Gennaro Gallucci

Gen­naro was born in Italy in 1857 to Luca Gal­luc­ci and Anto­nia Cav­al­lo. Broth­er to gang­ster Gio­sue Gal­luc­ci, Gen­naro arrived in New York in Decem­ber 1908.

He had escaped prison in Italy after serv­ing 23 years of his life sen­tence for mur­der­ing two men. On Sep­tem­ber 14^th, 1909, Gen­naro was arrest­ed for car­ry­ing con­cealed weapons, the police tried to have him deport­ed but the courts unaware of his full back­ground released him with a sus­pend­ed sen­tence. He lived with his broth­er Gio­sue and sister-in-law Assun­ta at 318 E109th Street, a three story brick house with an attached sta­ble and a bak­ery shop at the front.

On Novem­ber 14, 1909, Gen­naro was shot dead at the fam­i­ly home. He had been din­ing in the back room of the bak­ery when he was called to the front shop and mur­dered. Dr Toart of Harlem Hos­pi­tal pro­nounced Gen­naro dead at the scene.

The police arrest­ed his broth­er Fran­cis­co Gal­luc­ci, of 146 Hes­ter St, and his sister-in-law Assun­ta Gal­luc­ci, whom Gen­naro had been din­ing with. They both told the police that Gen­naro had been killed by a lone gun­man who had entered the build­ing look­ing for him, how­ev­er Cap­tain Carey dis­missed their story as no wit­ness­es or evi­dence could sup­port it.

The police believed the killing may have been con­nect­ed to Gen­naro’s black mail­ing threats, the Gal­luc­ci bak­ery had been shot up only a few months before when bul­lets smashed through the bak­ery win­dow. In let­ters that were later sent to the police, some infor­mants claimed that Gio­sue Gal­luc­ci had been respon­si­ble for the mur­der of his own brother.