Joe Masseria
Born in Menfi, Sicily, Giuseppe Masseria, better known as Joe “The Boss” (1887 – 1931), fled his homeland as a teenager in 1903 to escape a murder indictment and emigrated to the US, which had no extradition treaty with Italy at the time. In America, he founded what is today the Genovese crime family, and became New York City’s leading crime boss and kingpin from the early 1920s until his murder in 1931.
Masseria began his criminal career in the US as an enforcer for the Morello gang in NYC’s Lower East Side, and when that gang’s boss was murdered in 1916, Masseria broke off and formed his own splinter group. It was a dangerous career, and in 1922 he miraculously escaped an assassination attempt that injured 6 bystanders and killed 2, plus a horse, earning Masseria the nickname “The Man Who Can Dodge Bullets”.
That year, he consolidated his control over the old Morello gang, and by the mid-1920s, he was among NYC’s most powerful crime bosses. After Frankie Yale’s murder, Masseria took over his territory, and by 1929, now called “Joe the Boss”, Masseria was the head of the largest crime family in New York. His chief deputy by then was Lucky Luciano, and his crime family included notable Mafiosi such as Frank Costello, Meyer Lansky, Bugsy Seigel, Albert Anastasia, and Vito Genovese.
In early 1930, rivalry with a rising competitor, Joe Maranzano, erupted into a gang war, and in the ensuing bloodletting, which came to be known as the Castellamarese War, over 60 Mafiosi were slaughtered. The conflict finally ended when Masseria was betrayed by his own men after they had cut a deal with his rival, Maranzano. On April 15, 1931, Masseria was gunned down in a restaurant by a hit squad that included future crime bosses Vito Genovese, Bugsy Seigel, and Albert Anastasia, organized and led by Masseria’s chief deputy, Lucky Luciano.
