Mafia historian David Critchley identifies the enigmatic Castellammarese War gunman "Buster from Chicago" as Sebastiano Domingo and tracks him back to Berrien County, Michigan. Historians have neglected Berrien's role in the history of the American Mafia. Critchley shows that county's involvement in three major events of the Prohibition Era - the assassination of Antonio Lombardo, the St. Valentine's Day Massacre and the Castellammarese War.
Some underworld legends, often repeated in mob history books and long cherished by Hollywood, will have to be revised or discarded due to continuing discoveries related to a shadowy Prohibition Era Mafia figure named Saverio Pollaccia.
One hundred years ago:
Genesis of the FBI - 1908
Instructed by Congress to end the hiring Secret Service agents to conduct investigations, Theodore Roosevelt's Department of Justice temporarily assigned nine special agents to investigative duty. On July 26, 1908, those agents were placed under the direction of Chief Examiner Stanley Wellington Finch (right). That measure is regarded as the birth of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Finch did not become head of a permanent Bureau of Investigation until March 16, 1909 (Taft Administration).
Gangsters in Southwest Michigan
In the Shadows: Sam Pollaccia
Genesis of the FBI - 1908