The Business of Crime: Italians and Syndicate Crime in the United States

by Humbert S. Nelli

Book Overview

"Dr. Nelli . . . describes the kinds of crime that prevailed in Italian immigrant enclaves in America; like most American crime, then as now, Italian crime was one aspect of the so-called culture of urban poverty--boys graduated from street gangs to criminal gangs. None of these gangs were very big until Prohibition brought the Great Leap Forward, to a level that Dr. Nelli calls 'entrepreneurial crime.' His fine account makes sense of many murderous...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0226571327
• ISBN13: 9780226571324
• Release Date: April 1981
• Publisher: University of Chicago Press
• Length: 328 Pages
• Weight: 0.05 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 5.5" x 8.2"

Customer Reviews

Good Italian Mob History Book

I had to read this for a college class I took called The History of Urban Crime..This is a good book to get the general overview about the Italian Mafia...Black Hand gang was kind of a form of terrorism back then...."He is a friend of ours"...Hhehehehe....I like cover picture also...There are better, more thorough mob history books out there..But this would be a good one to start with