1946

Two brothers — Edward P. and George Jones — freely controlled Chicago, Illinois’ policy* racket for 25 years, beginning in the 1920s.

As a result, the two raked in money, $10 to $30 million per year, in nickels and dimes, primarily from the Caucasians and African Americans living in slums, which turned the siblings into multimillionaires. In one year alone, income from their operation, that spanned from Ohio to Idaho, was an estimated $4.5 million ($45 million today)!

On a Monday in May 1946, Edward Jones’ chauffeur drove him and his wife and cashier, Frances Myles, to Myles’ home. When the limousine arrived there, two masked men carrying submachine guns appeared, hit and grabbed Jones and tried to capture Myles, but she broke free and ran into her house. The abductors forced Jones in their car and sped away. Jones’ chauffeur and wife followed and a few blocks away, alerted police who then pursued and fired two bullets at the criminals. The gunmen fired back, shattering the squad car’s front window, injuring an officer and, ultimately, getting away.

Days passed.

Some underworld members speculated the kidnappers would hold Jones until he relinquished control of his policy business in the Windy City, or if he refused, murder him. In agreement with that motive, police theorized former Al Capone minions had taken Jones.

Their other hypothesis was that ex-cons who’d done time in federal prison with Jones (he served a couple of years for income tax evasion) had snatched him for ransom money. (Jones had been kidnapped twice before but hadn’t reported the incidents to law enforcement officers.)

Five days later, Jones was released. He said he’d been blindfolded while held but had been treated well, hadn’t spoken to his captors and couldn’t identify them.

A rumor then spread that Jones’ mother and sister had paid $100,000 ($1.2 million today) to free him.

Case Turns Cold

Police, as part of their crime investigation, tried to round up and question the usual suspects, 100 of them including former Capone associates, but the big-time players had disappeared. They included:

• Matt Capone (Al’s brother)
• Ralph “Bottles” Capone (Al’s brother)
• Sam “Golf Bag” Hunt
• Murray “The Camel” Humphreys
• Edward “Red” Meehan
• Anthony “Tough Tony” Capezzio
• Tony “Joe Batters” Accardo

Nothing came of the detectives’ efforts.

After the kidnapping, Jones moved into a 12-room mansion in Mexico City, Mexico, from where he continued to oversee his multistate policy enterprise.

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*In policy, also called numbers, players bet on a number they predicted would appear in a specific source on a given day. Originally, operators obtained the winning numbers through lottery drawings but that evolved into using baseball scores, pari-mutuel totals, cattle receipts and other combinations of figures that routinely appeared in the newspaper. Because players could wager nickels and dimes, even those who couldn’t afford even part of a lottery ticket could participate. Therefore, the game became prevalent in poor U.S. neighborhoods.

Sources

Photo from Pond5: “”The Road From Coins” by dbrus

1960

A cheap, spiral notebook held great power in Nevada’s gambling world for decades.

It contained known U.S. mobsters whose underworld statuses and histories were such that the state gambling authorities didn’t want them anywhere near The Silver State’s casinos. This was a problem as these undesirables frequented major gambling operations in the state.

Nevada had legalized gambling in 1931, but it wasn’t until about two decades later that casinos became under stricter regulatory control, after the creation of two such agencies — first the Nevada Gaming Control Board (NGCB) in 1955 and then the Nevada Gaming Commission (NGC) in 1959.

Soon after, in 1960, the NGCB created and distributed the book to major casinos along with the state regulation mandating all casinos be operated in a way “suitable to protect the public health, safety, morals, good order and general welfare of the State of Nevada.” Casinos weren’t to allow the hoodlums in the book into their establishments … under any circumstances … ever.

Failure to comply meant losing their gambling licenses and, thus, ability to run such enterprises. The compilation garnered the name “Black Book,” not because of its sinister connotations but due to its plain black cover. And despite being labeled “Top Secret,” everyone seemed to know about it.

Each mobster in the black book garnered one page, which contained their picture, aliases and FBI file number. Over time, the NGCB deleted names from and added names to the list. The public never knew how and why the gambling regulators chose the undesirables they did for inclusion.

Blacklisted Mobsters

These were the 11 original bad boys in the black book and their primary cities of operation:

Chicago

• Salvatore Giancana (aka Salvatore Giancana, Sam Giancana, Momo, Mooney, Sam the Cigar, Sammy): a boss from 1957 to 1966
• Llewelyn Morris Humphreys (aka Murray Llewelyn Humphreys, Murray Humphreys, The Camel, The Hump): an alleged lieutenant of Al Capone and Sam Giancana
• Marcello Giuseppe Caifano (aka Johnny Marshall, Marshall Caifano): an overseer of mob-controlled casinos in Las Vegas who was suspected of numerous murders

Kansas City

• Nicholas Civella (aka Nick Civella): a mob boss (brother of Carl Civella)
• Carl James Civella (aka Cork): in charge of day-to-day operations (brother of Nicholas Civella)
• Motel Grzebienacz (aka Max Jaben): an associate and alleged lieutenant for Sam Giancana

Los Angeles

• Louis Tom Dragna (aka Lou Allen): a boss, who challenged the black book’s constitutionality
• John Louis Battaglia (aka The Bat): an associate
• Joseph Sica (aka J.S., Joe Sica): a racketeer involved in bookmaking, armed robbery, murder for hire, extortion and narcotics distribution
• Robert L. Garcia (aka Bobby Garcia): an associate

New York

• Michael Coppola (aka Trigger Mike): a capo for the Genovese crime family

Today, a digital version of the black book (the Excluded Persons list) exists on Nevada’s gambling agencies’ website. Along with underworld-affiliated individuals, it contains known, big-time gambling cheaters.

Sources