Lucky Luciano Essay: Is he a Villian or Hero?

1. History Assessment Task
Thematic Studies- Heroes and Villians
Historical Figure Oral Presentation
Charles 'Lucky' Luciano (1897–1962) essay
Major events in his life, legacy and hero or villian
By: Musbah Fayed 10B
Charles Lucky Luciano was born in Sicily, Italy, in 1897. He was born as Salvatore Lucania, and
was raised in the Sicilian sulfur minning town of Lercardia Friddi. At the age of about 9 or 10, he
migrated with his parents to the United States in about 1906, and, not being able to speak English,
he struggled at school. Instead of focusing on bettering his education, he preferred to learn about
how to make it on the streets of New York's Lower East Side. The very first hint of Luciano
becoming somewhat of a 'criminal' was when he got his schoolmates to pay him for protection,
and if no money was given, then they were likely to recieve a beating from himself.
At the age of 14, he already had racked up a record of arrests ranging from shoplifting, drug
dealing and assault. He dropped out of school in 1914 and turned to other 'offences', and while
working as a clerk for a hat company, he managed a budding criminal career as well. As a
teenager, he befriended Jewish gang memebers Meyer Lansky and his associate Benjamin 'Bugsy'
Siegel, who, after a time, became important allies. Luciano also came into contact with Guiseppe
'Joe the Boss' Masseria's criminal operation where he got involved in dealing drugs, running him
with the law in 1916 after he was caught selling heroin and served 6 months at a reformatory for
the crime that he committed.
Luciano was a tough teenage hoodlum that lived on the Lower East Side of New York City. His
gang targeted a skinny Jewish kid whose bold defiance won their respect. This encounter led to a
merger of Jewish and Italian gangs and a lifelong friendship between them. When Luciano rebuilt
the mob, Meyer Lansky, the 'skinny Jewish kid' his gang attacked, was the architect. A ruthless
natural ability enabled them to rise through the ranks of their chosen profession. The Prohibition
Act in 1920, which prevented the selling and consumption of alcohol, allowed Luciano and
Lansky to supply alcohol to Manhattan speakeasies. Some of them used small boats to offload
supplies from the mother ships, however, their contacts enabled them to dock ships in the New
York harbour.
As a member of New York's largest Mafia family, that was run by Giuseppe 'Joe the Boss'
Masseria, Luciano began to grow impatient at the Castellammarese War in the late 1920s. The
Castellammarese War was a long and bloody power struggle between Giuseppe Masseria and
Salvatore Maranzano. Due to his impatient manner, Luciano offered to eliminate his boss and end
the violence, which he saw as 'disruptive' to business. At an Italian restaurant, Joe the Boss was
killed by Luciano's men. He gained control of the dead man's lottery business, while Maranzano
seized his bootlegging turf. Luciano's idea of replacing traditional Sicilian strong-arm methods
with a corporate structure, a board of directors and systematic infiltration of legitimate enterprise
failed to impress Maranzano. Maranzano believed himself to be boss of all bosses, and, like
Julius Caeser, he found Luciano was too ambitious, too enterprising and too dangerous.

2. However, Maranzano was too late because he was killed by men who pretended to be police
officers, men who were provided by Lansky and mutual friend Benjamin 'Bugsy' Siegel.
Luciano's management style was different from that of Al Capone, his Chicago counterpart, who
spent more time killing than doing business. The FBI states that Luciano's ascendancy as the
watershed event in the history of organized crime. Luciano organized organized crime after his
hostile takeover. He modernized the Mafia by shaping it into a smoothly run national crime
organisation that focused on the bottom line. This organisation was run by two dozen family
bosses who controlled bootlegging, numbers, narcotics, prostitution, the waterfront, the unions,
food marts, bakeries and the garment trade. Their influence and tentacles kept expanding,
infiltrating and corrupting legitimate business, politics and law enforcement. Luciano was also
famous for his trend in gangster chic. Living in a large suite at the Waldorf Astoria, he wore
expensive and elegant suits, silk shirts, handmade shoes, cashmere topcoats and fedoras which
enhanced his executive image. Frank Sinatra and actor George Raft were his friends.
Unfortunantly, that good life ended in 1935 when a man by the name of Thomas E. Dewey was
appointed New York City's special prosecutor to crack down on the crime. He mainly targeted
Luciano, and called him "the czar of organized crime in this city." He charged him with multiple
counts of compulsory prostitution, which made the the trial a sensation. Luciano denied being a
pimp and was quoted saying: "It's a bum rap." Some of the men that were part of the mob
remember Charlie. "Nobody had anything bad to say about Charlie," one of them had said. "He's
the one who put it all together. A gentleman. He'd give a girl a hundred dollars just for smiling at
him. That pimp charge was a frame just to get him off the streets."
He was convicted on 62 counts in the June of 1936 and recieved 30 to 50 years imprisonment. It
was the outbreak of World War II that caused Luciano to have his freedom back. After Pearl
Harbor, German U-boats off the U.S. coast were sinking merchant ships on a daily basis. U.S.
intelligence suspected they were helped by spies or Nazi sympathizers. Then the Normandie,
which was a French liner that was being transformed into a troop ship, sank in the Hudson River,
sparking fears of sabotage. Because of this, U.S intelligence agents turned to the underworld for
help. Lansky, known in the '30s for breaking heads at pro-Nazi meetings, acted as liaison and was
allowed to visit Luciano. He said he would cooperate, and made the dockworkers, fishermen and
hoodlums become the eyes and ears of naval intelligence. Soon after that, eight German spies,
landing by U-boat, were arrested. Explosives, maps and blueprints for sabotage were seized from
the arrest.
The Allies needed intelligence for the landing at Sicily when the invasion of Italy was planned.
Luciano's lawyer petitioned for clemency, citing his war efforts on V-E day in 1945.
Consequently, a deal was reached that included deportation and he was sent to Italy in February
1946. He went to sunny, pre-Castro Cuba months later. Lansky, Sinatra and other his other friends
paid visits to Luciano, in fact, so many times that the media took note, and in February 1947 the
U.S. Bureau of Narcotics learned of Luciano's reappearance in the Americas. U.S. authorities
claimed that he planned to headquarter a worldwide drug-smuggling operation in Cuba. Luciano
was again sent back to Italy. He died there on January 26, 1962, in homesick exile.
Luciano died of natural causes, unlike so many of his predecessors and colleagues who were
killed, murdered or assainated. Maybe he was just lucky to have died from a heart attack instead
of being shot to death. Italian and U.S. officials quickly announced they had been about to arrest
him in a $150 million heroin ring. The heart attack came at an airport, where he had gone to meet

3. a Hollywood producer. Always captivated by bad guys, Lucky Luciano excited the American
imagination. Asked if he would do it all again by a reporter, Luciano replied: "I'd do it legal. I
learned too late that you need just as good a brain to make a crooked million as an honest million.
These days you apply for a license to steal from the public. If I had my time again, I'd make sure I
got that license first."
Charles 'Lucky' Luciano was an interesting fellow. Many people today consider Luciano to be an
all out villian. Others say that he was a villian because of his gangster and mobster background. A
few consider him a hero, because he stood up to many of the major 'bosses' in New York at that
time, because of his leadership skills, his contributions in World War II and his ability to survive
many beatings and wounds. I consider him a villian as a consequence of his personalities, impatcs
and legacy in history.
His personalities, as described in my essay as his 'trend in gangster chic', would be described in
the following words: brave, cruel, drooped right eye, scar on chin, gangster, mobster, lucky
person, wealthy, celebrity, great leadership skills and respected greatly in the criminal world.
These can be considered the ideal personalities of a villian. Luciano's impact in history included
his ideas in creating the very first organised crime syndicate, the killings of the two major bosses
in New York City, Masseria and Maranzano, his selling of booze due to the Prohibition Act of the
1920's, his compulsory prostitution business and his rebuilding of the Mafia. These can also be
considered impacts that would have been done by a villian. His legacy that he left behind for us
consisted being the 'father' of organised crime, a different perspective and way of running the city
of New York, the development of the Five Families that led the city with Sicilian style rulings and
his contributions to the Castellammarese War in the late 1920s and World War II in the early
1940's. These are legacies that wolud be left behind, in my opinion, by a villian. Because of these
characteristics and events in Luciano's life, I have no objections to call Luciano a real villian.
Evidence and sources about Luciano:
Caught: Gangster Charles Luciano in a February 1931 mugshot after he was arrested for leading
a prostitution ring. His right eye is drooped after he was stabbed and left for dead, earning him
the nickname 'Lucky'.

4. Incriminating: Women, pictured in full length portraits, were arrested by police carrying out
raids of 80 New York City brothels. Hundreds agreed to give evidence in exchange for avoiding
jail time.
Witnesses: In total, 28 women testified against Luciano and his men in open court in 1936. The
prostitutes and madams were told they would serve seven years in prison if they did not
Doubt: While Luciano would have earned some money from the brothels as gang leader, some
believe he did not run them and was framed by DA Thomas E. Dewey, who had targeted the
gangster.

5. Working woman: Mugshot of Mildred Balizer in December 18, 1933.
On the witness stand: Florence 'Cokey' Newman's mug shot from October 10, 1934.
Wanted: Luciano appears on a Wanted poster. Following his arrest, he fled to Arkansas, where he
paid off police to help him evade capture. New York officers eventually came to get him.
No escape: Luciano (left) enters the police headquarters with a detective after being found in
Arkansas in 1936.

6. Luciano's men: (left to right) Meyer Berkman, Benny Spiller, Joseph 'Jo-Jo' Weintraub, Al
Weiner and Jack Eller were also arrested on prostitution charges. Some of the men were loan
sharks to the women.
Bibliography:
Reference 1:
Author: Edna Buchanan
Title of Article: 'LUCKY LUCIANO: Criminal Mastermind'
Title of encyclopedia: TIME
Year of publication: Monday, Dec. 07, 1998
Medium: Web
Publisher: TIME Magazine
Date accessed: 21/8/2014
Reference 2:
Author: Unknown
Page title: Primary sources about Lucky Luciano
Site title: Mail Online
Year of publication: Unknown
Medium: Web
Publisher: Daily Mail
Date accessed: 21/8/2014
URL: Black-and-white pictures of mob leader Charles 'Lucky' Luciano and the high class prostitutes that led
to his 1936 arrest | Mail Online
www.dailymail.co.uk
Reference 3:
Author: Unknown
Page title: Charles-Lucky-Luciano
Site title: Surfnetkids
Year of publication: Unknown
Medium: Web
Publisher: Surf Net Kids
Date accessed: 22/8/2014
URL: http://www.surfnetkids.com/go/1199/charles-lucky-luciano/
www.surfnetkids.com
Reference 4:
Author: Unknown

7. Page title: Charles "Lucky" Luciano- Facts & Summary
Site title: HISTORY.com
Year of publication: Unknown
Medium: Web
Publisher: HISTORY
Date accessed: 23/8/2014
URL: Charles “Lucky” Luciano - Facts & Summary - HISTORY.com
www.history.com
Reference 5:
Author: Unknown
Page title: Charles 'Lucky' Luciano Biography (Gangster)
Site title: Infoplease.com
Year of publication: Unknown
Medium: Web
Publisher: Infoplease
Date accessed: 20/8/2014
URL: Charles 'Lucky' Luciano Biography (Gangster) | Infoplease.com
www.infoplease.com
Reference 6:
Author: Unknown
Title: Law and History Review, Vol.17, No.1
Pages used: pp.197-199
Year of publication: Spring, 1999
Country: U.S.A
Publisher: JSTOR
Copyright Date: 1997
Reference 7:
Author: Unknown
Page title: Lucky Luciano Images
Site title: Google Images
Year of publication: Unknown
Medium: Web
Publisher: Unknown
Date accessed: 24/8/2014
URL: https://www.google.com.au/search?
q=lucky+lucian
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www.google.com.au
Reference 8:
Author: Unknown
Page title: Charles "Lucky" Luciano Images
Site title: Google Images
Year of publication: Unknown
Medium: Web
Publisher: Unknown
Date accessed: 24/8/2014
URL: https://www.google.com.au/search?
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%20luciano%20quotes & imgdii=_ & imgrc=_
www.google.com.au
Reference 9:
Author: Unknown
Page title: Lucky Luciano Synopsis
Site title: Biography.com
Year of publication: Unknown
Medium: Web
Publisher: Biography
Date accessed: 24/8/2014
URL: http://www.biography.com/people/lucky-luciano-9388350#synopsis
www.biography.com