EBOOK
The Incorruptibles
A True Story of Kingpins, Crime Busters, and the Birth of the American Underworld
Dan Slater(0)
About
Like a Jewish Gangs of New York or a precursor to Eliot Ness's classic The Untouchables, The Incorruptibles tells the incredible true story of one of early twentieth century New York City's most powerful crime bosses and the Lower East Side crusader who leads a secret vice squad to take him down.
Throughout the second decade of the twentieth century, the greatest city in the world was a maelstrom of corruption, violence, and a densely woven web of organized crime. In downtown New York City, gangs of Eastern European Jews and other immigrants jockeyed for power, giving rise to the most powerful crime syndicates in the United States-syndicates that kept a stranglehold on commerce south of 42nd Street.
But when the violence rose to a peak in the year 1912 with the murder of gambler and state's witness Herman Rosenthal in the middle of Times Square, a coterie of influential uptowners of German Jewish descent decided to take the future of New York into their own hands. Summoning the vast wealth and power they had accrued in the industrial revolution, the uptowners marshalled a strictly off-the-books vice squad led by an ambitious twenty-one-year-old reformer named Abe Shoenfeld to take the fight to the heart of crime in the city.
Over the next decade, Shoenfeld's squad waged war on the sin they saw as threatening the future of their community, in the process taking down corrupt Tammany Hall officials, smuggling kingpins, pimps and madams, and the violent gangsters whose misdeeds dominated the years leading up to Prohibition. In this riveting account, Dan Slater tells the breathtaking true-crime story of the twentieth century's fiercest battle for the soul of New York City. Dan Slater is the author of Wolf Boys and Love in the Time of Algorithms. A former reporter for the Wall Street Journal, Dan has written for the New York Times, The New Yorker, the Washington Post, the Boston Globe,New York magazine, The Atlantic,GQ, and Fast Company. Praise for WOLF BOYS:
"The truth is stranger than fiction and sometimes it's much more harrowing. Wolf Boys is one of those times. Dan Slater has put together a riveting story that takes us on an unforgettable descent into the dark heart of the drug trade."-Michael Connelly "A hell of a story… undeniably gripping."-The New York Times Book Review "Wolf Boys is a rare book that reads like a thriller without aiming to be one. What Dan Slater does intend for it to be-and what he powerfully succeeds in creating-is an intimate, horrifying journey through a war we know is close and intractable, a war we willfully ignore with the faith that a river and a wall keeps its brutality at bay. With courageous detail and unforgettable characters, Slater will bring you not only to refute such faith, but to feel for the marginalized Americans on both sides of the conflict."-Jeff Hobbs, author of The Short and Tragic Life of Robert Peace "Wolf Boys should be required reading, especially for anyone who supports the blood-chilling, appalling trade in illegal drugs."-Chuck Palahniuk, author of Fight Club "Shocking. Eye opening... Wolf Boys reads like a fictional thriller reminiscent of Brian De Palma's Scarface, but depicts actual events. If anyone needs proof that we're losing the war against drug cartels, here it is... A portrait of the evil that stalks our streets."-David Morrell, author of Murder as a Fine Art
Throughout the second decade of the twentieth century, the greatest city in the world was a maelstrom of corruption, violence, and a densely woven web of organized crime. In downtown New York City, gangs of Eastern European Jews and other immigrants jockeyed for power, giving rise to the most powerful crime syndicates in the United States-syndicates that kept a stranglehold on commerce south of 42nd Street.
But when the violence rose to a peak in the year 1912 with the murder of gambler and state's witness Herman Rosenthal in the middle of Times Square, a coterie of influential uptowners of German Jewish descent decided to take the future of New York into their own hands. Summoning the vast wealth and power they had accrued in the industrial revolution, the uptowners marshalled a strictly off-the-books vice squad led by an ambitious twenty-one-year-old reformer named Abe Shoenfeld to take the fight to the heart of crime in the city.
Over the next decade, Shoenfeld's squad waged war on the sin they saw as threatening the future of their community, in the process taking down corrupt Tammany Hall officials, smuggling kingpins, pimps and madams, and the violent gangsters whose misdeeds dominated the years leading up to Prohibition. In this riveting account, Dan Slater tells the breathtaking true-crime story of the twentieth century's fiercest battle for the soul of New York City. Dan Slater is the author of Wolf Boys and Love in the Time of Algorithms. A former reporter for the Wall Street Journal, Dan has written for the New York Times, The New Yorker, the Washington Post, the Boston Globe,New York magazine, The Atlantic,GQ, and Fast Company. Praise for WOLF BOYS:
"The truth is stranger than fiction and sometimes it's much more harrowing. Wolf Boys is one of those times. Dan Slater has put together a riveting story that takes us on an unforgettable descent into the dark heart of the drug trade."-Michael Connelly "A hell of a story… undeniably gripping."-The New York Times Book Review "Wolf Boys is a rare book that reads like a thriller without aiming to be one. What Dan Slater does intend for it to be-and what he powerfully succeeds in creating-is an intimate, horrifying journey through a war we know is close and intractable, a war we willfully ignore with the faith that a river and a wall keeps its brutality at bay. With courageous detail and unforgettable characters, Slater will bring you not only to refute such faith, but to feel for the marginalized Americans on both sides of the conflict."-Jeff Hobbs, author of The Short and Tragic Life of Robert Peace "Wolf Boys should be required reading, especially for anyone who supports the blood-chilling, appalling trade in illegal drugs."-Chuck Palahniuk, author of Fight Club "Shocking. Eye opening... Wolf Boys reads like a fictional thriller reminiscent of Brian De Palma's Scarface, but depicts actual events. If anyone needs proof that we're losing the war against drug cartels, here it is... A portrait of the evil that stalks our streets."-David Morrell, author of Murder as a Fine Art