Frank "The Prime Minister" Costello

Frank Costello was born Francesco Castiglia in Lauropoli, Calabria, in 1891 and raised in East Harlem. He served a year in prison for carrying a concealed weapon in 1915 and afterwards, by his own account, never carried one again. He preferred to work through lawyers, judges and district leaders.

Under Charles Luciano he served as consigliere, and when Luciano was convicted in 1936 Costello took effective control of the family. His authority came from an unusual source for the work: he was genuinely well connected in city politics, to the point where Tammany Hall district leaders were understood to need his approval.

Kefauver

In 1951 the Senate committee on organised crime televised its hearings, and Costello agreed to appear on condition that his face not be shown. The cameras settled on his hands instead. The footage of those hands moving while he evaded questions made him, briefly, the most recognisable criminal in the country. He walked out mid-testimony and was convicted of contempt.

The lobby

On 2 May 1957 a gunman confronted him in the lobby of his apartment building on Central Park West and fired once. Costello turned as the shot was fired and the bullet grazed his scalp. He declined to identify his attacker.

He read the message correctly, ceded the family to Vito Genovese, and withdrew from the business. He died of a heart attack in February 1973, at eighty-two, one of very few men at his level to reach that age.