Louis "Lepke" Buchalter (6 February 1897-4 March 1944) was the leader of Murder, Inc., a Jewish-American organized crime and contract killing organization. He was the only mob boss to be sentenced to death for his crimes, being electrocuted in 1944.
Biography[]
Louis Buchalter was born on 6 February 1897 on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, New York City to a family of Jewish immigrants. Buchalter's father died when he was young, and his mother moved to Arizona for medical reasons; Buchalter was supposed to have been raised by his sister, but he was out of her control. He became a criminal as a youth, and he was involved in burglary crimes. Buchalter befriended Jacob Shapiro as a youth, and the two of them worked under garment industry boss Jacob Orgen before killing him in 1927. Buchalter and Shapiro became major labor racketeers, and they decided to perform hits for the American Mafia, creating Murder, Inc. as a contract killing organization. Buchalter's organization was involved in up to 1,000 murders, including the murder of mobster Dutch Schultz. In 1938, Buchalter was arrested for heroin smuggling, murder, and for breaching antitrust laws, and he was implicated in four murders due to the testimony of his former lieutenant Abe Reles. On 4 March 1944, Buchalter was electrocuted at Sing Sing Prison.