Murder and Mayhem on Chicago's North Side by Troy Taylor

Author:Troy Taylor
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-03-11T16:00:00+00:00

Dion O’Banion and his wife. The leader of the North Side mob was an ally of Torrio and Capone in the early days, but gang warfare led to his assassination in 1924. Courtesy of the Chicago Daily News.

His hesitation backfired on him in May 1924, when O’Banion came to him and told him that he planned to retire and wanted to sell Torrio his largest gambling den and his favorite brewery. Torrio agreed to buy up O’Banion’s concerns and reportedly paid him half a million dollars in cash two days later. The gang leaders agreed to meet at the brewery on May 19, as Torrio wanted to inspect his new property. He had not been there for more than ten minutes before Police Chief Collins, leading twenty officers, raided the place and arrested O’Banion, Earl “Hymie” Weiss and Torrio. This was Torrio’s second arrest for violating Prohibition. He had been arrested once and fined in June 1923, but a second arrest could mean jail time—a fact of which O’Banion had been very much aware. Torrio also realized that O’Banion had no intention of retiring. He had conned Torrio into buying a brewery that he knew the police were about to shut down.

Torrio decided that it was time to get rid of O’Banion. When Mike Merlo, the founder and president of the powerful Unione Siciliana died in November 1924, Torrio saw a way to kill the North Side gang leader. O’Banion was the owner of Schofield’s Flower Shop, across the street from Holy Name Cathedral, which was known as the only place to buy flowers for gangland funerals. Torrio would have his enemy killed in his own place.

On November 10, James Genna and Carmen Vacco entered O’Banion’s flower shop and ordered a wreath for Merlo’s funeral. They gave O’Banion $750 to pay for the arrangement. They told him that they would send some boys back to pick it up a little later. They left the shop. Five minutes later, the telephone rang and an unknown caller wanted to know if O’Banion had the flowers ready. He promised they would be ready at noon, and at five minutes past the hour, a blue Jewett touring car pulled up in front of the shop.

One of the shop’s employees, a black man named William Crutchfield, who was sweeping up flower petals in the back room, looked up to see three men get out of the car and walk into the shop. Another man remained at the wheel of the car outside. O’Banion, dressed in a long white smock and holding a pair of florist’s shears in his left hand, came out from behind the counter and extended his hand in greeting. “Hello, boys,” O’Banion greeted them. “You from Mike Merlo’s?”

The three men walked abreast and approached O’Banion with smiles on their faces. The man in the center was tall, clean-shaven and wearing an expensive overcoat and fedora. It was determined years later that this man was Frankie Yale. The other two, believed to be John Scalise and Albert Anselmi, were shorter and stockier, with dark complexions.

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