DAY AFTER day after day in Washington, pretty clearly enjoying his nationally televised turn in the spotlight, old-time mobster Joseph Valachi continued to regale the nonplussed Senate rackets probers ...

For Joe Valachi, the twelve days of Christmas always turned up 13. “I believed in Santa Claus and hung up my stocking,” he solemnly attests in a recently completed 1,180-page autobiography. “But all I ...

For two weeks the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations received instructions in the organization of American crime from an experienced crook, Joseph Valachi. The Senators' desire to expand ...

FROM THE FEDERAL prison cell he had occupied since his 1959 narcotics racketeering conviction, Vito Genovese, who was either The Boss of All the Bosses or just a delusionary who imagined himself to be ...

THE VALACHI PAPERS by Peter Maas. 285 pages. Putnam. $6.95. Joseph Michael Valachi looks a bit like a Damon Runyon gangster—the tough guy who really is all heart. Short (5 ft. 6 in.) and bandy-legged, ...

I’d just like to make a quick followup to Monday’s discussion of the ongoing steroid story. Just after deadline, MLB responded to our calls on the subject. MLB spokesman Richard Levin said that it was ...

is pulp rather than a great film). The narrative is framed by scenes involving an older, imprisoned Valachi, we're yanked back in time to see his rise through the ranks as he earns the trust of older ...

Peter Maas, who wrote convincingly about crooks and incorruptible cops in such best-selling books as “Serpico,” and “The Valachi Papers,” died Thursday. He was 72. Maas died at Mount Sinai Hospital in ...