For close to 40 years, gangsters across Canada bowed to the fearsome will of Johnny "Pops" Papalia, the Mafia chieftain who rose from a working-class ghetto in Hamilton, Ontario to hold a tenuous grip on organized crime. 
National Post reporter Adrian Humphreys followed Papalia's career and in his book, The Enforcer: Johnny Pops Papalia--A Life and Death in the Mafia, published by HarperCollins, he tracks the rise to power and gangland slaying of Canada's Capone after more than four decades in the Mafia.

The Enforcer: Johnny Pops Papalia; A Life and Death in the Mafia

Politics & Social Sciences

Humphreys, Adrian

Social Sciences

Harpercollins

The Enforcer: Johnny Pops Papalia, a Life and Death in the Mafia (Revised and Updated Edition)

HarperCollins Canada / Cdn Adult Tp

The Sixth Family: The Collapse Of The New York Mafia And The Rise Of Vito Rizzuto

From The Sixth Family, according to witness testimony:
BROOKLYN, MAY 5, 1981
"We were in the closet. We all had our weapons loaded. We sat there and waited for the doorbell to ring," said Salvatore Vitale, a slender New York mobster known as Good-Looking Sal. "We left the door open a smidge to look out."
The ringing of the bell at the private social club’s entrance signaled the arrival of the first of the invited guests. Vito Rizzuto crouched low, peeking out from his vantage point. Through the swelling crowd and loud chatter from tough men all accustomed to having their say, Vito kept his eyes on one man, Gerlando Sciascia, a fellow Sicilian who was a long-time Rizzuto family friend.
Breathing deeply beneath his mask, Vito watched for the secret signal that would draw him from the closet, a signal that came when Sciascia slowly ran the fingers of his lean, right hand through the silver hair on the side of his head. That simple act of preening brought mayhem to the social club and radically changed the balance of power.
"Don’t anybody move. This is a holdup," Vito said as he confronted the roomful of powerful mobsters, his words muffled by a woolen ski mask pulled down over his long, thin face. Despite those words, this was not about robbery. Nothing would be taken but three lives and the rights to an underworld throne.

The Sixth Family: The Collapse of the New York Mafia and the Rise of Vito Rizzuto

Biographies & Memoirs

Lamothe, Lee

True Crime

wiley

Sociology

Harpercollins Canada

In the world of organized crime the bosses grab the headlines, as the names Capone, Gotti, Bonnano, Cotroni and Rizzuto attest. But a crime family has many working parts and the young mobster known as The Weasel was the epitome of a crucial, invisible cog-the soldier, the muscle, the driver, the gopher.
By a quirk of fate, Marvin Elkind-later The Weasel-was placed in the foster home of a tough gangster family, immersing him from the age of nine in a daring world of con men, cheats, bootleggers, loan sharks, bank robbers, leg breakers and Mafia bosses. During a Golden Age of underworld life in New York, Detroit and across Canada, The Weasel found himself working with a surprising cast of colourful characters. He befriended powerful gangsters by smuggling bottles of Scotch to their tables as a waiter at New York's famed Copacabana; he was pushed to be Jimmy Hoffa's chauffeur.
But his disenchantment with the broken promises of mob life brought him into another fraternity, one offering the same adrenaline rush, danger and dark comedy he craved. After a startling confrontation, he was embraced by law enforcement, and a cop with a reputation for results. Now a career informant, The Weasel learned he was a far better fink than he ever was a crook.
With his impeccable gangland pedigree, enormous girth, cold stare and sausage-like fingers adorned with chunky rings, no one questioned The Weasel's loyalty. The backroom doors were flung open and The Weasel slipped in, bringing undercover cops with him. For case after case over two decades, he worked for the FBI, U.S. Customs, Scotland Yard, RCMP, Ontario Provincial Police and other law enforcement agencies on three continents, trapping and betraying mobsters, mercenaries, spies, drug traffickers, pornographers, union fat cats and corrupt politicians.
With unflinching honesty, The Weasel and many of the undercover officers he worked with revealed their successes and failures to award-winning crime reporter and best-selling author Adrian Humphreys.
The Weasel is the riveting chronicle of a unique and engaging figure who lived a most dangerous and rare experience.
It is a story that was never supposed to be told.

The Weasel: A Double Life in the Mob

On May 5, 1981, three rebellious members of New York's Bonanno crime family were gunned down in a Brooklyn social club. One of the gunmen was Vito Rizzuto, a man who would rise to the top of the underworld in Canada and then expand his reign across continents to become a global superboss. The Sixth Family, now revised and updated, reveals the hidden history of the rise of the Rizzuto clan, the alliances it forged around the world and the bloody events that led to charges against Vito Rizzuto in the United States and Italy for racketeering and corruption. As police in the United States, Italy and Canada meticulously pieced together the puzzle that is Vito Rizzuto, established notions about the nature of authority within the Mafia were called into question. Who was this so-called "John Gotti of Canada"? How did he become one of the biggest names in global crime? And how did he survive the deadly assault from gangland rivals that almost destroyed his family?

The Sixth Family

HarperCollins, Publishers

In the world of organized crime, the bosses grab the headlines. But a crime family has many working parts, and the young mobster known as The Weasel was the epitome of a crucial, invisible cog-the soldier, the muscle, the driver, the gopher. By a quirk of fate, Marvin Elkind-The Weasel-was placed in the Toronto foster home of a tough gangster family, which immersed him from the age of nine in a daring world of con men, cheats, bootleggers, bank robbers and Mafia bosses. During a golden age of underworld life in New York, Detroit and across Canada, The Weasel found himself working with a surprising cast of colourful characters. He befriended powerful gangsters by smuggling bottles of Scotch to their tables at New York's famed Copacabana, and he was pushed to be Jimmy Hoffa's chauffeur. But his disenchantment with broken promises put him in the hands of law enforcement, and he made an abrupt career change, becoming Canada's most prolific police informant. As he travelled the world befriending and betraying a stunning array of mobsters, mercenaries, spies, drug traffickers, pornographers, union fat cats and corrupt politicians, The Weasel learned he was a far better fink than he ever was a crook. The Weasel reveals a unique and engaging figure who lived a dangerous and rare experience.

The Weasel

Shortly after lunch on May 31, 1997, Johnny Papalia-also known as Johnny Pops, Canada's Capone, Godfather or The Enforcer-was gunned down outside his office at 10 Railway Street in Hamilton, Ontario.
For close to forty years, gangsters across Canada had bowed to the fearsome will of Johnny Pops Papalia, a Mafia chieftain who grew up in a working-class ghetto and rose to hold a tenuous grip on organized crime. Journalist Adrian Humphreys followed the life, business and influence of Papalia, and using an intriguing selection of sources-from gangsters and street rogues to police and honest citizens-he recreates that shadowy world and reveals a man who could be as brutal as he was generous. The Enforcer takes the reader inside the Mafia's inner sanctum and reveals the power this organization still wields.

The Enforcer: The True Saga Of A Mafia Boss, The

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Humphreys, Adrian. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Humphreys, Adrian