Michele Miranda
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Michele "Mr. Big" Miranda (1896-1973) was a high ranking member and later acting head of the Lucchese crime family (although other sources claim the Genovese crime family) during the 1950s and 60s.
Born in Naples, Italy, Miranda immigrated with him family to the United States in 1905 and settled in New York. Becoming involved in crime during his teenage years, he was eventually arrested for petty theft and assault in 1915. During Prohibition, he would become an associate of Thomas Lucchese and became a member of the Lucchese crime family following the end of the Castellammarese War in 1931.
Rising through the ranks during the 1930s, Miranda would eventually bring Louis "Lepke" Buchalter's former garment industry racketeering activity under the control of the Lucchese family following Buchalter's execution, along with the rest of Murder Inc., in 1944. As head of the crime family during the 1950s, Miranda was one of countless mobsters apprehended by federal agents at the Apalachin Conference in 1957.
[edit] Further reading
- United States. Congress. House. Select Committee on Assassinations. Investigation of the Assassination of President John F. Kennedy. [1]
- United States. Congress. Senate. Government Operations Committee. Organized Crime and Illicit Traffic in Narcotics. 1964. [2]
[edit] References
- Fox, Stephen. Blood and Power: Organized Crime in Twentieth-Century America. New York: William Morrow and Company, 1989. ISBN 0-688-04350-X
- Kelly, Robert J. Encyclopedia of Organized Crime in the United States. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 2000. ISBN 0-313-30653-2
- Sifakis, Carl. The Mafia Encyclopedia. New York: Da Capo Press, 2005. ISBN 0-8160-5694-3
- Sifakis, Carl. The Encyclopedia of American Crime. New York: Facts on File Inc., 2001. ISBN 0-8160-4040-0
