Showing titles in Organized Crime

Cindy Murphy is the early 2000s poster girl for having it all. A top job in finance in Manhattan, two delightful daughters and a house in the suburbs. But Cindy’s life is built on a lie. She’s really a Russian spy sent to live in deep cover in the US and send intel back to Moscow. Rosamund Pike narrates this true story documentary about an extraordinary woman who deceives her friends, neighbors, boss and even her children.

Genovese, Gambino, Bonnano, Colombo, and Lucchese. For decades these Five Families ruled New York and built the American Mafia (or Cosa Nostra) into an underworld empire. Today, the Mafia is an endangered species, battered and beleaguered by aggressive investigators, incompetent leadership, betrayals, and generational changes that produced violent, unreliable leaders and recruits.

Mafia Prince is the first-person account of one of the most violent eras in Mafia history - "Little" Nicky Scarfo’s reign as boss of the Philly family in the 1980s - written by Scarfo’s underboss and nephew, "Crazy" Phil Leonetti. The youngest-ever underboss at the age of 31, Leonetti was at the crux of the violent downfall of the traditional American Mafia in the 1980s when he infiltrated Atlantic City after gambling was legalized, and later turned state’s evidence against his own.

To infiltrate international drug cartels, he had to become a player...‘Undercover’: The true story behind Operation Julie, one of Britain's largest drug busts and how the same detective infiltrated a cartel planning to smuggle cocaine into Britain. Forget ‘Breaking Bad’ this is the extraordinary story of the 1970s Welsh LSD ring that supplied the world, told by a cop in deepest cover on the case. In the dim chaos of a Liverpool nightclub, a sharp question cut through the noise: “Are you guys cops?” For Steve Jackson, the words chilled him to the bone.

Sir Michael Caine knows a thing or two about gangs: whether that’s joining one as a kid, or playing them in movies for over 50 years. Organised crime has captivated pop culture for decades, from the Krays to the Mafia. Now Caine delves into the real stories behind the gangs we think we know so well, revealing the hidden realities behind the myths. And he throughout the series he asks: can a gang ever truly be ‘successful’?

In this gritty New York Times best-seller, the true story of a crooked deal between the FBI and the Irish Mob is exposed. By providing a penetrating look into the mean streets of mid-1970s South Boston, the author shows how two kids from the neighborhood cross paths again years later, ending in the biggest informant scandal in FBI history.

Cosa Nostra is the compelling story of the Sicilian mafia, the world's most famous, most secretive and most misunderstood criminal fraternity. The mafia has been given many names since it was founded 140 years ago: the Sect, the Brotherhood, the Honoured Society and now Cosa Nostra. Yet as times have changed, the mafia's subtle and bloody methods have remained the same. Now, for the first time, Cosa Nostra reconstructs the complete history of the Sicilian mafia from its origins to the present day.

To Britain's criminal underworld, Freddie Foreman is the Godfather. Held responsible for the gangland killings of Ginger Marks and Frank 'The Mad Axeman' Mitchell, he was the punisher to those who broke the underworld's strict code of conduct. Foreman's dramatic kidnap and arrest for Britain's biggest cash robbery made headlines around the world, yet this daring raid was just the peak of the safe-blowing, bank-robbing career that spanned decades.

In 1999, when Tom O’Neill was assigned a magazine piece about the 30th anniversary of the Manson murders, he worried there was nothing new to say. Weren’t the facts indisputable? Charles Manson had ordered his teenage followers to commit seven brutal murders, and in his thrall, they’d gladly complied. But when O’Neill began reporting the story, he kept finding holes in the prosecutor Vincent Bugliosi’s narrative, long enshrined in the best-selling Helter Skelter. Before long, O’Neill had questions about everything from the motive to the manhunt.

On the streets of the tough Dublin inner-city neighbourhood where he grew up, Gerry Hutch was perceived as an ordinary decent criminal, a quintessential Robin Hood figure who fought the law—and won. To the rest of the world he was an elusive criminal godfather called the Monk: an enigmatic criminal mastermind and the hunted leader of one side in the deadliest gangland feud in Irish criminal history.

In 2011 a group of fishermen living on the Isle of Wight, off the south coast of England, were convicted for one of the largest, most audacious drug-smuggling plots in British history. They were accused of scooping up £53mill ($69 mill) worth of pure cocaine in the dead of night from the middle of the English Channel.

They were the DeMeo gang - the most deadly hit men in organized crime. Their Mafia higher-ups came to know, use, and ultimately fear them as the Murder Machine. They killed for profit and for pleasure, following cold-blooded plans and wild whims, from the mean streets of New York to the Florida Gold Coast, and from coast to coast. Now complete with personal revelations of one of the key players, this is the savage story that leaves no corpse unturned in its terrifying telling.

Vincent "Chin" Gigante. He started out as a professional boxer - until he found his true calling as a ruthless contract killer. His doting mother's pet name for the boy evolved into his famous alias, "Chin", a nickname that struck fear throughout organized crime as he routinely ordered the murders of mobsters who violated the Mafia code. Vincent Gigante was hand-picked by Vito Genovese to run the Genovese Family when Vito was sent to prison. Chin raked in more than $100 million for the Genovese Family, all while evading federal investigators.

Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Anthony M. DeStefano presents the rise and fall of Vito Genovese in this first comprehensive biography of the legendary mafioso - from his childhood in Naples, Italy, and the beginnings of his bullet-ridden criminal career on lower Manhattan's mean streets, through his self-exile in the mid-1930s back to his homeland where he ran a black market operation under the fascist regime of Benito Mussolini, and his return to New York where Genovese made a fortune as the head of an illegal narcotics empire.

Belle Gunness was a farmer, a mother, and a murderer who lured victims to her Indiana farm with promises of love and opportunity. But behind the idyllic rural façade lay a gruesome reality—a farm where dreams were shattered, lives were stolen, and secrets were buried. Dubbed the "Black Widow of La Porte," Belle’s chilling crimes have haunted history for over a century. Whispers from the Murder Farm peels back the layers of this twisted case, exploring Belle’s calculated methods, the psychology behind her crimes, and the failures of law enforcement that allowed her to evade justice.

El Narco is the story of the ultraviolent criminal organizations that have turned huge areas of Mexico into a combat zone. It is a piercing portrait of a drug trade that turns ordinary men into mass murderers, as well as a diagnosis of what drives the cartels and what gives them such power. Veteran Mexico correspondent Ioan Grillo traces the gangs from their origins as smugglers to their present status as criminal empires.

Shay grew up on a tough Manchester council estate where drugs and gangs were rife. A life of crime would have been an easy path to take. So it went against everything that was expected of him when he joined the police. It wouldn't be long before Shay's prodigious talent caught the attention of the top. Then came the call that changed his life: an offer to join the secret level one undercover unit known as Omega. And it was easy to see why they wanted him; he wouldn't have to stray too far from what he already knew.

One time king of the underworld, Jack Spot was known as one of the most powerful criminals in Britain—amassing incredible wealth, and being associated with a string of women, throughout his 30-year career. From taking to the streets of London in the thirties and associating with the pantheon of criminals who led the '60s organisations, Jack Spot’s tale is a gripping cocktail of dastardly crimes and glamourous associations.

Mark Galeotti is the go-to expert on organized crime in Russia, consulted by governments and police around the world. Now, Western listeners can explore the fascinating history of the vory v zakone, a group that has survived and thrived amid the changes brought on by Stalinism, the Cold War, the Afghan War, and the end of the Soviet experiment.

From New York Times reporter and Pulitzer finalist Ali Watkins, this true-crime saga is the long-buried story of how a group of Philadelphia gunrunners armed the IRA at the height of the Troubles. A ragtag band of carpenters, family men and fugitives, the Philadelphia Five, as they came to be known, banded together, bolstering the fight for a united Ireland but fuelling the Troubles at an untold cost.