Lucky Luciano in the context of "Thomas E. Dewey"

The Genovese crime family (pronounced [dʒenoˈveːze, -eːse]), also sometimes referred to as the Westside, is an Italian American Mafia crime family and one of the "Five Families" that dominate organized crime activities in New York City and New Jersey as part of the American Mafia. The Genovese family has generally maintained a varying degree of influence over many of the smaller mob families outside New York, including ties with the Philadelphia, Cleveland, Patriarca, and Buffalo crime families.

The modern family was founded by Charles "Lucky" Luciano and was known as the Luciano crime family from 1931 to 1957, when Vito Genovese became boss. Genovese was head of the family during the McClellan hearings in 1963, which gave the Five Families their current names. Originally in control of the waterfront on the West Side of Manhattan as well as the docks and the Fulton Fish Market on the East River waterfront, the family was run between 1981 and 2005 by "The Oddfather", Vincent "The Chin" Gigante, who feigned insanity by shuffling unshaven through New York's Greenwich Village wearing a tattered bath robe and muttering to himself incoherently to avoid prosecution.

John Donato Torrio (born Donato Torrio, Italian: [doˈnaːto ˈtɔrrjo]; January 20, 1882 – April 16, 1957) was an Italian-born mobster who helped build the Chicago Outfit in the 1920s later inherited by his protégé Al Capone. Torrio proposed a National Crime Syndicate in the 1930s and later became an adviser to Lucky Luciano and his Luciano crime family.

Torrio had several nicknames, primarily "The Fox" for his cunning and finesse. The US Treasury official Elmer Irey considered him "the biggest gangster in America" and wrote, "He was the smartest and, I dare say, the best of all the hoodlums. 'Best' referring to talent, not morals." Virgil W. Peterson of the Chicago Crime Commission stated that his "talents as an organizational genius were widely respected by the major gang bosses in the New York City area". Crime journalist Herbert Asbury affirmed: "As an organizer and administrator of underworld affairs, Johnny Torrio is unsurpassed in the annals of American crime; he was probably the nearest thing to a real mastermind that this country has yet produced".

The Five Points Gang was a criminal street gang, initially of primarily Irish-American origins, based in the Five Points of Lower Manhattan, New York City, during the late 19th and early 20th century.

The gang had its origin in the various Irish immigrant and Irish-American gangs in the Five Points area. Paul Kelly, born Paolo Antonio Vaccarelli before utilizing an Irish-sounding name, was an Italian-American who organized and founded the more cohesive "Five Points Gang". While the gang had some continuity with the prior Irish gangs of the Five Points, it eventually predominately consisted of the Italian immigrant and Italian-American gangsters that had begun to populate the previously mostly Irish-American Five Points. The gang eventually consisted largely of Italian-Americans and Italian immigrants living in the Five Points, though it continued to include Irish-American members and members of other ethnicities throughout its existence. Some of the gang's members later became prominent criminals in their own right, including Johnny Torrio, Al Capone, and Lucky Luciano.

Irving Wexler (born January 19, 1888 – June 24, 1952), better known as Waxey Gordon, was an American gangster who specialized in bootlegging and illegal gambling. An associate of Arnold Rothstein during prohibition, he was caught up in a power struggle following Rothstein's death. Fellow Rothstein associates Charles "Lucky" Luciano and Meyer Lansky provided authorities with evidence that led to his imprisonment for ten years.

Arthur Simon Flegenheimer (August 6, 1901 – October 24, 1935), known as Dutch Schultz, was an American mobster based in New York City in the 1920s and 1930s. He made his fortune in organized crime-related activities, including bootlegging and the numbers racket. Schultz's rackets were weakened by two tax evasion trials led by United States Attorney Thomas Dewey, and also threatened by fellow mobster Lucky Luciano.

Schultz asked the Commission, the governing body of the American Mafia, for permission to kill Dewey, in an attempt to avert his conviction. They refused. When Schultz disobeyed them and made an attempt to kill Dewey, the Commission ordered his murder in 1935. Schultz was shot at a restaurant in Newark, New Jersey, and died the next day.

The Five Families are the five Italian American Mafia crime families who operate in New York City. In 1931, the five families were organized by Salvatore Maranzano following his victory in the Castellammarese War. Maranzano reorganized the Italian American gangs in New York City into the Maranzano, Profaci, Mangano, Luciano, and Gagliano families, which are now known as the Bonanno, Colombo, Gambino, Genovese, and Lucchese families, respectively. Each family had a demarcated territory and a hierarchy and reported to the same overarching governing entity.

Initially, Maranzano intended each family's boss to report to him as the capo dei capi ("boss of all the bosses"). This led to his assassination that September, and that role was abolished for the Commission, a ruling committee established by Lucky Luciano to oversee all Mafia activities in the United States and to mediate conflicts between families. It consisted of the bosses of the Five Families as well as the bosses of the Chicago Outfit and the Buffalo crime family. In 1963, Joseph Valachi publicly disclosed the existence of New York City's Five Families at the Valachi hearings. Since then, a few other crime families have been able to become powerful or notable enough to rise to a level comparable to that of the Five Families, holding or sharing the unofficial designation of Sixth Family.

Vito Genovese (Italian: [ˈviːto dʒenoˈveːze, -eːse]; November 21, 1897 – February 14, 1969) was an Italian-born American mafioso and the leader of the Genovese crime family in New York City. A childhood friend and criminal associate of Lucky Luciano, Genovese took part in the Castellammarese War and helped Luciano shape the Mafia's rise as a major force in organized crime in the United States. He would later lead Luciano's crime family, which was renamed by the FBI after Genovese in 1957.

Along with Luciano, Genovese facilitated the expansion of the heroin trade to an international level. He fled to Italy in 1937, and for a brief period during World War II he supported Benito Mussolini's Fascist regime for fear of being deported back to the U.S. to face murder charges. After returning to the U.S. in 1945, Genovese served as mentor to Vincent "Chin" Gigante, the future boss of the Genovese family.