The Violent Years (26 page)

T
he Ferguson Grand Jury investigation essentially destroyed the old-style roadhouse gambling operations in the Detroit area. Many Prohibition era gamblers left the state. Some went to Hallendale, Florida, where their gambling expertise was in demand. These men were sought out by the New York and Chicago Mobs and offered good jobs in the Florida casino business and later in Las Vegas.

The Italian Mob was in firm control of the Detroit underworld by the early ‘40s. They were heavily involved in bookmaking and numbers in Detroit. Both of these types of operations could be easily concealed. Operators who were not directly connected to the Detroit Mafia organization paid a street tax to the Mob to remain in business. However, there were always rebel underworld operators in Detroit who tried to buck the system. Some of these men were former Prohibition era gangsters who had thrived during the period when the Purple Gang ceased to exist in the mid-’30s, and the Italian Mob took over. Often they were thugs who had either worked for the Purples or the local Mafia family and decided they wanted a piece of the action for themselves.

• • •

EDDIE SARKESIAN

At approximately 11 p.m. on August 16, 1944, residents in a neighborhood near the east side of Detroit were startled by the sound of gunfire. Witnesses later told police that they heard seven or eight shots and saw a Cadillac convertible run up over the curb close to a busy nearby intersection and come to a stop. Three men were seen running from the car. When police arrived, they found a man slumped over the steering wheel. Although he had been shot in the head at close range and was unconscious, he was still alive. Detroit homicide detectives quickly identified the gravely wounded man as Eddie Sarkesian, a freelance thug and stick-up man who often worked as a collector for the Detroit Mob. He died en route to the hospital. It was later discovered that he had been shot six times in the head by someone who had been sitting next to him in the front seat of the car.

Earlier that day, someone had called Detroit police headquarters and stated that the Mob was hunting Sarkesian and if they did not act, he would be murdered. Detectives were looking for Sarkesian when they received word that he had been shot. Crime scene investigators assumed that Eddie Sarkesian was riding with men he trusted. A man seated in the back seat had evidently grabbed Sarkesian around the neck while he was driving and held him as he was shot. Detectives surmised that a moment before he was shot Sarkesian realized that his friends were in reality his executioners. He had pulled his revolver, which was knocked out of his hand when his assassin struck him with the barrel of the pistol that he used to dispatch Sarkesian a moment later. Except for a bruise on his right hand, there were no other signs of a struggle. Eddie’s gun lay in a pool of blood on the floor of the car, fully loaded. His murder was a long time in coming.

Eddie Sarkesian’s life had been a long, hard-luck story. Born in East St. Louis, Illinois, in 1914, Sarkesian’s parents were both Middle Eastern immigrants. The family moved to Detroit in 1919, where Eddie essentially grew up on the street. As a teenager, he got involved in amateur boxing and became a heavyweight fighter of indifferent ability. His training, however, gave him a definite edge on the street.

By the late ‘20s, Eddie was regularly getting into trouble with the law. From petty theft and breaking and entering he quickly graduated into strong-arm work. Sarkesian was 5’8” and 180 pounds and was tough. He had a reputation in the Detroit underworld of being totally unprincipled and ruthless. While still in his late teens, local mobsters often used Sarkesian’s strong-arm talents for collecting bookie debts and loan shark money. By the early ‘30s, Sarkesian grew impatient with his progress in the Detroit underworld. Eddie and a partner began sticking up Detroit area beer gardens. In June of 1934 Sarkesian got into a scuffle with a Detroit beer-joint owner during a holdup and shot the man in the leg. He was quickly arrested and convicted in Detroit Recorders Court of armed robbery. On September 11, 1934, Sarkesian was sentenced to serve from 10 to 30 years in Marquette Prison. Eddie was just 20 years old at the time of his sentence.

Sarkesian served eight years in prison and was paroled in 1942 on the condition that he enlist in the army. He quickly enlisted but was discharged for medical reasons after serving only a few months. Once he was back on the street, Sarkesian began to realize that things had changed considerably in the Detroit underworld since he had gone to prison. He kept in shape while he was incarcerated and even worked for a short time as a professional fighter after he was discharged. Lacking ability as a full-time pugilist, Eddie put his physical skills to work as a bouncer in a Hamtramck bowling alley and lounge. Sarkesian was not happy with the money he was making and went back to work once again as a collector for the Detroit Mob. He made the rounds of bookie joints and underworld hangouts, where he was known and feared as a Mob muscleman. Sarkesian’s strong-arm ability was respected by the Detroit Mob, but Eddie again grew tired of the work and longed for a bigger piece of the action. This was an impossibility in the Detroit underworld of the ‘40s. The local Mafia had most of the lucrative rackets locked up. Nobody operated in the wartime Detroit underworld without the okay from the local Mafia bosses.

Sometime in 1943 Sarkesian and a former Purple Gangster named Harry “Chink” Meltzer decided to go into business sticking up bookmakers who were operating under the protection of the Mob. The pair believed that their plan was foolproof. Meltzer, a former bookmaker himself, personally knew many of the Detroit area gambling operators. He would visit various bookmaking establishments and make a note of when the daily bet money was transferred from the bookmaker to a local bank. A messenger would usually carry the money to the bank. Meltzer served as the “finger man” by pointing out the messenger to Eddie Sarkesian, who would be waiting nearby. Sarkesian would put a gun against the back of the messenger’s head and relieve him of his deposit money. The proceeds were then divided between Sarkesian and Meltzer. The bookmakers couldn’t go to the police but soon began complaining bitterly to their Mafia protectors about their losses. For a while, this system worked efficiently. Meltzer and Sarkesian continued to rob Detroit and Hamtramck bookmakers. Like many high-profile gangsters before him, either Sarkesian believed that the Mob was afraid to interfere or he had a suicidal death wish.

Sarkesian soon branched out into hijacking liquor trucks and then selling the stolen liquor to bars in Detroit and surrounding communities. For more than a year, Sarkesian continued to shake down Detroit area bookmakers with his various partners. Finally, he was approached by chief Detroit Mob enforcer Mike Rubino and warned to lay off the handbook robberies. Sarkesian agreed but continued robbing handbooks. It was assumed by Detroit police that his actions led to his murder on August 16, 1944.

But there was another theory floating around the Detroit underworld. It was believed that Sarkesian had been given $7,500 by some former Purple Gangsters in order to pay off some jockeys and fix several races at the Detroit Race Track. Sarkesian, according to this account, made off with the money, and a Purple Gang associate put up $5,000 to have Sarkesian killed.

Shortly after the murder, Eddie’s 20-year-old wife Mary was questioned about his business and his associates. The couple had only been married two weeks when Sarkesian was murdered. She told detectives that she didn’t know how her husband made his living. The only evidence police discovered was a .32 caliber pistol found by two boys the day after Sarkesian was murdered. Ballistics tests proved that this was the weapon used to murder Sarkesian. His murder was a warning sent to freelance underworld operators, letting them know that they were not welcome in Detroit. It would be a losing proposition for anyone to rebel against local Mob authority.

• • •

The Scroy Brothers

On the afternoon of June 12, 1948, Sam Scroy and his cousin, Pete Lucido, left their homes for a meeting in downtown Detroit with mobster Maxie Stern. Scroy and Lucido were professional gamblers and bookmakers. Stern was a lieutenant of Detroit Mob boss Pete Licavoli and was one of the Italian Mob’s gambling czars in the Detroit and Windsor, Ontario, area. The purpose of the meeting was reportedly to get permission for the Scroy brothers and Lucido to set up a handbook in Windsor. Sam Scroy and Pete Lucido were never seen again. The next day the families of the two men reported them missing. Detroit police later found Sam Scroy’s car parked in a downtown Detroit lot. Several days later Lucido’s car was discovered by detectives near Toledo, Ohio. Police found the trunk on Lucido’s car open. When they looked inside, all they found were two maroon buttons. There was no evidence of foul play. Members of the Lucido family later identified the buttons as being off the shirt that Lucido wore the day he disappeared.

Detroit police talked to an employee of Sam Scroy’s named Tony Marino. Marino worked in one of the Scroy brothers’ Detroit handbooks. He claimed he had a brief conversation with the two men the day they disappeared. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary at that time. Underworld informants told detectives that the two men had been murdered by the Detroit Mob for trying to break into the Windsor gambling rackets the year before. The two men were reported to be partners in a Detroit book-making business and were in financial difficulty over recent gambling losses. Detroit mobsters Anthony (Tony Jack) Giacalone, Joe “Scarface” Bommarito, Dave Feldman, and Max Stern, known associates of Scroy and Lucido, were picked up for questioning and released. For almost two years, the disappearance of the two men remained a mystery.

On the evening of February 17, 1950, Chris Scroy, Sam’s older brother, pulled his car up to the curb near Moses Joseph’s coffee house in Detroit. Chris was a tough, independent bookmaker and local racketeer who once had close connections to the Detroit Mafia family. These contacts had soured since the disappearance of his younger brother, Sam.

As Chris Scroy sat in his car and waited patiently in the dusk of that frigid February evening, he soon saw a familiar car pull up. Pulling a Mauser pistol out of his overcoat and checking the clip, he quickly stepped out of his vehicle and walked up to where the driver was backing the car into a parking space. Without saying a word, Chris Scroy emptied the clip into the car. The force of the blasts threw the driver back against his seat, and he slumped down to the floor. Chris Scroy had just shot Maxie Stern. Thinking Stern was dead, Scroy turned, walked back to his car, and drove away.

A friend of Stern’s who had been waiting for Maxie in the coffee shop rushed him to the hospital. Police quickly arrived at the scene of the shooting. Nine shots had penetrated Stern’s car. Only two hit Stern. Although he was listed in critical condition, doctors had confidence he would live. At the time of his attempted murder, Max Stern was 37 years old. He was known in the Detroit underworld as an enforcer and as the chief of local gambling operations for the Italian Mob.

Chris Scroy drove to Belle Isle, a city park in the Detroit River. As he drove over the Belle Isle Bridge, he pitched the Mauser pistol that he used to shoot Stern into the river. The next day he was arrested by Detroit police and charged with assault with intent to commit murder. Scroy had been recognized by people inside the coffee shop the night he shot Stern. Scroy denied the charge and was released. On March 9, 1950, Scroy was arrested at his home. He was taken to Detroit police headquarters and made a full confession. Scroy told police that he held Stern responsible for the murder of his younger brother, Sam, and his cousin, Pete Lucido. That was why he had shot Stern.

Of the incident Scroy confessed, “The night of the shooting I went to Congress Street in Detroit next to Moses Joseph’s coffee house because I knew Stern came there. When he pulled up in his car, I walked up and started shooting. After my gun was empty, I walked around the corner, got in my car, and took off.”

Chris Scroy also blamed Mob boss Pete Licavoli and Joe “Scarface” Bommarito for his brother’s murder. Scroy told homicide detectives that he had really wanted to kill Licavoli or Bommarito. “They run the Sicilian clique that is taking over everything,” Scroy told police. For four consecutive weeks, Chris Scroy had hidden in bushes near Joe Bommarito’s Detroit home hoping to ambush the Mafia capo, but Bommarito never appeared.

“Stern works for them,” Scroy told police. “They are heads of the Detroit syndicate.” When Scroy was told that Stern had only been shot twice, he was surprised. “He must have been wearing a bulletproof vest,” Scroy explained. “I’m not that bad of a shot. Every time I fired a round, he squirmed.”

There had been bad blood between the Scroy brothers and Max Stern for more than 10 years. According to Chris Scroy, the trouble began in 1940. Stern’s brother-in-law, Ben Griesman, had tried to shortchange Chris Scroy on the sale of some horse-racing tip sheets. The quick-tempered Scroy slapped Griesman, who complained about the incident to Stern. The next day, according to Scroy, Stern came around with a gun and forced Scroy and his younger brother to get into his car. As they were driving out of the city, Stern spotted a police car and was momentarily distracted. At that point, according to Chris Scroy, he had knocked the pistol out of Stern’s hand, and he and his brother jumped out of the car. Several days later, Chris and Sam Scroy ran into Max Stern in a downtown Detroit nightclub. Sam Scroy wanted to shoot Stern on the spot, but Chris claimed he had talked him out of it. Instead, Sam Scroy walked up to Stern and warned him to stop throwing his weight around on Woodward Avenue.

Chris Scroy told Detroit police that he, Sam, and their cousin, Pete Lucido, had operated a Detroit bookmaking business independently of the Detroit Mob. At that time, they also owned a news stand in downtown Detroit near the Detroit/Windsor tunnel. In 1947, they attempted to start a horse-betting operation in Windsor. In order to solicit customers, they would approach people waiting at the tunnel bus stop for the Windsor bus. Scroy stated that the Licavoli faction of the Detroit Mob controlled all gambling in Windsor. By agreement with the local police, Scroy’s Windsor competitors would close. The Scroy brothers’ Windsor handbook would then be raided and busted up. Continued harassment by Windsor law-enforcement friendly to the Licavoli combine finally forced the Scroy brothers out of business in Windsor. Chris and Sam then sold the handbook to their cousin, Pete Lucido. “Then that Sicilian bunch muscled in and took over Windsor,” Scroy told police. “They had the wire service, they just ran things. I’m a Sicilian myself but not one of their kind,” Chris Scroy explained. “I never had a gun and never hurt anybody until my brother disappeared.”