Al Capone Biography Quotes 11 Report mistakes

Early Life
Alphonse Gabriel Capone was born in Brooklyn, New York, on January 17, 1899, to Italian immigrant parents Gabriele and Teresa Capone. He grew up in a crowded, working-class neighborhood where family ties and street loyalties were strong. Teachers noted his intelligence, but discipline problems and a clash with school authorities pushed him out in his early teens. As a youth he ran with local gangs and found work as a bouncer and bartender, notably at Frankie Yale's Harvard Inn on Coney Island. During this period he acquired the scar that inspired the nickname "Scarface", the result of a knife altercation in which Frank Galluccio cut his face. In 1918 he married Mae Coughlin; their son, Albert Francis "Sonny" Capone, was born the same year, grounding Capone in a family life that he maintained alongside his increasingly risky professional world.

Move to Chicago and the Torrio Years
Capone relocated to Chicago around 1919 at the invitation of Johnny Torrio, who had helped systematize the city's illicit liquor trade as national Prohibition began. Working first under Torrio and the brothel and vice interests long associated with James "Big Jim" Colosimo, Capone learned organizational discipline and the value of alliances across neighborhoods and ethnic lines. After Colosimo's 1920 murder, a case never officially resolved, Torrio tightened control of the operation and relied on Capone as his field commander. Capone demonstrated a gift for logistics, recruitment, and pragmatic bribery, aided by lieutenants such as Jake "Greasy Thumb" Guzik. Violence ebbed and flowed; in 1924 Capone's brother Frank Capone was shot and killed by police during a bloody Cicero election season that secured crucial territory for the organization.

Ascendancy and the Chicago Outfit
When Torrio was wounded in an assassination attempt in 1925 and later retired, Capone assumed command. He expanded the network of breweries, distilleries, trucking, and speakeasies that supplied a thirsty metropolis, while gambling dens and protection rackets added revenue. Publicly, he cultivated an image of the successful businessman and benefactor, giving to charities and appearing approachable to reporters. Privately, he relied on a cadre that included Frank Nitti, Jack "Machine Gun" McGurn, Tony Accardo, Paul Ricca, and Louis Campagna to enforce agreements and discipline enemies. His brother Ralph Capone helped manage Cicero operations, while associates like Guzik handled finances. Capone preferred negotiation when it served his interests, but he accepted force as a tool in a notoriously competitive market.

Rivalries and the North Side Wars
Chicago's North Side Gang, first under Dean O'Banion and later Hymie Weiss and George "Bugs" Moran, contested control of territory and supply. The 1924 murder of O'Banion ignited a cycle of reprisal that left Torrio wounded and Weiss slain. Moran inherited the North Side mantle and continued to resist. The conflict culminated in the St. Valentine's Day Massacre on February 14, 1929, when seven men associated with Moran were gunned down by assailants disguised as police. Capone, in Florida at the time, denied involvement and was never indicted for the killings. Nonetheless, the massacre fixed his name indelibly to the era's brutality and catalyzed public outrage, convincing national authorities that Chicago's underworld demanded federal attention.

Public Pressure and the Untouchables
By the late 1920s, municipal politics had begun to shift. While earlier alliances with figures like Mayor William Hale "Big Bill" Thompson offered breathing room, reform currents gained strength. Mayor Anton Cermak made cleaning up the city a priority. A Prohibition Bureau team led by Eliot Ness, later dubbed "the Untouchables", targeted brewhouses and supply chains linked to Capone, hitting at the infrastructure that underpinned his profits. Although headlines about Ness became famous, the most consequential threat came from the U.S. Treasury's Special Intelligence Unit, where accountant Frank J. Wilson built a meticulous paper case that matched Capone's expenditures and lifestyle to unreported income.

Tax Evasion Trial and Conviction
In 1931, U.S. Attorney George E.Q. Johnson secured indictments for income tax evasion and violations of the Prohibition Act. Capone attempted a plea agreement, but Judge James H. Wilkerson refused to honor it, insisting on a trial. The prosecution, supported by Wilson's accounting and protected witnesses, presented a steady case that framed Capone not as an untouchable gangster but as a taxpayer who ignored the law. A jury found him guilty on multiple counts of tax evasion. Wilkerson sentenced him to 11 years in federal prison, along with fines and court costs, a landmark victory for the government that signaled a new strategy in combating organized crime.

Imprisonment and Health Decline
Capone began serving his sentence at the federal penitentiary in Atlanta in 1932. Reports of preferential treatment triggered a transfer in 1934 to Alcatraz, the new high-security prison in San Francisco Bay designed to isolate influential inmates from their networks. On the Rock, Capone performed routine prison jobs and was cut off from the communications that once amplified his power. Longstanding untreated syphilis advanced during his incarceration, leading to neurological impairment and cognitive decline. After several years, with his health deteriorating significantly, he was transferred out and eventually paroled in 1939.

Retirement in Florida and Death
Following release, Capone withdrew from public life, living with Mae and family on Palm Island near Miami. The man who had once commanded a sprawling syndicate was diminished by neurosyphilis, requiring care and shielding from publicity. He spent his last years fishing, entertaining a small circle of relatives, and receiving medical attention. His brothers Ralph and Albert visited; his son Sonny maintained a protective distance from the past. On January 25, 1947, Capone died in Florida after complications associated with his long illness.

Legacy
Capone's legacy is inseparable from the era of Prohibition and the evolution of organized crime in the United States. He embodied the contradictions of the time: an entrepreneur who exploited a black market created by federal law; a public figure who mixed philanthropy with intimidation; a boss who thrived on a political ecosystem where corruption and reform were in constant tension. Figures around him left their own marks: Johnny Torrio as the architect of a system that outlived its founder; Frank Nitti as a successor within the Outfit; Tony Accardo and Paul Ricca as leaders who adapted the enterprise to the post-Prohibition world; and adversaries such as Eliot Ness and Frank J. Wilson as symbols of a federal response that emphasized financial accountability over street battles. Capone's story, from Brooklyn streets to Alcatraz and a quiet end in Florida, charts the rise of modern organized crime and the methods that government would use to confront it. His notoriety persists, but so does the cautionary lesson that spectacular violence often masks the quieter structures of money, influence, and law that decide the fate of empires, licit or illicit.

Our collection contains 11 quotes who is written by Al, under the main topics: Witty One-Liners - Motivational - Justice - Leadership - Dark Humor.

Other people realated to Al: David Mamet (Dramatist), Geraldo Rivera (Journalist)