Al Capone

Al Capone--Public Enemy Number One--has long captured the popular imagination. At the height of Prohibition, his multimillion-dollar Chicago bootlegging, prostitution, and gambling operation dominated organized crime. His competition with rival gangs was brutally violent, a long-running war that crested with the shocking St. Valentine's Day Massacre of 1929. Law enforcement and the media elite seemed powerless to stop him. And then the fall: a legal noose tightened by the FBI, a conviction on tax evasion, Alcatraz. After his release he returned to his family in Miami a much diminished man, living quietly until the ravages of his neurosyphilis took their final toll. The slick mobster persona endures, immortalized in countless novels and movies. But the true flesh-and-blood man behind the legend has remained a mystery. Through dogged research and exclusive access to Capone's family, Deirdre Bair cuts through the myths to reveal his essential humanity, uncovering a complex character who was flawed and cruel but also capable of nobility. Rigorous and intimate, Al Capone provides new answers to the enduring questions about this fascinating figure, who was equal parts charismatic gangster, devoted patriarch, and calculating monster.