The Adair County news. [volume] (Columbia, Ky.) 1897-1987, 1909-04-21
PETROS|NO'S NEW JOB
Detective Who Has Waged War
on italian Criminals.
HEAD OF A SECRET SQUAD.
Believes Work Against Black Hand tc
7 Be Effective Must Begin In Southern
ItaIy-Now Has Facilities to Put In
to Practice His Theory.

to Practice His Theory.
Joseph Petrosino, the Italian detec-
tive lieutenant of New York city, who
has been placed in charge of Mulberry
streets new secret service squad, has
been New York policeman twenty six
years and on duty as a detective for
about half of that time.
AS a matter of fact, he has been do
ing for several years the same sort of
work that the secret squad has been
organized to do under his supervision,
so the real difference will not be SO
much in kind as in extent With the
outside fund which a group of private
citizens have placed at the disposal of
Commissioner Bingham for this secret
work, Petrosino will have much more
latitude to work effectively in Kidding
New York city of the Italians who per-
petrate the Blank Hand variety of
matchmaking crime with bomb accom-
paniment.
PetrOsinO recently went to Italy to
arrange some cooperative plan with
the. Sicilian authorities by which it
may be made more difficult for Grim
fnals of this type to come to New York
and easier to catch them should they
manage to get into the United States.
The immigration department of the
United States will also help Mulberry
street in the process of determination.
But it is in Italy, according to Petro-
sino, that the real work must be done
to cut off this undesirable class of i'm
migration. From his experience, he
would require passport from every
man coming from Italy. Then, with the
police records spread on the passport
I'm each case, it would be comparatively
easy to select those worthy of depor-
tation. The police there, he thinks,
would give these records carefully.
The projects of Palermo, for exam
pie, have an almost absolute power
over the criminal classes. If they get
together a lot Of, say, 100 or 200 and
take them before magistrate the pre-
fect's mere word that they are danger
Gus or criminal is sufficient. The lot
are promptly sent to q penal colony
on an island near by, where they turn
farmers for their country's good.
There is no real Black Hand organ
ization for kidnapping and blaekmailing,,
said Petrosino recently. "Such operations
are conducted by small gangs, usually of
three or four, who prey on the fears of
their countrymen. Their work, too. is
made more easy by the considerable pub
icity given to such cases. The cafes il,
the Italian districts-little places where
coffee and candy are sold and where men
sit around all day playing cards-are
among the danger spots.
There the, men get together and plan
their outrages. There, too, many of the
domestic Quarrels begin which end in
murder. 1t is probable that the police
will find it necessary to card catalogue
these places in self defense-that is, to
make a permanent record not only of the
proprietors of these resorts, but OF the
patrons as well. Then the department
would have means whereby 1t could trace
men on whom suspicion fell and could
also send to Italy for the records of the
more important of them"
1t was Inspector Williams who frs
discovered Petrosino. That was near
ly thirty years ago, when the police
managed the work Of street cleaning
PetrOSinO was the boss of a dunn
scow gang, and he handled his fellow
Italians so well that Williams urged
him to become policeman. The sug
gestiOn didn't seem attractive then
Instead, he quit working for the city
and became clerk in banking house
on Marion street. But Williams hai
good memory and soon hunted hin
up to renew the proposition, with the
result that Patrolman Joseph Petro
sino became a familiar figure to the
Tenderloin habitues There PetrOsin'
stayed for thirteen years, patrOlling al
the time except when the inspector
detailed him, as he did occasionally, tt
some "plain clothes job" Then, in his
fourteenth year in the department
this occasional work bore fruit in a.
assignment to the detective bureau a
headquarters.
Mulberry street records contain the
details of many pieces of artistic de
teetive work. followed by arrests an6
convictions, credit for which belongs
to PetrOsinO.
A comparatively recent case and one
illustrating on how slender clew q
detective often must work was that
of man found in Van Cortlandt park
in New York, on Aug. IS, 1905, will
thirty-six stab wounds. There was
nothing on the body to identify it
The surgeons held that it was that OF
a cultivated man, an Italian, but Pc
trosino told them the dead man had
been laborer and was a native Of
southern Italy.S' There appeared to be
no clew until Petrosino in examining
that part Of the park where the body
was found noticed bit of paper of
in patch of bushes. 1t had been
trampled into the mud and was Sc
soiled that the little writing that was
on it was barely decipherable.
After some studying Petrosino deci
phered the writing. 1t was merely &
name and an address Sabbato Gizzio
Box $50, Lambertville, N. J. There
was nothing TO indicate that it bore
any relation to the murder save thai
the name was Italian. But the detec-
tive went straight to Lambertville
where he asked the superintendent OF
the Pennsylvania railroad il Gizzio
was working there. He was told that