T. J. English

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T. J. English (born 6 October 1957), is an Irish American author and journalist known primarily for his non-fiction books about differing aspects of organized crime, both contemporary and historical. His book, The Westies: Inside the Hell's Kitchen Irish Mob, first published in 1990, is the best-selling account of an Irish American gang in the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood in New York City. The Westies operated primarily in the 1970s and 1980s, though the roots of the gang go all the way back to the Prohibition Era.

T. J. English was born in Tacoma, Washington and grew up in a large Irish Catholic family of ten children. His father was a steel worker and his mother a social worker for Catholic Charities. In 1980, he moved to New York City and worked in series of odd jobs including bartender, janitor and taxi driver while working as a freelance journalist. His writing for Irish America Magazine led to his first book, The Westies. Later, in the mid-1990s, English wrote a series of articles for Playboy magazine entitled "The New Mob," which explored the new face of organized crime.

He later published Born to Kill (1995), about a Vietnamese gang based in New York City's Chinatown, and Paddy Whacked (2005), a history of the Irish American gangster. In Fall 2007, ReganBooks is to publish The Havana Mob: Gangsters, Gamblers, Showgirls and Revolutionaries in Cuba.

English is also a screenwriter who has written episodes of the television crime dramas NYPD Blue and Homicide: Life on the Streets. He shared a Humanitas Prize with David Simon and Julie Martin for the episode "Shades of Gray"[1].[2]

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[edit] References

  1. ^ "Shades of Gray". Adam Bernstein, Writ. Julie Martin and David Simon (story), T. J. English (teleplay). Homicide: Life on the Street. NBC. 1999-01-08. No. 10, season 7.
  2. ^ 60 Minute Category. Humanitas Prize. Retrieved on 2006-09-28.

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