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20 Significant Mafia Hits

Khalid Elhassan February 19, 2019 23 min

11. Bugsy Siegel

Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel (1906 – 1947) was a Jewish NYC gangster who became a friend and associate of major mafia luminaries such as Charles “Lucky” Luciano, and Meyer Lansky. In 1930, Siegel was a member of a hit team organized by Luciano, which killed NYC’s then-reigning mob boss, Joe Masseria. A feared hitman and one of the original leaders of a contract killing organization that came to be known as Murder Inc., Bugy Siegel also dabbled in bootlegging and gambling, before relocating to the West Coast to expand the mafia rackets there.

While in the West Coast, Siegel raised mafia eyebrows by hobnobbing with Hollywood figures. That was overlooked – for a while – because he helped establish the mafia in Las Vegas, by building the Flamingo Hotel and Casino. Unfortunately for Siegel, he was caught skimming off huge amounts from East Coast mobsters who had invested in Las Vegas. On the evening of June 20th, 1947, Siegel was relaxing in a palatial Beverly Hills mansion, reading the Los Angeles Times, when a hitman riddled him with bullets fired through the window with an M1 rifle, including two shots to the head.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.