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"Westies" redirects here. For other uses see Westie (disambiguation).

The Westies are a predominantly Irish American organized crime association operating from the Hell's Kitchen area of Manhattan's West Side in New York City. They were most influential from 1965 — 1986. During this time period, the NYPD Organized Crime Bureau, the FBI, and other organized crime experts believe that the Westies murdered 60-100 people, making them one of the most dangerous crime groups in New York City.

Despite the long-time presence of Irish-American organized crime in Hell's Kitchen and the notorious generational rise to power in the mid-1960s, the Westies did not receive their title until 1977, from a detective investigating the murder of Genovese crime family-affiliated loanshark Charles "Ruby" Stein.

According to crime author T.J. English, "Although never comprised of more than twelve to twenty members — depending on who was in or out of jail at any given time — the Westies became synonymous with the last generation of Irish in the birthplace of the Irish Mob . . ."

The most notorious Westie figures were Michael "Mickey" Spillane, James "Jimmy" Coonan, Francis "Mickey" Featherstone, Eddie McGrath and Eddie Cummiskey.

History

Spillane years

In the early 1960s Mickey Spillane — no relation to the author of the same name — stepped into a power vacuum that had existed in Hell's Kitchen since gang leaders fled the area in the early 1950s to avoid prosecution. A mobster from Queens named Hughie Mulligan had been running Hell's Kitchen since then; Spillane, a Hell's Kitchen native, was his apprentice until inheriting the fief.

Spillane ran the area with a "Godfather" style, sending flowers to neighbors in the hospital and providing turkeys to needy families during Thanksgiving in addition to running gambling enterprises such as bookmaking and policy, accompanied inevitably by loansharking. Loansharking naturally leads to assault, and Spillane had burglary arrests as well. However, among all his criminal activities, the most audacious was his "snatch" racket (kidnapping and holding local businessmen and members of other crime organizations for ransom); this probably most contributed to his eventual downfall.

Nonetheless, he was able to add to his neighborhood prominence by marrying Maureen McManus, a daughter of the prestigious McManus family which had run the Midtown Democratic Club since 1905. The union of political power with criminal activity enhanced the Westies' ability to control union jobs and labor racketeering, moving away from the declining waterfront and more strongly into construction jobs and service work at the New York Coliseum, Madison Square Garden and later the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center.

Spillane-Coonan Wars

The war began because James "Jimmy C" Coonan, an 18 year old Irish hood, had sworn revenge against Michael "Mickey" Spillane, the boss of Hell's Kitchen. He had sworn revenge for two reasons. The first was Spillane's kidnapping of Coonan's father, demanding a ransom, which was paid, and then Spillane's pistol whipping his father before releasing him. The second reason was that Spillane had an open affair with Coonan's mother. Coonan's whole purpose was to restore his father's honor. The war began in 1966 when a young Jimmy Coonan purchased an automatic machine gun and fired off a magazine from the top of a Hell's Kitchen tenement building at Mickey Spillane and some of Spillane's top men. Although Coonan failed to murder Spillane and his followers, not even wounding one man, he began to get his message across to Spillane, that Jimmy Coonan was not to be taken lightly.

Coonan was imprisoned for a short period of time because of murder and kidnapping charges that were pleaded down to a Class E Disorderly Conduct Felony Charge and a Class C Manslaughter Felony Charge. He was released in late 1971 and continued on with his war and his criminal career. He and his gang of young Irish hoods began kidnapping, beating, and murdering Spillane loyalists. Coonan soon enlisted a 24 year old Vietnam Vet by the name of Francis "Mickey" Featherstone as his right-hand man in his war against Spillane. The war became so intense that citizens of Hell's Kitchen had to choose sides. Those who took Spillane's side were subject to beatings, kidnappings, store vandalism, and robberies, all at the hands of Coonan's younger generation of Irish hoods. Those who chose Coonan's side were immune from these harsh activities because Spillane's gang was much older and more respectable.

Trouble with the Genoveses

In 1973, Spillane, feeling that the old neighborhood of Hell's Kitchen was no longer safe for himself and his family, moved to the Irish working class neighborhood of Woodside, Queens. Since Spillane was now gone his control of the rackets in Hell's Kitchen began to deteriorate and Coonan became the neighborhood's boss, although some still viewed Spillane as the boss. But now, the Jacob Javits Center came into play. On the New York Commission, Spillane was still viewed as the boss of the Irish Mob on the Westside of Manhattan, putting the Jacob Javits construction site under his control, but, Anthony "Fat Tony" Salerno, who was a high-ranking figure in the Genovese crime family at the time wanted the center for himself and reached an agreement with Jimmy Coonan. If Coonan became the boss Salerno would run the construction site and give Coonan a taste of the criminal proceeds.

Salerno then sent in Genovese Family Associate and freelance hitman, Joseph "the Mad Dog" Sullivan, to eliminate the remaining three main Spillane supporters in Hell's Kitchen, Tom Devaney, Tom "the Greek" Kapatos and Eddie "the Butcher" Cummiskey. Although Cummiskey had apparently switched sides to the Coonan camp, Salerno and Sullivan were not aware of the switch and Salerno ordered his murder as well. Devaney and Cummiskey were murdered in late 1976, and Kapatos was killed in January of 1977. Spillane was now definitely out of the picture, because he did not live in the neighborhood any longer, and because his top two supporters had been killed. Coonan was the undisputed boss of Hell's Kitchen. But, it was felt that Spillane still had to die. Roy DeMeo, a Gambino crime family soldato murdered Spillane as a favor to Coonan. Mickey Featherstone stood trial for the murder and was found not guilty.

Coonan and Featherstone

During the late 1970s Coonan tightened his alliance between the Westies and the Gambino organization, then run by Paul Castellano. Coonan's main contact was Roy DeMeo, who had brought him word of Spillane's assassination. With Coonan's cunning and Featherstone's reputation, the two men ensured a notoriously vicious stranglehold on the already brutal racketeering circles of Hell's Kitchen. In 1979 both Coonan and Featherstone were acquitted of the murder of a bartender, Harold Whitehead. Another Westie, Jimmy McElroy, was acquitted of the murder of a Teamster in 1980.

Even as both Westies leaders were imprisoned in 1980 -- Coonan on gun possession charges, Featherstone on a federal counterfeiting rap -- the gambling, loansharking, and union shakedowns continued on the streets of the West Side. After DeMeo himself was murdered, Coonan's Gambino Family connection became Danny Marino, a capo from Brooklyn. Coonan eventually interacted directly with John Gotti, who took over the Gambino Family after the murder of Castellano in December of 1985. From time to time, the Westies worked for the Gambino Family as a contract murder squad.

Bad blood between Coonan and Featherstone, in part due to Featherstone's distaste for Coonan's Italian mob connections, eventually led to Featherstone being framed for the murder of Michael Holly, a construction worker and neighborhood bar owner who refused to give the Westies "protection money." Holly became an enemy of the Westies gang when an off-duty policeman saw John Bokun shoot Michael Holly in Holly's bar. The policeman shot and killed John Bokun and the Westies blamed Holly for the death. Holly was murdered in broad daylight on West 35th Street in April, 1985 by Westie member, and John's brother Billy Bokun, while wearing a wig and moustache to impersonate Featherstone, and renting a car identical to the one Featherstone was driving.

Featherstone was convicted in early 1986 and began cooperating with the government in hopes of getting the murder conviction overturned. The information he and his wife Sissy provided, and the recordings they helped make, achieved this aim. In September of 1986 the prosecutor who oversaw Featherstone's conviction in the Holly frame told the presiding judge that post-conviction investigation had revealed Featherstone was innocent of that particular crime. The judge immediately overturned the verdict.

At that point the information provided by the Featherstones resulted in the arrest of Coonan and several other Westies on state charges of murder and other crimes. Shortly afterward, federal prosecutor Rudolph Giuliani announced a devastating RICO indictment against Coonan and others for criminal activities going back twenty years. Featherstone testified in open court for four weeks in the trial that began in September of 1987 and concluded with major convictions in 1988. Jimmy Coonan was sentenced to sixty years in prison on assorted charges. Other leading gang members were also sentenced to long prison terms, including James "Jimmy Mac" McElroy, a top enforcer who was sentenced to 60 years, and Richard "Mugsy" Ritter, a career criminal sentenced to 40 years imprisonment on loan-sharking and drug related charges.

Kevin Kelly and Kenny Shannon

During the mid-to-late 1980s, while Jimmy Coonan lavished in his luxurious suburban home, and Mickey Featherstone futilely attempted to support his family by legitimate means, Kevin Kelly and his sidekick, Kenny Shannon, became the most active racketeers on the West Side. Sports, gambling, and dealing coke to young professionals on the East Side were their primary rackets. In 1988, after two years on the run, Kelly and Shannon could no longer take the heat and decided to turn themselves in to the authorities. Rudolph Giuliani, who was a federal prosecutor at the time, claimed that they were the last ruling body of the Westies. He was wrong.

The Yugo and the New Era

By the early 1990s the old Hells Kitchen neighborhood was disappearing. The blue-collar Irish-American residents were being replaced by wealthy yuppies and a mix of Hispanic and black residents. With this demographic change came a decrease in street crime and a new name for the gentrified neighborhood, Clinton.

A Yugoslavian born thug, Bosco “The Yugo” Radonjich, started out as a low-level associate of Jimmy Coonan, but in the absence of the old leaders he was able to take control over the still predominantly Irish-American gang and reestablish their connections with Gambino family boss John Gotti. Among Bosco's underlings was Brian Bentley, an Irish-American mobster in his mid-20s who used two younger Hispanic associates to operate a highly successful burglary operation which victimized over 1,000 corporations in Manhattan from 1989 to the crew's indictment in 1992. When Michael G. Cherkasky, chief of the Investigations Division of the District Attorney's Office, was asked how much of the notorious gang remained in an interview, he replied "too much", and stated that "it is not the end".

The Westies continued to work as a contract hit-squad for the Gambinos until John Gotti's imprisonment in 1992. Around this time the organization's kingpin, Radonjich, fled the country to avoid jury tampering charges. Radonjich was eventually arrested by U.S. Customs officials during a stopover in Miami, Florida, in 1999. Radonjich was however released when the main witness in the case, Sammy Gravano, was deemed unreliable. Radonjich has sinced returned to his native Yugoslavia.

Recent years

Kevin Kelly is eligible for release in 2011. Shannon and Bokun were released from federal prison on March 6, 2001 and February 16, 2001 respectively.

Marine Construction, a staple of the gang, is still in business. It is run by alleged former members Francis Leahy, William Murtha and Mickey Cahill.

The gang's present status is unknown. The neighborhood they once operated in has dramatically changed due to gentrification.

Leaders of the Westies

1921–1934 — Owney Madden
1934–1959 — Eddie McGrath
1959–1973 — Michael Spillane
1973–1986 — James Coonan
1986–1988 — Kevin Kelly
1988–1995 — Bosko Radonjich

Members

Murders

Robert Lagville killed by Jimmy Coonan
Jeremy Morales killed by Jimmy Coonan, Eddie Coonan, Jackie Coonan and Eddie Sullivan
John Riley killed by Mickey Featherstone and Tommy McElroy
Emilio Rettagliatta killed by Mickey Featherstone
Linwood Willis killed by Mickey Featherstone
Michael Yelovich killed by Eddie Cummiskey
Dennis Curley killed by Paddy Dugan
Patrick "Paddy" Dugan killed by Eddie Cummiskey and Jimmy Coonan
Charles Stein killed by Danny Grillo, Jimmy Coonan, Richie Ryan, Billie Beattie and Jimmy McElroy
Walter Curtis killed by Eddie Cummiskey and Jimmy Coonan
Richard Tassiello killed by Jimmy Coonan and Mickey Featherstone
William Walker killed by Jimmy McElroy
Harold Whitehead killed by Jimmy Coonan
Henry Diaz killed by Kenny Shannon and Kevin Kelly
Thomas Hess killed by Richie Ryan
Thomas Moresco
Vincent Leone killed by Kevin Kelly and Jimmy McElroy
Michael Holly killed by Billy Bokun and Kenny Shannon

In popular culture

The 1996 movie Sleepers portrayed The Westies as "The West Side Boys". The two leaders of The West Side Boys, "Tommy 'Butter' Marcano" and "John O'Reilly", were based on two Westies that were close friends, Tommy "Butter" Moresco and Richie Ryan. In the movie’s epilogue, the murder of Tommy Marcano depicted Tommy Moresco's true life murder, and the character of John O’Reilly drank himself to death in a tenement basement, just like Richie Ryan did.
The 2002 Martin Scorsese film Gangs of New York provided a lightly fictionalized history of the Civil War-era origin of the competing Irish immigrant crime crews who dominated Five Points. The movie explains the social tradition of enduring, if not actually shielding, Irish gangs in Manhattan's Irish neighborhoods, which led to the eventual ascendancy of the Westies in the mid-to-late 20th century.
The 1990 movie State of Grace also paints a largely fictionalized portrait of the Westies as they were under Jimmy Coonan. The film centers around the return to the neighborhood of an undercover cop who infiltrates the gang and finds himself torn between the neighborhood's code of silence and the badge he wears.
In the 2001 John Favreau film Made the lead characters are assaulted by a group of Irish thugs referred to as Westies. However, it is made clear that they were not in fact Westies.
The 2008 movie in development Emerald City is based on the true-crime book The Westies by T.J. English and is being written by Jim Sheridan.
On March 17, 2006 The History Channel premiered a two-hour history of Irish-American organized crime that prominently profiled the Westies. Titled Paddy Whacked, it featured narrative interviews with crime historians such as T.J. English, author of a book by the same name, and Rose Keefe.
The 2001 Law & Order episode entitled "Brother's Keeper" features a fictional character named Cally Lonegan, who is referred to as "the last of the Westies".
The 2005 Don Winslow novel The Power of the Dog highlights the partnerships between the Westies, the Italian mobs, and their involvement with drug trafficking into New York.
The 2008 video game Grand Theft Auto IV includes the New York City(Named Liberty City in the game) Irish Mob. They are named the McReary crime family. Also, a neighborhood in the game, Purgatory, is a neighborhood based on the Westies old neighborhood Hell's Kitchen.

References

English, T.J. The Westies: Inside the Hell's Kitchen Irish Mob. St Martin's Paperbacks, 1991. ISBN 0-312-92429-1
English, T.J. Paddy Whacked: The Untold Story of the Irish American Gangster. New York: HarperCollins, 2005. ISBN 0-06-059002-5

External links

@@ Line 49: / Line 49: @@
 ==Recent years==
-Kevin Kelly is eligible for release in 2011. John Coonan, a nephew of Jimmy, is currently serving a one-year sentence for drug charges. He will be released in June 2008.
+Kevin Kelly is eligible for release in 2011.
 Shannon and Bokun were released from federal prison on [[March 6]], [[2001]] and [[February 16]], [[2001]] respectively.