Umberto "The Ghost" Valenti (August 14, 1891 – August 11, 1922) was a Sicilian-born

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the U ...

gangster and prominent member of the D'Aquila crime family during the 1910s. He is frequently confused with

Rocco Valenti Rocco Valenti (born in 1895, date of death unknown) was a New York City gangster and prominent member of the Camorra in New York during the early 1910s. He is often confused with contemporary Mafioso Umberto Valenti. Mafia–Camorra War Valenti ...

, a

Camorra The Camorra (; ) is an Italian Mafia-typeMafia and Mafia-type orga ...

gunman of the same era.

Career

Valenti was born in Barcellona Pozzo di Gotto, Sicily and immigrated to America in 1910. After settling in the

Lower East Side The Lower East Side, sometimes abbreviated as LES, is a historic neighborhood in the southeastern part of Manhattan in New York City. It is located roughly between the Bowery and the East River from Canal to Houston streets. Traditionally ...

of New York, he joined the

Mafia "Mafia" is an informal term that is used to describe criminal organizations that bear a strong similarity to the original “Mafia”, the Sicilian Mafia and Italian Mafia. The central activity of such an organization would be the arbitration of ...

family led by

capo di tutti capi ''Capo dei capi'' (; "boss of hebosses") or ''capo di tutti i capi'' (; "boss of all hebosses") or ''Godfather'' ( it, Padrino) are terms used mainly by the media, public, fiction writers and law enforcement community to indicate a supremely po ...

Salvatore D'Aquila. He was said to have been the shooter in the May 1914 murder of D'Aquila's chief rival, Italian Harlem mobster Fortunato Lomonte, After this successful hit, Valenti became known as D'Aquila's chief assassin. By the beginning of

Prohibition Prohibition is the act or practice of forbidding something by law; more particularly the term refers to the banning of the manufacture, storage (whether in barrels or in bottles), transportation, sale, possession, and consumption of alcoholic ...

, Valenti was considered one of the best gunmen in New York; he was suspected in at least twenty murders. During this period, Umberto Valenti had run afoul of his boss, Salvatore D'Aquila, and was one of twelve men (including Giuseppe Morello, Ignazio Lupo, Ciro Terranova and others) marked for death. Valenti fled to Sicily for a time. Upon his return to America in January 1922, Valenti attempted to make amends with D'Aquila by eliminating his chief rival, Vincenzo Terranova.David Critchley,
The Origin of Organized Crime in America: The New York City Mafia, 1891–1931
'' New York: Routledge, 2008. pgs. 100, 155–57

Valenti vs. Masseria

On May 7, 1922, the boss of the Morello/Terranova crime family, Terranova, was killed in a drive-by shooting near his E. 116th Street home. Valenti was believed to have been personally responsible. Mere hours later, Terranova's underboss Silva Tagliagamba was fatally wounded in Lower Manhattan by Valenti and gunmen working for him. The next day, Valenti and some of his men attacked the new boss of the rival Terranova family,

Joe Masseria Giuseppe "Joe the Boss" Masseria (; January 17, 1886April 15, 1931) was an early Italian-American Mafia boss in New York City. He was boss of what is now called the Genovese crime family, one of the New York City Mafia's Five Families, from 1922 t ...

. Valenti found Masseria and his bodyguards on Grand Street "within a block of Police Headquarters". The ''

New York Herald The ''New York Herald'' was a large-distribution newspaper based in New York City that existed between 1835 and 1924. At that point it was acquired by its smaller rival the ''New-York Tribune'' to form the ''New York Herald Tribune''. Hist ...

'' reported that "When the fight was ended, the gunmen had shot four men and two women, but had not harmed each other." Masseria tossed his pistol away and was arrested while fleeing the scene. On August 9, 1922, Masseria walked out of his apartment at 80 2nd Avenue, and was rushed by two armed men who opened fire on him. Masseria ducked into a store at 82 2nd Avenue with the gunmen in pursuit. They shot out the front window and shot up the inside of the store. The gunmen fled across 2nd Avenue to a getaway car idling just around the corner on E. 5th Street. The car was a Hudson Cruiser. The gunmen jumped on the

running board A running board or footboard is a narrow step fitted under the side doors of a tram ( cable car, trolley, or streetcar in North America), car, or truck. It aids entry, especially into high vehicles, and is typical of vintage trams and cars, ...

s as the car sped west on E. 5th Street towards the

Bowery The Bowery () is a street and neighborhood in Lower Manhattan in New York City. The street runs from Chatham Square at Park Row, Worth Street, and Mott Street in the south to Cooper Square at 4th Street in the north.Jackson, Kenneth L. ...

, guns blazing. The gunmen then plowed through a crowd and shot randomly at the

blockade A blockade is the act of actively preventing a country or region from receiving or sending out food, supplies, weapons, or communications, and sometimes people, by military force. A blockade differs from an embargo or sanction, which ar ...

, wounding six men. Masseria survived the incident and was found by police in his upstairs bedroom shell-shocked. He was sitting on his bed dazed, with two bullet holes through his straw hat, which he was still wearing on his head. The incident gained Masseria new respect among gangsters as "the man who can dodge bullets" and his reputation began to rise as D'Aquila's began to wane.

Murder

Forty-eight hours later, on August 11, Umberto Valenti attended a meeting in a cafe at the corner of Second Avenue and E. 12th Street. Accounts differ as to who was there. Masseria's key ally Giuseppe Morello is often said to have been present. Apparently realizing his life was in danger, Valenti burst outside as the bullets began flying. An eight-year-old girl standing nearby was wounded. Valenti managed to make it on the running board of a passing taxi before collapsing mortally wounded. The ''

Herald A herald, or a herald of arms, is an officer of arms, ranking between pursuivant and king of arms. The title is commonly applied more broadly to all officers of arms. Heralds were originally messengers sent by monarchs or noblemen ...

'' stated, "Valenti, said to be strong in his hatred of Masseria, was killed coldly and with as little compunction as one would swat a fly." Gangland lore had long held that his killer was none other than Charles "Lucky" Luciano. Just after this incident, Giuseppe Masseria began being referred to as "Joe the Boss".Critchley, pg. 156

Career

Valenti vs. Masseria

Murder

References

Further reading