Читать реферат по английскому: "The Mafia Essay Research Paper The Mafia" Страница 1

(Назад) (Cкачать работу)

The Mafia Essay, Research Paper

The Mafia is a secret criminal organization that has great economic and political control over large parts of Sicilian society and operates both criminal and legitimate enterprises in the United States. It is believed to have started during Sicily’s late Middle Ages, beginning as separate bonds of strong-arm enforcers hired by local landowners. It eventually evolved into a network of independent groups governing in rural areas. With the Sicilian immigration of the late 19th century, the Mafia began to operate in several large United States cities. During the period of Prohibition it monopolized the trade in bootleg liquor and controlled loan sharking, gambling, and prostitution. Competing Mafia families established mutually recognized territories, reaching agreement by negotiation or by intimidation. By the mid-1930 the Mafia had taken on the institutionalized structure that is now typical of organized crime in the United States.

Sammy the Bull, lesser known as the infamous Salvatore Gravano, is the highest-ranking member of the Mafia ever to break his blood vow of silence and turn against his boss, Mafia giant John Gotti. In 1992, Gravano realized he was about to take the fall for Gotti, so he became a federal witness. His testimony eventually led to convictions of dozens of key Cosa Nostra figures, including Gotti, who is now serving a life sentence without parole.

Sammy the Bull is now living a new life under a new name; aware he could be murdered at any moment for what he had done. He still harbors bad feelings for his former associates in the Mafia for what he considers the corruption and betrayal of what he once believed to be a brotherhood of honor.

In “Underboss,” by Peter Maas, Gravano tells the story of his life as a gangster and opens up the secret inner secrets of Cosa Nostra, and underworld of power, betrayal, deception, and greed. There was always the incredible possibility of violent death if you made one wrong move.

Sammy Gravano, who grew up in Brooklyn, earned his nickname for his courage and refusal to be bullied, even by much larger, much older kids. He chose to become a wise guy and was eventually a “made” member of the Colombo crime family, moving from smaller crimes such as burglaries and stickups to the larger operations of gambling, loan-sharking operations, and the occasional mob-sanctioned murder.

Gravano was horrified at the Mafia’s slow transition from its traditional low profile and traditional refusal to involve “civilians” in its assignations. Gravano tells how the Mafia controlled the construction business in New York and describes the significant hits on such figures as Paul Castellano and more than a dozen other Mafioso, all of which were not solved until Gravano provided the needed information to law enforcement officials.

Gravano never believed that he would ever turn against his associates and still refuses to blow the whistle on those who he considers his friends. When Gotti, however, took over as the mob boss and flaunted his newfound fame, courting the media, and endangering the future of their secret operations, he grew increasingly more disgusted. “John just fell in love with himself,” Gravano says in the book.

Due in part to Gotti’s actions and his tendency to believe his own press and his fame, he led to the downfall of his crime family. Gotti turned into a self-obsessed, egomaniac. His own insistence on having a solid, powerful presence at a social club in Little Italy allowed surveillance teams from the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) to identify the whole Gambino family and eventually led to its downfall. In the book, Gravano says that he believes the Mafia is currently on unstable ground but that he also believes that Cosa Nostra could make its appearance again. “I hear the Chinese, the Russians are going to move in. Believe me, they can’t put together what took us fifty, sixty years to do.”

This is Godfather fiction come to life and it is powerful reading.

After reading the story of Sammy the Bull, I felt I had read information that could be applied to some of the things I have learned this semester in Organized Crime. I liked “Underboss” because it presented a case that was personally interesting to me and I thought it was something that was worthwhile reading.

One of the more intriguing aspects of the book is that way that Maas narrates Gravano’s life story while at the same time quoting directly from him. One early quote sets the whole scene for the book when Sammy says, “I wouldn’t have minded going to Vietnam. You got medals for killing people there.” Through the details descriptions of Sammy’s involvement in the Mafia as a hit man, I got a real sense of Gravano’s life. I learned things reading the book that I might not have known otherwise. I learned that Gotti and Gravano masterminded and carried out the murder of Paul Castellano, that both were eventually indicted on murder, and that Sammy opted to rat on Gotti and served only five years. One of the most interesting things that I learned about the book was that it provoked a lawsuit by relatives of Gravano’s victims because they thought that Gravano was paid for his contributions.

In reading “Underboss” I also learned some lessons about morality; through Sammy Gravano, it teaches the reader lessons about good and evil, rights and wrongs. Because of the way that the author tells the story, I felt as if I was actually in the secret parts of Cosa Nostra, almost as if I was being a witness to the power, greed, and deception of the inner workings of the Mafia. It was exciting because, as with anything dealing with organized crime, the possibility of death was never really far away.

“Underboss” is a good reading because it deals with different issues that have connections to

Похожие работы