Mickey Spillane (mobster)
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Michael Spillane much better known as Mickey Spillane (July 13th 1934-May 13th 1977) was an Irish-American mobster from Hell's Kitchen, New York. Spillane, who was called the "last of the gentleman gangsters", was a marked contrast to the violent Westies gang members who succeeded him in Hell's Kitchen.
[edit] Early life
As a young boy in Hell's Kitchen, Spillane started as a numbers runner for various organized crime figures in his neighborhood. In 1960, Mickey took over the rackets left to him by his predecessor Eddie McGrath, the waterfront racketeer and longshormen's union leader. He married Maureen McManus, the daughter of the Democratic district leader Eugene McManus.
Though Italian mobsters dominated organized crime in the city, Irish street gangs had long operated in Hell's Kitchen. The Italians allowed Spillane to operate on the West Side as long as they got their cut. As retribution for their hostile takeover, Spillane would kidnap members of the Italian Mafia and hold them for ransom. Although he ran the rackets such as gambling, policy, and loansharking, he was against the sale of drugs in his neighborhood and wouldn't allow it.
[edit] Spillane-Coonan rivalry & the Gambino crime family
In 1966 a young upstart named Jimmy Coonan attempted to take the neighborhood from Mickey, muscling in on his territory and murdering a Spillane underling. Ultimately, Coonan was sent to prison in 1967. When Coonan was released from prison, he sought to align himself with the Gambino crime family through an up and coming capo from Brooklyn named Roy DeMeo.
The 1970s saw an increased threat from the Genovese crime family, as Fat Tony Salerno sought control over the soon to be built Jacob K. Javits Convention Center. Since the Convention Center was located on the West Side, Spillane stood his ground against the takeover by the Italians. Salerno responded by hiring an Irish-American hitman named Joseph "Mad Dog" Sullivan to assassinate Tom Devaney, Eddie "the Butcher" Cummiskey and Tom "the Greek" Kapatos, three of Spillane's chief lieutenants. However, Sullivan failed to kill them and only killed a young child, causing much outrage and lead to Sullivan's murder. When people found out Spillane hired him he was publicly humiliated, as he always tried to keep his dirty work quiet so his "legitimate friends" would not know of it. By the mid 1970s Spillane had moved his family out of Hell's Kitchen to Woodside, Queens, for fear for their safety.
On May 13, 1977, Mickey Spillane was killed outside his apartment in Woodside, Queens. It has long been rumored that Roy DeMeo murdered Spillane as a favor to Jimmy Coonan, who subsequently took over as the boss of the Hell's Kitchen Irish Mob.
Spillane was of no relation to the author Mickey Spillane or the wrestler Michael Spillane.
[edit] References
- English, T.J. The Westies. St. Martin's Paperbacks, 1991. ISBN 0-312-92429-1
- English, T.J. Paddy Whacked: The Untold Story of the Irish American Gangster. New York: HarperCollins, 2005. ISBN 0-06-059002-5
