Joe Kennedy is one of the biggest crooks who ever lived.


Sam Giancana was born in 1908 grew up on the streets of Chicago. He was involved in the 43 Gang and eventually moved on up to working with the big boys with such colorful gangster names like Frank "the Enforcer" Nitti, Paul "the Waiter" Ricca, and Tony "Joe Batters" Accardo. Viewers of the old television series "The Untouchables" will remember the fictionalized version of Frank Nitti.

Giancana started out stealing cars and moved on up to the status of "trigger man". By the time he turned twenty he was the primary suspect in three murder investigations. However he never stood trial for any of them.

In 1939 Giancana was convicted of bootlegging and spent four years in prison. Following that, he handled pretty much all illegal gambling and liquor distribution in Louisiana along with HA Killian, who worked with Carlos Marcello.

Back in Chicago he began working his way up the organization. The black leaders of the Souths Side gambling rackets did not want to relinquish control to the mob. In August of 1952 he saw that, Theodore Roe came to a violent end and his partner Eddie Jones was “convinced” to escape to Mexico.

Giancana was at the 1957 Appalachian summit at the upstate New York home of Joseph Barbara. Later he complained that the meeting should have been held in Chicago since they would have been safe there.

He moved the financial center from Miami to Panama as it was much easier to launder money without US banking rules. This was a joint action between the mob and CIA had mutual needs and interests.

When John Kennedy got the nomination for president in 1960, his old friend Joseph Kennedy prevailed upon Giancana to help get his son elected through his connections in the windy city. He bragged to mistress, Judith Exner, that he was responsible for electing the president. This is why the attacks on organized crime by Attorney General Robert Kennedy were particularly annoying to the crime boss.

While this was going on the CIA contacted Giancana about plans to take out Castro. This appeared to be a mutually beneficial operation as organized crime bosses saw their major investments in Cuban casinos and hotels nationalized and the revenue gone. The efforts to get Castro came to nothing but helped cement the relationship between organized crime and the CIA.

In 1975 Giancana was scheduled to testify before the Church Commission, and he was being watched closely by the FBI. However on the night of June 19 all surveillance was called off and did not return until Giancana's body was discovered with several .22 bullets in his head.

The mob boss had a nephew, also named Sam Giancana who wrote a book named Double Cross where he wrote about the things he learned in conversations with his uncle – such as his involvement in the Marcello plan to eliminate President Kennedy and, perhaps more surprising, that his men were the ones who murdered Marilyn Monroe. He was hoping that by doing this job he could also implicate Robert Kennedy, but the government cleaners got there first spared the Kennedy's from Giancana's revenge.

Double Cross: The Explosive Inside Story of the Mobster Who Controlled America
by Sam Giancana, Chuck Giancana, Bettina Giancana

One of the most feared Chicago mobsters Sam Giancana clawed his way to the top of the Mafia hierarchy by starting as a hit man for Al Capone. He was known as one of the best vehicle escape artists, a tenacious business man, and a ruthless killer. He partied with major stars such as Frank Sinatra and Marilyn Monroe and did business with agents ranging from the CIA to the Vatican to the shah of Iran.

When politician Joe Kennedy gave Giancana the chance to use mob muscle to get his son John elected, Giancana jumped at the task. But the Kennedy brothers double-crossed him, waging full-out war on organized crime throughout the United States. And Giancana went after them.

Written with suspense and conviction, we learn about how the CIA asked Giancana to assassinate Fidel Castro

JFK and Sam: The Connection Between the Giancana and Kennedy Assassinations

by Antoinette Giancana, John R Hughes, Thomas H Jobe

JFK AND SAM is unique from other books on the Kennedy assassination. Written by an insider with access to key figures, it names the assassins and traces the assassination team's movements on November 22, 1963, and discusses the team leader's life and his taped confession.