Secret Societies: Inside the World's Most Notorious Organizations (29 page)

The late Johnny D'Amato. All the sex you want, as long as it's hetero.

Louis (Lepke) Buchalter. He sat in the electric chair as though riding the subway to work.

Thanks to his notoriety and a few traitorous colleagues, Buchalter was convicted of murder and sentenced to die in the electric chair on March 4, 1944. In spite of appeals by his lawyers for a commutation, Lepke's death sentence was carried out, and he was executed along with two associates. Buchalter was the last of the three to die, and while the first two men had stumbled quivering with fear into the execution chamber, Lepke strode in confidently, plopped himself into the electric chair, and sat as impassively as though he were riding the subway to work. Five minutes after being strapped in, he was pronounced dead.

The next day, Buchalter's widow hosted a press conference at a hotel near the prison in Ossining, New York, where her husband had been executed. “My husband dictated this statement in his death cell,” she told reporters, “and I wrote it down, word for word.” According to Beatrice Buchalter, Lepke had insisted that his statement receive the widest possible coverage, and reporters wrote down every word that Beatrice read from his note.

“I am anxious to have it clearly understood,” Lepke dictated, “that I did not offer to talk and give information in exchange for any promise of commutation of my death sentence. I did not ask for that!” According to his widow, Lepke insisted on the exclamation point.

Buchalter, everyone agreed, was providing a clear signal to Mafia cohorts that he had not broken
omerta
. Some observers believed he did this to prevent reprisals against his family, but others suggested his motive was less practical and more emotional. Even in death, it was important that others understood he had acted in an honorable fashion towards his colleagues, if not towards his victims. This was a matter of personal pride that the prospect of having 5000 volts of electricity blasting through his body within a few hours could not divert.

Sixty years later, Big Joey Massino was boss of New York's Bonanno family, the top man of one of Manhattan's five most powerful Mafia. But the 400-pound leader of a group that practiced extortion among the same garment district that Lepke Buchalter terrorized proved to be a very different kind of man.
Omerta
may have meant honor to Buchalter but it meant nothing to Big Joey—not when he was looking at a hard-time life sentence after being convicted of murder and racketeering. Out on bail in September 2004, the Mafia boss did the unthinkable for a man of his stature in the world's most powerful criminal society: he agreed to wear an fbi microphone and record a colleague discussing the slaying of an associate and the planned murder of a federal prosecutor. Through his cooperation, dozens of his family members were brought to justice, and Massino avoided a potential life sentence.

When news of Massino's turncoat behavior became known, it hit Cosa Nostra members with the impact of an express train. Massino was hardly the first to break the
omerta
code; Joe Valachi set that mark back in 1963 when he testified to the U.S. Congress about the Mafia's presence, using the term “Cosa Nostra” in public for the first time. Since then, dozens of members have sought lighter sentences by cooperating with prosecutors. In every previous case, however, these were lower-level wise guys, with limited knowledge of the family's operations, no hope of reaching the higher levels where the big money was earned, and perhaps with a grudge or two against the men above them. The turning of a family boss was
unprecedented and foreshadowed the possibility of a total breakdown of discipline within the organization. How can any Cosa Nostra family generate respect and loyalty, and exert discipline among the lower levels, when a family head betrays the entire organization?

The future of secrecy within the American branch of the Mafia/Cosa Nostra is in doubt. The prospect of its continued existence, and the strength of its control over criminal activities long associated with it, are even less certain.

NINE

YAKUZA

TRADITIONS AND AMPUTATIONS

TOKYO'S GINZA DISTRICT REMAINS THE SAME GLITZY ENTER
-tainment area it has been since the end of World War ii, a Japanese blend of New York's Broadway and London's Soho, with a dash of Las Vegas. One recent night on a main Ginza thoroughfare, several dozen Japanese businessmen sat mesmerized in front of pinball-like machines, watching small shiny balls meander their way down through a maze of metal pins. This is
pachinko
, a national craze among Japanese men, its name derived from the sound of the chrome balls as they bounce among the pins, over and over.

The atmosphere in a private men's club located directly above the parlor was very different. Here the lights were dimmed, the furniture was plush, and soft music, played on traditional Japanese instruments, floated through the smoky air. In a far corner, a man in his 60s sat in front of a low table, flanked by two young women who giggled at the orders he gave in a harsh and guttural manner to several young men hovering nearby. The men approached at his command, nodded at his instructions, then bowed and withdrew, sent on errands elsewhere in the club or onto the busy street below. A simple nod from the older man brought a drink or a serving of tempura from an attentive waitress; a similar gesture silenced one of the younger men in mid-sentence. From time to time, the older man smiled at the young women, one in a short cocktail dress, the other in a schoolgirl's pleated plaid skirt and starched white blouse. When he slipped his hand up the leg of the woman in the cocktail dress or stroked the blouse of the
woman in the schoolgirl uniform, they laughed nervously and covered their mouths.

To a Westerner, the scene appeared to be a Japanese version of a Mafia godfather dispensing orders, retribution and rewards to his underlings. In some ways, it was. In other ways, it differed, especially when a young man appeared at the entrance to the club and stood waiting for his presence to be acknowledged. Dressed in the same slim-fitting suits as the other men his age, his hair shiny and his white shirt perfectly starched, he lingered nervously shifting his weight from one foot to the other, his face pale. His left hand was bandaged. His right hand held a small, carefully wrapped object.

Finally, responding to a curt nod from the older man and keeping his head down and his eyes lowered, the young man approached the older man in the corner. The girls ceased their giggles. The other young men stepped aside, permitting him to pass. The room grew silent.

Standing in front of the older man, the newcomer, his eyes and head still lowered, set the small parcel, using both hands in a gesture of solemn ceremony, onto the table. The older man looked at the young man's bandaged hand, nodded, and waved his own hand over the package in a signal to remove it. One of the other young men approached and whisked it away.

Inside the package was the severed last joint of the newly arrived man's pinkie finger, removed and submitted as an act of contrition and a plea for forgiveness. Something the younger man had done offended the older man, his boss. Apparently, other men in the room had offended him in a similar fashion, for many of them were also lacking a portion of their smallest finger. Some had no small finger on one hand at all, suggesting multiple affronts committed in the past. This was the Japanese Yakuza, a secret crime society tracing its origins back to the days of samurai warriors, and enforcing discipline in the same traditional and terrible manner.

Like chivalrous knights defending a lady's honor and flint-eyed sheriffs of the American Wild West, samurai warriors are
viewed by many as guardians of medieval Japanese moral standards. Once again, the reality falls far short of the legend.

The samurai may be hailed as great and noble warriors, but their exploits belie their reputation. They also inspired the Yakuza.

The samurai rose out of coalitions of warrior-chiefs in twelfth-century Japan, which was evolving into a feudal society much like the one already established in Europe. As with European feudalism, weaker leaders and groups pledged allegiance to larger and more powerful forces in return for protection. These groups, bonded by personal and family loyalties, began selecting the best fighters among them to serve as “gentlemen warriors,” men skilled in combat and prepared at any moment to defend their personal chiefs. (Samurai is translated as “one who serves.”)

Along with their fighting ability, the samurai were marked by a fanatical dedication to loyalty. Over time, this loyalty aspect grew to override other aspects of the warrior's life. Love of wife and children, duty to one's parents and fear of death were all secondary to the samurai's obligation of absolute loyalty and ferocity when encountering an adversary. Battles between warring factions became chilling events marked by samurai fighters boasting of their prowess and the exploits of their illustrious ancestors as they swung their swords at the bodies of their enemies.

Such ferocity and dedication set the samurai apart from the rest of Japanese society and earned them special privileges. Only recognized samurai, for example, were permitted to own
katana
, the long two-handed swords that the samurai revered like sacred objects. If a samurai believed he had been insulted by someone of a lower birth status, he could cut the offender in two with his sword and suffer no punishment. Samurai weapons
evolved into the central object of an elaborate code of honor. Swords used to slay many opponents in battle were believed to possess spiritual powers, and new swords were tested on human bodies, usually the corpses of beheaded criminals.

Like medieval knights, wealthy samurai fought on horseback clad in helmet and flexible armor while less affluent warriors functioned as foot-soldiers. Unlike their European counterparts, however, samurai were motivated not by religious fervor or motives of chivalry but by simple dedication to the orders of their warlords. In this sense, they resembled mafia
capos
more than heroic battlers.

Nor, contrary to the aura often associated with the samurai, was there much heroism exhibited during battles. Consider this account of a thirteenth-century raid on an emperor's palace:

The nobles, courtiers and even the ladies in waiting of the women's quarters were slashed to death…. The palace was set ablaze and when the occupants rushed out, so as not to be burned by the fire, they were met by warriors. When they turned back… they were consumed by the flames…. [Some] even jumped into wells in large numbers and of these, too, the bottom ones in a short time had drowned, those in the middle were crushed to death by their fellows, and those on top had been cut to pieces or burned by the flames….

Inevitably, admirable samurai standards grew corrupted with time, and eventually even their noble causes began to crumble. In the seventeenth century the
hatamoto-yakko
(servants of the shogun), an extravagant branch of independent samurai, found their services unneeded during an extended period of peace. Unable to function in ordinary society, they veered from performing service on behalf of their warlords to creating mayhem among the populace. In some cases, they acted like Robin Hood-inspired folk heroes, defending the poor and defenseless, and sharing stolen booty with starving peasants. In most instances, however, they grew as ruthless and
exploitive as any mob of hoodlums, despite their claimed penchant for ceremony and honor.