The Untouchables Season 3, Episode 5: The Matt Bass Scheme

1

The Troubleshooter

In the summer of 1934, a new gambling device was sweeping the nation: the punchboards. Even though they were nickel-and-dime games, it added up-- they made more money for the mob than the numbers racket. After Ness and his men smash some of the punchboard manufacturing sites, the 5 members of the syndicate running the punchboards hold a meet at a building by the freight yards: the top mobsters from Chicago (Jake ""Joe"" Petrie), Cincinnati, St. Louis, Detroit and New York (Max Riegel). Petrie says he can sum up all their problems in 2 words: Eliot Ness.

60 min

2

Power Play

By the Summer of 1933, a new wave of crime has engulfed Chicago.  Due to a public outcry for action, Willard Thornton is appointed as a new commissioner to clean up the town.  At a press conference, Thornton arrogantly says his office does not publicly constitute criticism of any law enforcement agency-- while his tone of voice implies he privately does criticize them.  Eliot Ness is standing right next to him, looking more dour than usual. Ness and his men go on a raid, they find a shipment of heroin in a hideout.

60 min

3

Tunnel of Horrors

August 28, 1933. That night, Eliot Ness and his Untouchables, and some undercover plainclothes police, are staking out an amusement pier on the Chicago lakefront; they are tailing Alexander Raeder-- owner of the pier, and the source of the new narcotics flooding the Windy City. Ness had received an anonymous tip that Raeder was delivering 15 pounds of heroin, half a million dollars' worth, to a syndicate contact.

60 min

4

The Genna Brothers

In the years following WWI, there was a flood of European immigrants into the USA. In the early 1920s, the 6 Genna brothers, place of origin Sicily, were headed to Chicago. The Genna brothers are nothing but a gang of bullies, and in a few short years they are the ruling lords of Little Italy, an Italian neighborhood in Chicago. One night, as the 6 Gennas are beating up a street vendor, Agent Enrico Rossi whales into them. The leader, Mike Genna, asks if he knows who they are; Rossi says, ""Yeah, the Genna brothers-- one rat with 6 heads!"" Mike Genna says that Enrico Rossi is Italian, just like them; Rossi says he's ashamed.

60 min

5

The Matt Bass Scheme

In mid-June 1932, Eliot Ness, having compiled a list of Frank Nitti's breweries & distilleries, began a series of raids designed to break the back of the Capone empire. This puts the pressure on Frank Nitti, Capone's lieutenant. Nitti calls a meet with Seth Otis and Phil Grier, who jointly own the biggest speakeasy in Chicago, the Hotsy Totsy Club.

60 min

6

Loophole

Chicago, January 1933. Ness and his men raid a speakeasy owned by gangster Mikhail ""Red Mike"" Probich, and run by Connie LaVerne. At the trial, Probich is represented by his crooked lawyer Morton Halas, who grew up in poverty. The trial drags on for 5 days. Finally, Ness is ready to call the last prosecution witness, Connie LaVerne, who ""is 80% of their case."" Morton Halas objects, on the grounds that a wife cannot be forced to testify against her husband.

60 min

7

Jigsaw

September 14, 1932. At 11:30 p.m., Eliot Ness goes to the Odeon movie theatre (not the Odeon Burlesque theatre used in several episodes); he gives stoolie Marty Wilger an envelope with cash for his tips. Those tips had led to successful raids by Ness against Nitti's speaks: booze, girls, gambling tables; also 2 warehouses and a distillery in the last week. Nitti's plenty sore.

60 min

8

Man Killer

Chicago, July 1934. Anonymous phone calls have been tipping off Ness and his men to narcotics activities; they do a bunch of raids. On August 4, even though sales have fallen off, Frank Nitti is ordering 15 kilos of heroin*, the biggest single shipment ever. That night, one of Nitti's boys makes the trade: dough for the H. He gets into a car driven by another of Nitti's boys, Manny Kravitz.

60 min

9

City Without a Name

1933. Violence and corruption were at an all-time high in Chicago, New York, St. Louis, Detroit, Kansas City-- virtually every city in the U.S. The lone exception is an Eastern seaboard metropolis, referred to as City Without a Name, in which the voters had used the ballot box to vote corruption out of public office. And Federal agent Arnold Wainwright had kept organized crime out-- but on October 22, he is blasted by machine-guns while in a coffee shop.

60 min

10

Hammerlock

New York, middle of 1932. The Syndicate-- headed by Joe Kulak, Louis ""Lepke"" Buchalter and Dutch Schultz-- has the city's huge garment industry organized and under control. Now they are setting their sights on bakeries; there are 500 independent wholesale bakers in the city. They give Bull Hanlon the word: get the biggest independent baker, Adam Stone, to sign up and all the rest will fall in line.

60 min

11

Canada Run

November 1932. Big-time gangster Joe Palakopolous is playing a dangerous game-- he just had his hitman rub out Danny Kugan, the biggest supplier of Canadian whiskey that Frank Nitti had. And Nitti's plenty sore. Kugan was the only guy who could import Canadian Gold for Nitti. The phony stuff is no good; Nitti quips that bottled rotgut is so bad, ""it peels off the labels from the inside."" Eliot Ness and his men investigate Kugan's killing, and try to find out who will take over the operation.

60 min

12

Fall Guy

October 1932, Chicago.  With Capone in the slammer, other bosses are biting off chunks of Capone's empire.  One boss is Frankie Gruder, head of a group that is the forerunner of Murder, Inc.; Gruder wants control of all the Canadian imports and exports.  Gruder and his boys go to a warehouse, Gruder shoots a longshoreman.  Ness and his men show up and start blasting.  There's a shoot-out.  Gruder manages to escape.

60 min

13

The Gang War

1932. Chicago is a thirsty town, consuming 86,000 gallons of booze a day; that's 32-million gallons a year. Almost all this booze is beer and rotgut, but 1% is the finest Canadian scotch. Nitti's boys, armed with tommy guns, shoot up a rival speak, the Blue Lion, that's serving the Canadian scotch. Ness and his men investigate; 2 people dead, 3 critically injured.

60 min

14

The Silent Partner

Chicago, March 2, 1932. The hottest nightspot in town is the Club Tunisian, owned by gangster Pete Kalik, who built it up from a small speak. Ness and Lee Hobson show up, but not to see gorgeous singer Mavis Carroll-- they had gotten an anonymous phone tip earlier. Lee Hobson is tired, he is due to take his vacation leave starting Friday. Ness and Hobson get contacted by the club comedian Eddie Paris, he is the one who phoned them. After his show, he meets with Ness and Hobson at the Denton Street wharf; Eddie wants Pete Kalik put away behind bars, he says Kalik is working out a big alcohol deal with the Partner, the mysterious man who had backed Torrio and Capone.

60 min

15

The Whitey Steele Story

New York City. July 23, 1934. The Underworld, which had long made big money by covering bets on horse races, wants to get their hands on a new invention-- the racewire, which can speed the results of horse races to bookmakers everywhere.  That rainy night, Michael Barrigan and Frederic Withers (who, along with their partner Douglas Barrows, own and run the Trans-Pacific News Service) receive an urgent call from Barrows-- but Barrigan finds Barrows dead in a bookie joint (the back room of Hayes florists) when he gets there.

60 min

16

The Death Tree

Early November 1931. On West Madison Street, there is a wonderfully diverse neighborhood made up of gypsies of Romanian, Hungarian and Czech descent. The area is flooded with Capone's rotgut, being distributed by Janos Colescu. There are many colorful characters, including the chestnut vendor with his singsong voice: ""Get your red-hot che-e-estnuts, the wind is cold."" When the rotgut leads to a drunken knife-fight that leaves a gypsy dead, the 8-member gypsy Senate, headed by Victor Bartok, with his brother Fedor Bartok, convenes. Eliot Ness shows up to offer his help to end the bootleg booze; they decline his help, saying they will handle matters themselves.

60 min

17

Takeover

Chicago, October 1932. The only ""beer"" allowed to be served during Prohibition is ""near-beer"" or ""Near-O""-- which is 0.5% alcohol, as opposed to real beer which is 4.0% alcohol. And so, a lot of legitimate beer producers wind up ""spiking"" the barrels of near-beer with pure alcohol, to get it up to strength. A northside brewer named Woody O'Mara wants to smash all his competition; he tells his girlfriend Amy Gratzner, a rather plain-looking 23-year-old secretary for rival brewer Franz Koenig, to blow the whistle on her boss.

60 min

18

The Stryker Brothers

March 3, 1932. It's the great train robbery, on the southbound express headed for Chicago. The Stryker brothers steal mail sacks containing 750 grand in payroll money. During the robbery, a baggage man and Lippy Carson (an associate of the Stryker brothers, who had worked as a mail clerk) are killed, and thrown from the speeding train. Since mail robbery is a federal offense, Eliot Ness and his Untouchables are called in.

60 min

19

Element of Danger

Chicago, August 29, 1934. That night, in the Haymarket district, special agent Daniel Gosden, a policeman on loan to the Untouchables, goes through a skylight and finds an opium laboratory in the top floor of a rundown tenement hotel. Just then, drug lord Victor Rait and 4 hoods (Gus, Sully, Max, and Trapp) show up, carrying crates of supplies into the place. Rait spots Gosden and gives chase; just as Gosden phones Ness for back-up, Rait blows him away with a shotgun. Then Rait blasts 6 bullets from his gun to disperse the crowd of tenants investigating the noise. Somebody phones the cops, because within minutes Eliot Ness and his men and some policemen are on the scene.

60 min

20

The Maggie Storm Story

Chicago, after the Repeal of Prohibition; (so this would be around 1934). With booze legal, the racket czars step up their dealings in narcotics. Ness and Lee Hobson are chasing 2 dope-pushers, one of them is Benny Rivas. After the shootout, one hood is dead; Benny moans, ""Get me a priest."" Ness finds heroin on him; wanting to die with a clear conscience, Benny says, ""808"" and dies. That leads Ness to Maggie Storm's 808 Club.

60 min

21

Man in the Middle

November 7, 1933.  Slot machines are big business; 2,000 of the one-armed bandits rake in $100,000 per week; ($50 per machine).  One night, ""Moose"" Tobin and 3 other Bomer hoods drop in on Porker Davis' upstairs gambling joint.  Tobin tells Davis that Bomer wants to teach him a lesson; the hoods chase everybody out of the joint.  Then they start throwing the slot machines out the 2nd story window; when one of Davis' employees tries to stop them, the hoods throw him out the window. 

60 min

22

Downfall

Chicago. Pete ""The Persuader"" Kalmisky, former bodyguard of Al Capone, accompanied by Syndicate business manager Alan Sitkin, have a meeting with Joey December, president of the debt-ridden Great Lakes Pacific Railroad. They form a crooked alliance; Joey agrees to transport their illegal liquor on his trains, in exchange for ""20% off the top."" After Kalmisky leaves, Sitkin talks privately with Joey. Sitkin gives Joey $100,000 for 10,000 shares of Canada Central stock, now worth $10 a share;

60 min

23

The Case Against Eliot Ness

March 4, 1933. The Windy City is getting ready for the Chicago World's Fair, also known as the ""Century of Progress"" Exposition. The 3 wealthy Endicott brothers, who jointly owned franchises at the upcoming Fair, are all rubbed out in short order. Restaurant owner Gus Dmytryk goes to the Licensing Committee, and it seems he will get the former Endicott franchises: 3 nightclubs at the Midway, and 5 other concessions. It will mean big bucks, since the Chicago World's Fair is expected to draw 50-million visitors.

60 min

24

The Ginnie Littlesmith Story

May 17, 1932. There are many free soup kitchens in Chicago, but one of them in the skid row section is really a front; upstairs, gangster Chiz Gosher, twice convicted of white slavery, has his office. His partners in crime are the powerful, nationwide vice ring known as The Group, represented by hood Vic Cassandros. Chiz's niece is Ginnie Littlesmith, who runs the soup kitchen, and she is not involved in the rackets. Downstairs, Enrico Rossi is working undercover-- he's dressed in dirty old clothes, and phones Ness; Eliot tells him the raid is set for 12:45.* But Vic is soon tipped of Ness' impending raid; Vic goes upstairs and demands the ledger books from Gosher.

60 min

25

The Contract

New York City; February 4, 1934.  3 months of intensive investigation is paying off for Ness and his Untouchables; they have ""Smiley"" Barris cornered in an upper floor of an Eastside tenement.  With the aid of local police, and some tear gas, Smiley is apprehended.  But somebody wants Smiley dead; a sniper with a high-powered rifle, on the roof of a building, shoots at Smiley-- he accidentally kills the cop beside Smiley.

60 min

26

Pressure

Chicago, April 16, 1934. Prohibition is over, the main racket is now narcotics. The New York Syndicate, the ""Big 6"" send their representative Wally Corbin to Chicago, to pick up a shipment of heroin from Louie ""The Bear"" Madikoff-- he's the top dealer in the Midwest and the chief supplier of the NY Syndicate. Ness has already picked off 2 of Madikoff's runners. Wally picks up 1-1/2 kilos of the junk, worth $200,000.

60 min

27

Arsenal

January 1929. Gangster Matt Malloy walks into a sporting goods store; he can't buy an automatic pistol without a police permit, however anyone with $150 can buy a machine-gun. Later, at the Club Montmartre, half a dozen choppers are laid out on Nitti's table. The Council says that now they can move in on the Northside and Bugs Moran. Nitti picks up a chopper and says, ""You got 'em-- use 'em!"" Gang war!

60 min

28

The Monkey Wrench

March 2, 1933. The remote section of the northern Michigan Lake front, 180 miles northeast of Chicago. The Chicago Syndicate, to improve the quality of their booze, is now smuggling in master brewers from Germany; the illegal immigrants had come 6,000 miles to the new country. Tonight, 8 new immigrants are brought in. One of them looks at the sign: ""Welcome to Chippewa Landing, Michigan""-- Bernd asks, ""Chippewa? What does that mean? But this is America, yes?"" Max Kerner tells him to move on.

60 min