Charles Carrollo - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Charles Vincent "Charlie the Wop" Carrollo (born August 22, 1902 - died 1979) was a Kansas City, Missouri

Kansas City, Missouri

Kansas City, Missouri is the largest city in the U.S. state of Missouri and is the anchor city of the Kansas City Metropolitan Area, the second largest metropolitan area in Missouri. It encompasses in parts of Jackson, Clay, Cass, and Platte counties...

crime boss during the 1930s.

Born Carlo Carollo in Sandrigo

Sandrigo

Sandrigo is a town in the province of Vicenza, Veneto, Italy. It is east of SP248. The town is famous due to the "Festa del Baccalà", where the typical dish baccalà alla vicentina is prepared with the stockfish imported from Røst, a Norwegian town belonging to the Lofoten.-Sources:*...

a town in the Veneto

Veneto

Veneto is one of the 20 regions of Italy. Its population is about 5 million, ranking 5th in Italy.Veneto had been for more than a millennium an independent state, the Republic of Venice, until it was eventually annexed by Italy in 1866 after brief Austrian and French rule...

region, birthplace of Baccalà

Baccalà

Baccalà is Venetian Language for salt cod. Most baccalà dishes require that the fish be soaked numerous times to remove excess saltiness...

, Carollo's family emigrated to the United States when he was twelve years old, initially settling in New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

before moving to Kansas City. His father was Antonino Carrollo and his mother Rosa Maria Carrollo.

At some time after 1917, Carrollo became a close friend and enforcer for future Kansas City mob boss John Lazia

John Lazia

John Lazia, also known as "Brother John" , was an American organized crime figure in Kansas City, Missouri, during the prohibition period in the United States.-Early years:...

. During the early 1920s, when Lazia was arrested for bootlegging

Rum-running

Rum-running, also known as bootlegging, is the illegal business of transporting alcoholic beverages where such transportation is forbidden by law...

, Carrollo accepted responsibility for the crime and went to prison for a short time. By the late 1920s, Lazia controlled all organized crime in Kansas City and Carrollo was a top lieutenant.

On the night of July 10, 1934, Carrollo drove Lazia and his wife Marie to their apartment building. When Lazia got out of the car, an unidentified "hit team" gunned him down in a hail of submachine gun

Submachine gun

A submachine gun is an automatic carbine, designed to fire pistol cartridges. It combines the automatic fire of a machine gun with the cartridge of a pistol. The submachine gun was invented during World War I , but the apex of its use was during World War II when millions of the weapon type were...

fire. Lazia last word's were for Carrollo to drive Marie to safety. Carrollo and Marie Lazia escaped unharmed. The murder was never solved. With the aid of the Kansas City Pendergast political organization, Carrollo became the new mob boss. Carollo and newly appointed Kansas City police chief Otto Higgins became closely involved in numerous criminal activities.

In 1939, Treasury Agents

United States Department of the Treasury

The Department of the Treasury is an executive department and the treasury of the United States federal government. It was established by an Act of Congress in 1789 to manage government revenue...

under Secretary Henry Morgenthau, Jr.

Henry Morgenthau, Jr.

Henry Morgenthau, Jr. was the U.S. Secretary of the Treasury during the administration of Franklin D. Roosevelt. He played a major role in designing and financing the New Deal...

started pursuing Carrollo. Carrollo responded by refusing any warrants and sending his gunmen to harass the agents. However, on October 20, 1939, Carrollo, Higgins, and Tom Pendergast were convicted of income tax evasion and sent to Leavenworth Federal Penitentiary in Leavenworth, Kansas

Leavenworth, Kansas

Leavenworth is the largest city and county seat of Leavenworth County, in the U.S. state of Kansas and within the Kansas City, Missouri Metropolitan Area. Located in the northeast portion of the state, it is on the west bank of the Missouri River. As of the 2010 census, the city population was...

. While at Leavenworth, Carrollo was discovered trafficking in contraband

Contraband

The word contraband, reported in English since 1529, from Medieval French contrebande "a smuggling," denotes any item which, relating to its nature, is illegal to be possessed or sold....

within the prison and was transferred to Alcatraz, the high security prison in San Francisco Bay

San Francisco Bay

San Francisco Bay is a shallow, productive estuary through which water draining from approximately forty percent of California, flowing in the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers from the Sierra Nevada mountains, enters the Pacific Ocean...

.

Released from prison in 1954, Carrollo was eventually deported to Italy. In 1979, Carrollo died of natural causes in Kansas City.

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