Thomas Dunne Books, 2005.
Review published Mar 2007.
When Lucky Luciano settled the mob wars in the thirties, he organized New York into five families: Genovese, Gambino, Bonnano, Colombo, and Lucchese. This explains the title of Selwyn Raab's book. Raab, a New York Times reporter, covered the Mafia for twenty-five years. An excellent writer, he tells the story of governmental response to Cosa Nostra, starting with denial, then ignoring the problem, then prosecutions of underlings, then using the RICO law to convict the capos and godfathers and pack them off for long prison terms. Near the end, the government broke the Mafia code of omertà by convincing lower-ranking wiseguys to testify against the dons and go, with their families, into the federal witness protection program. By the end of the century, all five bosses were gone, and the New York Mafia was greatly weakened.
But after 9/11 the federal government mistakenly declared victory, since more FBI agents were needed for anti-terrorism assignments. The mob makes a great deal of money through corrupt labor unions and crooked businesses in the construction, food service, trash, gambling and financial industries in New York. Customers ultimately pay for Mafia skim in terms of higher prices, especially on government contracts. By dropping the priority of controlling organized crime, the government is doomed to having to repeat the anti-Mafia campaign, as the five families continue to recruit made men and build up their numbers.
Perhaps the most frightening feature of the book is how popular culture, exemplified by The Godfather and Sopranos, has made the public tolerant of a gang of vicious criminals that calmly commit extortion, murder and torture. Raab's 700-page book allows the reader to learn, through dispassionate recounting of the facts, that the Mafia is not a bunch of good guys who cheat a little. Now available in paperback.