting that nickname), it all feels like a big bowl of Italian alphabet soup and it leaves the reader confused.

This would have been a lot better if it hadn't gone into such detail about specifics of crimes, juice loans, and court testimony. Because the court testimony required attention to detail, the Coen's jumping around of the time line didn't do me any favors. In the end, I just wound up Googling what happened. You can save yourself a lot of time and frustration by doing so. I wish I'd thought of it before getting 200 pages in.

[Erin · Rating 1 out of 5]

Ugh, I couldn't even get through the third chapter. Jeff Coen does not write in a readable fashion. His tangents have no conclusion, there's no resolution to the main point of the chapter. Horrible.

[Walt · Rating 4 out of 5]

There are many books on the Chicago Mob. Bill Roemer comes to mind as the authority on the Chicago Outfit. And yet, this book offers a clear and concise picture of the organization that Roemer was never able to present. This remains one of the few books on the Chicago Mob that covers the period after Roemer's retirement, so it serves as an epilogue in that regard.

William F. Roemer Jr. was an FBI agent who thuggishly pursued to the Chicago Mob. His book is full of boasting of how he and his fellow agents hounded the gangsters; but scored limited success. His mode of thinking was to target individual racketeers instead of a group of them. His way of thinking changed in the 1970s with the RICO law. RICO is a complex legal instrument used to attack organizations - effectively guilt by association. A gambler who threatens to harm someone (extortion) can be charged with racketeering. If another member of the organization is charged with murder, then both of them can go to prison for life. It can be tricky proving they are part of the same organization therefore RICO trials are long and highly publicized.

The Family Secrets prosecution of the Chicago Mob was a RICO trial lasting months. The evidence was overwhelming. Jeff Coen covered the trial for the Chicago Tribune. This book is mostly a synopsis of the trial with Coen including even trivial witnesses in his book. The trial covers 15+ gangland murders between 1970 and 1986. The bulk of them were committed by Nick Calabrese, a member of the Chicago Mafia, who was linked to a 1986 murder by DNA evidence and the testimony of his nephew. The 13 murders Calabrese confessed participation formed the basis of the trial. He was a hitman serving the entire organization, not just his small corner of Chicago. Extortion and loansharking figured in the case; but murder - a lot of murder - was the basis for the prosecution.

More interesting is that Calabrese was never identified as a significant member of the organization. The FBI seemingly paid little attention to him or his more established brother, Frank Calabrese Sr. And yet, these guys were among the most prolific hitmen in the Chicago underworld. Even more interesting is how the case fell into the FBI's lap. Frank Calabrese Jr., an associate of the mob, convicted in a loan sharking case with his uncle and father contacted the FBI asking to cooperate. And the FBI considered not hearing him out. However, his testimony (second hand) that his uncle killed a man in 1986 and left his blood at the scene blew he case wide open.

Family Secrets is the story of the secrets of the Calabrese Family and the Chicago Crime Family. Brother against brother, father against son. The other defendants were all tethered to the disputes of the small family. Coen does not spend much time on legal analysis. He barely mentions RICO. However, he did observe that loan sharking once again figured strangely into the case. Strangely because the Calabreses were already in jail for loan sharking, so this was seemingly double jeopardy. However, RICO would not have kicked in without a pattern of racketeering, so through some complex legal maneuvering, prosecutors were allowed to charge them with loan sharking again; and the defense could not argue that it was double jeopardy. After all, why convict some guys of murder when you can jazz it up to be a Mafia wipe out?

The book weaves through space and time; but nearly everything is grounded in the trial proceedings. I would have preferred a straight chronological progression, or an individual chapter for each murder structure than the strange hybrid that Coen wrote. However, the story is clear. Nick Calabrese killed a lot of people with a lot of other people. Incidental subplots like Jimmy Marcello illegally paying off gamblers with his video poker machines only went to reinforce the organization aspect of the story (in addition to embarrassing Marcello for paying off his girlfriend up until the day she testified against him), Nick Calabrese collecting quarters from peep shows, and other mobsters shaking down porn shops and pizzerias.

Overall, this is a very informative story of the mob. The writing style is a bit awkward. The organization is a bit awkward; but then so is the story. It is definitely recommended for readers of organized crime. Coen removes any semblance of romanticism on the mob. He reveals them to be the brutish, violent, irrational people at the lowest order of society. And he does this with the aide of most of the attorneys involved in the trial, the tape recordings of the mobsters, interviews with FBI agents and cooperating witnesses, and other sources. His presentation is a well-rounded portrayal of the Chicago Mob ca. 1970 - 2000.

[Krlb · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was particularly relevant for me since I grew up in the neighborhood where many of the main characters lived, several of them are about my age, and I went to high school with at least one of the protagonists. Even though much of the action that led up to the trial took place in the 1970's and 1980's, I still recall some of the stories that wound up being explained in the trial proceedings. I also remember reading about the trial in the Chicago Tribune as it was happening, about 10 years ago, but, having grown up in Chicago, it didn't make that much of an impression on me. I guess one gets a little jaded from growing up in the hometown of mob-land, so it seemed like just another revelation of one bad guy squealing on his partners in crime in order to save his own neck. The principal difference in Family Secrets, versus other "dirty rat" stories, is that the main witness was the brother (Nick) of one of the accused, Frank Calabrese, who admitted his own role in over a dozen murders, while dragging the defendants along with him.

As it turns out, many of the killings in the book were recast in the movie "Casino", most significantly those of the Spilotro brothers. Probably the most surprising revelation was the amount of planning that went into many of the hits. Unlike what you see on TV or in the movies, many of the murders were plotted, planned out, and tested before they occurred, often over a several month time-frame. If the circumstances weren't quite right, the execution would be called off, delayed but not forgotten, until success and sure escape was most likely. These were the ultimate examples of premeditation, not crimes of passion, but murders committed to maintain order in the ranks or to send an effective message to all who felt that the mob rules didn't apply to them. The irony was that in this "brotherhood" no one felt truly safe, since your most likely executioner was probably someone you knew well, someone who may have participated in other hits with you. For the penalty for failure to carry out an execution was your execution, truly kill or be killed.

The contents of the book, as a whole, were comprehensive, but the narration of the story left a lot to be desired. The book is divided into two broad parts, 1) the murders and other crimes and 2) the trial. The problem with the narration is that it is very scattered in the first part and repetitive in the second part. The style that Coen uses in first half of the book reminds me of how a dinner conversation with 5 or 6 longtime friends might sound if committed to print -- interesting stories, not really connected other than by shared experiences, told in no particular order. Given all of the characters involved, it's very difficult to remember who goes with whom, and where does each story fall on the timeline. The trial section of the book repeats many of the stories, with small additions, but are retold as Nick says his piece and then responded to by each of the defendants. A more understandable approach my have been to start with the trial and then tell the backstory as the prosecution and defense present their cases. There's a lot going on in the book, so a more understandable organizing principle would have been appreciated.

[Chaz · Rating 1 out of 5]

1.5

Just not a very interesting book. It's mostly courtroom stuff. Being a mob case, there are of course a LOT of names... But then throw in judges, prosecutors, attorneys, witnesses, FBI agents, and what you end up with is just a bunch of names on a page. So hard to keep track of who did what to whom and why.

[liv · Rating 4 out of 5]

truly interesting stuff but very difficult to try and keep track of the one million vaguely similar italian names 😭😭

[Philip A. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Being a major Mafia fan and growing up in the neighborhood where most of this action was going on, I absolutely loved the book but I will have a natural nostalgic biased which others may not. I was taken down a trip down memory lane and even remember running into many of the characters in the old neighborhood.

LIKES:
One thing I can say that is contrary to most people who have read this, I love the amount of detail that was put into describing each and every corner of the crime scenes in this book because it painted a very clear picture of what was going on, what time of day it was, and why. I also feel that up until the middle part of the book (where the trials begin) it had a very sort of Resevoir Dogs type feel where there was a bunch of different events that happened that somehow all connect in the end and only make complete sense AT the end. Each person named and persecuted in trial was given a very thorough explanation of their background, purpose, and how it coincided with Operation: Family Secrets. One of the biggest and last things that I enjoyed were the photos included in the book because they really gave you a better idea of who was involved in certain situations (it can be easily confusing with a numerous amount of Franks, Joeys, Anthonys, etc.)

COMPLAINTS:
BUT you can definitely tell that this was written by a Chicago Tribune journalist. The entire end half of the book takes an almost completely cheesy twist describing every breath taken and every dust particle flowing through the air of the courtroom. Who was wearing what, how they grinned, how they walked....very cartoonish and honestly based on interpretation. The way Coen writes about every little inch of the courtroom makes it seems like hes a paranoid schizophrenic hiding behind a bench with only his eyes visible but I guess he was just doing his job as a journalist....

Overall, if you love the Mafia, the movies, the TV shows and most of all, the first-hand stories you hear about these people, this is a great read. Born and raised in Chicago I always thought New York blew us out of the water, this book helped me realize otherwise.

[Sara · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kudos to Chicago Tribune reporter Jeff Coen for his excellent coverage of the Family Secrets trial. I found myself horrified by the crimes committed and fascinated by the unraveling of the Chicago Mob by hitman turned FBI informant Nick Calabrese. The extortion, murder and general mayhem Nick and his brother, along with the other capos and crews of the Chicago Outfit astonished me. Really, you can't make this stuff up. Even Hollywood took a bit from the Chicago Mob when making the movie "Casino." It would be wrong for me to say I found Nick a "sympathetic" character, because in truth he was a stone cold killer, but I did feel somewhat of a sense of gratitude knowing that beneath the jaded mobster persona, there were indications of a bit of remorse or actual human feeling (such as Nick's attempts to fight emotion over two killings in particular- the first one he participated in, and the one of Michael Cagnoni.) And of course, as a Chicagoan, I'm glad these people are now LOCKED UP. It does make me wonder - if they are gone, who has come to fill their shoes? Highly interesting read for those who like true crime, law/order cases and local history.

[Laina · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'm giving this 2.5 stars. It was really interesting to learn about the goings on of the mob in Chicago during the last half of the 20th century, but I agree with other reviews that the last 2/3 of the book were really dry, detail-oriented, and not as interesting as it could have been. It goes through the court case in ridiculous detail, which really detracted from the secrecy and craziness of the entire operation. There are probably better books out there worth your time, but if you're super interested in the Chicago mob then you'll still enjoy this.

[Darlene · Rating 3 out of 5]

I find the Outfit fascinating, but this book is really slowed down by the minutia of the trial.

[Sarah · Rating 2 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book, to an extent. It was interesting, but again, just couldn't hold my attention.

[Gary Sosniecki · Rating 4 out of 5]

A paragraph on Page 244 of “Family Secrets: The Case That Crippled the Chicago Mob” left me wondering:

“The house, Nick said, was due north up Route 83 in a suburb called Bensenville adjacent to O’Hare International Airport, a town known for warehouses and having its neighborhoods of modest homes in the way of airport expansion. Marcello drove the men in his ‘fancy’ conversion van to within about a mile or so of O’Hare’s runways, turning near Irving Park Road into a subdivision that, like so many developments in the area, had a set of small brick walls marking the entrance. He and Fecarotta were in the backseat, Nick remembered, and La Pietra was in front.” (page 244)

I wonder if this was the subdivision where I grew up. I was long gone from the Chicago area by 1986 and don’t remember which subdivisions off Route 83 had brick entrance walls and which didn’t. But my parents still lived there. I wonder how close the brutal murders of two mobsters, brothers Anthony and Michael Spilotro, by a group of other Chicago “Outfit” members, in the basement of a home in a Bensenville subdivision, occurred to our family home. A mile or two — or a block or two?

Either way, author Jeff Coen’s book about the months-long “Family Secrets” trial, had me wondering more about mobster activity where I grew up.

I knew that mobsters, including Tony “Big Tuna” Accardo, a successor to Al Capone as head of the Chicago Outfit, golfed in the 1960s at the course three blocks from our home. I’m related to a waitress who Accardo complimented for good service.

But I didn’t know that a Bensenville businessman, Daniel Siefert, was “gunned down in front of his family in 1974, just before he could testify against (Joey ‘The Clown’) Lombardo and others accused of defrauding a Teamsters pension fund.”(page 409) At least that murder occurred several miles north of where I grew up.

I didn’t know that a large, well-known car dealership in Elmhurst, adjacent to Bensenville to the south, was victimized by an Outfit “street crew” that obtained a service contract from the dealership “and then began overbilling.” (page 14)

I wonder if one of my classmates was related to a mobster with a nearly identical surname.

Elmwood Park, a suburb to our east, is mentioned on eight pages, including that a garage there was “where a collection of Outfit work cars were kept.” In the 1950s, my family ate frequently at an Italian restaurant in Elmwood Park. I wonder if it was mob-connected.

I wonder if any other mobsters mentioned in the book, besides Accardo, golfed at the course near our house. I wonder if the golfer whose surname supposedly was “Haircut,” who sometimes my brother and I sat with when we ate lunch at the golf course as children, was part of the Outfit. He isn’t mentioned in the book. But a lot of mobsters with intriguing nicknames were:

The Clown. Jimmy Light. The Indian. Twan. The German. Gumba. Doves. Poker. No Nose, also known as Johnny Bananas. Butch. Hambone. Big Stoop. Captain D. Rocky. The Little Guy. Shorty. Pops. A few of them were murdered by others in the Outfit, mostly for stealing money that was meant for Outfit higher-ups or for snitching — or suspected snitching — to authorities.

I wonder why it took so long, even months, for mobsters to plan some of these murders. That doesn’t sound efficient.

I wonder if the book would have been so fascinating if I hadn’t recognized so many of the suburbs where crimes occurred.

Probably.

[Jay French · Rating 3 out of 5]

“Family Secrets” was a truly detailed, thorough look at the state of the Mafia in Chicago from roughly the 60s to the 80s. The source was solid reporting from the author, a Chicago Tribune reporter, and the testimony from the “Family Secrets” trial. No matter what kind of book you like, there’s a bit of it in here. Like courtroom drama? The last half of the book details the trial itself, with scenes described in cinematic detail that you would expect from a seasoned court reporter in a no-cameras-allowed courtroom. Like vicious murders? There are quite a few described here, including gore, and even the occasional humor that you might have seen in a killing in “The Sopranos”. Like science? There’s enough of the grisly CSI stuff here, but surprisingly there is a long description of the series of experiments around the development of car bombs triggered by unattended remote controls. These killers didn’t just walk up to someone and blast away, at least not all of the time. They put a lot of thought and attention and run-through into their killings. Like business stories? Here you read details of how the mob ran their business over the years. Are you from Chicago and want to read about local people and sites? Here you get some local celebrities, like the founder of Connie’s Pizza. And you hear of many locations you might already know. The location closest to me was a few miles from home – a Connie’s Pizza in the “Wonder Bread” suburb of Naperville that was initially funded by the mob. And there’s family drama. And there’s even a kind of time passage story, where most of the FBI and the mobsters we followed throughout the book are retiring, jailed, dead, or heading to the witness protection program at the end of the book. There’s a bit of a romanticized view of a time gone by, but only a bit.

I listened to this on audio and found it incredibly hard to follow the many, many people in the story – they kept popping up at different times, and the story isn’t told chronologically. I took an earlier reviewer’s suggestion to just focus on the family, and with that I found the story enjoyable. I found reading this similar to watching “The Sopranos”, interesting but ultimately just kind of sad.

I read this for Book Riot’s Read Harder Challenge 2018 for the prompt “Read a true crime book”. This fit the bill well.

[Burt · Rating 3 out of 5]

A few days ago, I was between books. My local library had an electronic copy of Jeff Coen’s Family Secrets available through Hoopla. I read it and found Family Secrets to be pretty good, but no better.

On its surface, Family Secrets would seem to have everything. Coen makes a good case that the Family Secrets case really did mark the end of Chicago’s outfit as a powerful entity. This is the end of the story that began with Al Capone’s consolidation of Chicago’s organized crime in the 1920s.

Even better, it involves the dynamics of a son and a brother who decide to turn on a made member of The Outfit. Also, Family Secrets details murder after murder going back decades. Some of the murders covered (such as the Spilotro brothers and Sam Giancana) are quite well known. There is intrigue, greed, betrayal, and violence at every turn. And it’s all true.

So why isn’t this book better than three stars? It’s Coen’s presentation. As with so many true crime books, Coen doesn’t know how to describe the court proceedings in an engaging way. He bogs the story down in uninteresting details and the reader’s attention wavers.

Family Secrets is one of the more-interesting accounts of mob life that I’ve read. Unfortunately, I had to wade through a lot of dull material in the process.

[Stefanie Robinson · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have the book, (Operation Family Secrets: How a Mobster's Son and the FBI Brought Down Chicago's Murderous Crime Family), written by Frank Calabrese, which is the son who turned into an informant against his father. Frank detailed the inner workings of his specific crime family- from how the induction ceremony was conducted, how crimes were committed, to who committed murders. This book was about the same case, though it offered a broader view of the events surrounding the case and trial. I usually really enjoy reading books about the same topic from multiple perspectives, and this one was no different. This was a really good Mafia book, and I have read a lot of Mafia books. I would certainly suggest picking this one up if you are interested in organized crime, especially the organized crime in Chicago.

[Victor J. Triolo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very interesting and compelling reading .

This book takes you the endless foregone conclusion of how a gangster 's life will end , ( dead, jail , or being a Govt informer ) . But this obvious outcomes is always blinded. by greed , money , and power and always more . The book you full circle , from shinning shoes to the top echelon 's of the syndicate . With the common thread of treachery within the syndicate 's members and associates for greed and survival . A very sad tale for all concerned , especially because had all this tragic history just seems to repeat itself . The book seems to resonate a quality of thoroughness and accuracy , which makes its reading more enjoyable .

[Derrick Nedzel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing account of the downfall of several senior members of the Chicago mob. Well told story of the trial, of a key mob member’s decent into the crime world and multiple murders and his subsequent decision to inform on the mob. My family has been victimized by mob extortion and theft, it is difficult to read about the damage the mob’s greet and violence has done to the people of Chicago, a city I love. However it was also inspiring to read about the dedicated FBI team, members who’s determination, focus on justice and their commitment to the greater good brought so many of there criminals to justice. In the end, this is an inspiring book that shows commitment to public service can overcome greed, self-interest and cruelty.

[Alexander · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a fairly straightforward account of the 21st century's biggest legal case as Chicago's "Outfit" that is propelled by the remarkable facts themselves. To say that the defendants, witnesses, and lawyers are characters in these pages is an understatement and a sure testament to the author's diligent attendance of the months-long trial that brought down Frank Calabrese, Sr., Joey the Clown Lombardo, and James Marcello among others.

While the trial's back and forth is compelling reading, my only critique here is that the book had the opportunity to get beyond the trial a bit more but did not really pursue it.

If you ever wondered about the facts that inspired the movie 'Casino,' this will also be a compelling read since so much of the book revolves around the solution to the murder of the Spilotro brothers.

Or, if you just enjoy true crime tales and a look at the Justice system in action, this is a must-read.

[Colby Cali · Rating 2 out of 5]

There is a lot of good content in this, but it's really not written well. There is no story being told or any sort of flow. It's kind of a complicated situation, and it's written in a choppy way, like the facts were thrown together. It would have been much better in some sort of narrative form. You don't even get introduced to key characters in the beginning. It's almost as if the author expects you to have far more information than most would have. I follow this kind of stuff, and it still was not an enjoyable read.

[Dave · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really enjoyed this book. Having grown up in Chicago during the time period the book covers, I remember many of these events and people. Didn’t realize how active the Outfit still was in the 80s and 90s. This book filled in a lot of info for me and made me want to read more about the modern Outfit.

[Tom Bourgeois · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an excellent rendering of one of the most important criminal trials ever to take place in Chicago. This trial wrote the epitaph to the Chicago mob. Mr. Coen provides lurid and thorough coverage of this trial that chronicled the exploits of Nick Calabrese, his brother Frank and the hierarchy of the last remnants to the Chicago La Cosa Nostra. Great read.

[Phil · Rating 5 out of 5]

Simply outstanding! The author simultaneously educates readers and demythologizes the Chicago Mob. Well researched excellently written and informative. Probably the best book I’ve read on this subject in years.

[Mila Pool · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book after reading frank calabrese jr’s book and actually picked up even greater details on some crimes and covered a lot of the trial. I recommend if.

[Dan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Possibly the best book on the Chicago Family Secrets trial. Riveting, and well written.

[Deborah Korpitz · Rating 4 out of 5]

Understanding the mob

Informative, gives a good idea of how things work in the mob. Tells of a type of family backed friendship gone bad.