Louis Litif
Encyclopedia
Louis R. Litif also known as Nicholas Noonan and Louis Woodward, was a Lebanese-American bookmaker
from South Boston, Massachusetts
. After running afoul of neighborhood Irish mob
boss James J. Bulger
, Litif was murdered in 1982. His body was left in a car trunk in the South End, Boston. The murder remained officially unsolved for decades.
-Lebanese
parents who were immigrants from what was then known as the Lebanese Republic. His family surname Litif is a derivation of the Qur'anic Sufis verses, virtually all the Sufis distinguish the Lataif-as-Sitta, otherwise referred to as the six subtleties; which are made of Nafs
, Qalb
, Sirr, Ruh
, Khafi, and Akhfa. His last name was shortened and Americanized upon his parent's arrival in America. Louis's parents emigrated from Lebanon in 1934 after the Vichy French took over the colony. They subsequently settled in Somerville, Massachusetts
where Litif was born. He married a woman named Anne who bore him two children, a daughter Luanne, and son Lee.
neighborhood that had spawned Patriarca crime family
captain Ilario Zannino
, Stephen Flemmi
, and Vincent Flemmi
. Litif made himself a fixture on the handball courts at the L Street Bathhouse, playing all comers for $25 or $50 a game. His reputation as an earner made him popular with South Boston's criminal elite, and at one point police believed he was essentially running the neighborhood gambling rackets, taking in as much as $20,000 a week.
In he late 1960s and early 1970s he was considered in law official circles to be one of the top bookmakers in South Boston. He was one of the few prominent Arab-Americans active in Boston
's criminal underworld other than the brothers.
Before 1976, when he began associating with the Winter Hill Gang, little is known about Louis, except that he was the leader of a large scale sports gambling operation. Partnered with a fellow bookie known as, "Joe the Barber," the operation was one of the biggest moneymakers for neighborhood boss Donald Killeen
and his successors.
According to former South Boston mob boss Kevin Weeks
, who was then the bouncer
in the Triple O's saloon,
Under the influence of an addiction to cocaine
, Litif became more violent beginning in the late 1970s
. In 1975 he was arrested and convicted for pistol whipping an individual with a .357 Magnum
which he carried in the waistband of his pants and pulled out whenever he had the urge.
Eventually, Boston newspapers reported that Litif was suspected of shooting a man named Lip Mongelio six times in the alley outside Hap's Lounge, the bar Litif co-owned with fellow bookmaker, James Matera. The doctors at Boston City hospital were fortunate enough to be able to save Litif's alleged victim.
According to Weeks, Litif had never shot anyone before and began walking toward the police station, intending to turn himself in. However, he was intercepted by Bulger, who calmed him down and drove him home.
According to Weeks,
Litif began stealing from his partners in the bookmaking operation and using the money to traffic cocaine
. To the fury of Bulger, Litif refused to pay a cut of the profits. Litif also became addicted to the drugs he was selling.
According to Weeks,
Unfortunately, for Litif, bartender Robert Conrad was working that night and witnessed the crime. Shortly thereafter, Conrad disappeared. According to Kevin Weeks,
As Robert Conrad's daughter later recalled in court, when she went to the FBI searching for answers about her father's disappearance, John Connolly told her bluntly what had happened. "Honey," he said, "Your father's dead. They knifed him. But don't worry. They got him drunk first." She later recalled herself asking him in a 2001 newspaper account, "I saw it", he said. John Connolly told her that if she went to the Boston police, it might jeopardize some very important informants in the Boston underworld. The daughter's problem was that her family badly needed the money from her father's life insurance policy, but couldn't collect the money without a death certificate. John Connolly straightened everything out with a single letter to the insurance company on FBI stationary. Two decades later, the Conrad family was able to produce a letter from the carrier stating that the missing persons case had been resolved thanks to the efforts of, "Agent Connolly."
At the time Kevin Weeks was about to get married to his longtime girlfriend. A short time before the wedding, Weeks informed Bulger that he was having difficulty seating Louis Litif. "Don't worry about it," Bulger responded. "He probably won't show."
According to Weeks,
According to Kevin Weeks,
The FBI, however, eventually decided that Halloran was an unreliable witness. After being refused a place in the Witness Protection Program, he made the mistake of returning to South Boston. There, Halloran was ambushed on the waterfront and machine gunned to death by Bulger, Flemmi, Kevin Weeks, and a third man whom Weeks refuses to name. Stephen Flemmi has alleged that the fourth assassin was South Boston mobster Patrick Nee
. Nee denies the allegation.
A week or so after Litif's death, Boston Herald
reporter Paul Corsetti began researching an article about the murder and Bulger's suspected involvement in it. After several days of reporting the story, he was approached by a man who told him, "I'm Jim Bulger and if you continue to write shit about me, I'm going to blow your f---ing head off."
Corsetti attempted to seek out help from the Patriarca crime family
, but was informed that Bulger was outside their control.
According to Kevin Weeks,
Bookmaker
A bookmaker, or bookie, is an organization or a person that takes bets on sporting and other events at agreed upon odds.- Range of events :...
from South Boston, Massachusetts
South Boston, Massachusetts
South Boston is a densely populated neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts, located south and east of the Fort Point Channel and abutting Dorchester Bay. One of America's oldest and most historic neighborhoods, South Boston was formerly known as Dorchester Neck, and today is called "Southie" by...
. After running afoul of neighborhood Irish mob
Irish Mob
The Irish Mob is one of the oldest organized crime groups in the United States, in existence since the early 19th century. Originating in Irish American street gangs of the 19th century — depicted in Herbert Asbury's 1928 book The Gangs of New York — the Irish Mob has appeared in most...
boss James J. Bulger
James J. Bulger
James Joseph "Whitey" Bulger, Jr. is a former organized crime figure from Boston, Massachusetts.Local folklore depicted Bulger as a Robin Hood-style social bandit dedicated to protecting the neighborhood and its residents. Bulger allegedly masterminded a protection racket targeting drug kingpins...
, Litif was murdered in 1982. His body was left in a car trunk in the South End, Boston. The murder remained officially unsolved for decades.
Family background
He was born "Louis R. Lataif-Litif", and carried the nicknames "Little Louis" and "Disco Louie". He was the son of FrancophoneFrancophone
The adjective francophone means French-speaking, typically as primary language, whether referring to individuals, groups, or places. Often, the word is used as a noun to describe a natively French-speaking person....
-Lebanese
Lebanese people
The Lebanese people are a nation and ethnic group of Levantine people originating in what is today the country of Lebanon, including those who had inhabited Mount Lebanon prior to the creation of the modern Lebanese state....
parents who were immigrants from what was then known as the Lebanese Republic. His family surname Litif is a derivation of the Qur'anic Sufis verses, virtually all the Sufis distinguish the Lataif-as-Sitta, otherwise referred to as the six subtleties; which are made of Nafs
Nafs
Nafs is an Arabic word which occurs in the Qur'an and means self, psyche, ego or soul. In its unrefined state, "the ego is the lowest dimension of man's inward existence, his animal and satanic nature." Nafs is an important concept in the Islamic tradition, especially within Sufism and the...
, Qalb
Qalb
قلب is an Arabic word meaning "Heart". It is the second among the six purities or Lataif-e-sitta in Sufi philosophy.-Sixteen stages of Taming Qalb:To attend Tasfiya-e-Qalb, the Salik needs to achieve the following sixteen goals.#Zuhd or abstention from evil...
, Sirr, Ruh
Ruh
Rūḥ is an Arabic word meaning spirit. It is the third among the six purities or Lataif-e-sitta-Thirteen stages of taming ruh:To attend Tajalliy-e-Ruh, the Salik needs to achieve the following thirteen.#Iradah or Commitment with God...
, Khafi, and Akhfa. His last name was shortened and Americanized upon his parent's arrival in America. Louis's parents emigrated from Lebanon in 1934 after the Vichy French took over the colony. They subsequently settled in Somerville, Massachusetts
Somerville, Massachusetts
Somerville is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States, located just north of Boston. As of the 2010 census, the city had a total population of 75,754 and was the most densely populated municipality in New England. It is also the 17th most densely populated incorporated place in...
where Litif was born. He married a woman named Anne who bore him two children, a daughter Luanne, and son Lee.
Criminal career
During the 1950s Litif married an Irish-American woman named Anna. He was born and raised in the same South End, Boston-RoxburyRoxbury, Massachusetts
Roxbury is a dissolved municipality and current neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts, United States. It was one of the first towns founded in the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1630, and became a city in 1846 until annexed to Boston on January 5, 1868...
neighborhood that had spawned Patriarca crime family
Patriarca crime family
The Patriarca crime family, also known as the New England crime family and the Providence crime family, is an Italian-American organized crime syndicate based in New England, specifically Providence, Rhode Island and Boston, Massachusetts, and is part of the Italian-American Mafia or "La Cosa Nostra"...
captain Ilario Zannino
Ilario Zannino
Ilario "Larry Baione" Maria Antonio Zannino was the muscle and chief gambling honcho for Raymond J. Patriarca and the Patriarca crime family. Zannino was said to be the second-highest-ranking figure in the Boston faction of the Patriarca family...
, Stephen Flemmi
Stephen Flemmi
Stephen Joseph "The Rifleman" Flemmi is an Italian-American mobster and close associate of Winter Hill Gang boss James J. Bulger. Beginning in 1965, Flemmi was a top echelon informant for the Federal Bureau of Investigation...
, and Vincent Flemmi
Vincent Flemmi
Vincent James Flemmi , also known as "Jimmy The Bear," was an Italian-American mobster who freelanced for the Winter Hill Gang and the Patriarca crime family. He was also a longtime informant for the Federal Bureau of Investigation. He was also the brother of government informant Stephen...
. Litif made himself a fixture on the handball courts at the L Street Bathhouse, playing all comers for $25 or $50 a game. His reputation as an earner made him popular with South Boston's criminal elite, and at one point police believed he was essentially running the neighborhood gambling rackets, taking in as much as $20,000 a week.
In he late 1960s and early 1970s he was considered in law official circles to be one of the top bookmakers in South Boston. He was one of the few prominent Arab-Americans active in Boston
Boston
Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...
's criminal underworld other than the brothers.
Before 1976, when he began associating with the Winter Hill Gang, little is known about Louis, except that he was the leader of a large scale sports gambling operation. Partnered with a fellow bookie known as, "Joe the Barber," the operation was one of the biggest moneymakers for neighborhood boss Donald Killeen
Donald Killeen
Donald Killeen was an Irish-American mob boss who controlled criminal activity, primarily bookmaking in South Boston, Massachusetts, during the 1960s and 1970s...
and his successors.
According to former South Boston mob boss Kevin Weeks
Kevin Weeks
Kevin Weeks is a former mobster of Irish-American descent and a longtime friend and confidant to James J. Bulger, the infamous boss of the Winter Hill Gang, a crime family based out of the Winter Hill neighborhood in Somerville, Massachusetts.After his arrest and imprisonment in 1999, he became a...
, who was then the bouncer
Bouncer
Bouncer or The Bouncer may refer to:* Bouncer , a person who provides security at a public venue* Bouncer or BNC, a piece of software used to relay traffic and connections in computer networksIn sport:...
in the Triple O's saloon,
"He wasn't a big guy, maybe five seven and 185 pounds. Of Arab descent, he had a mustache like Saddam HusseinSaddam HusseinSaddam Hussein Abd al-Majid al-Tikriti was the fifth President of Iraq, serving in this capacity from 16 July 1979 until 9 April 2003...
. He had a wife and a couple of kids, and a three decker townhouse on East Broadway and G. I was friendly with his daughter Louanne, who was a few years younger than me. That night, as always, he was talking in his obnoxious loud voice. Even when there were 400 people in the bar, you always knew Louie was there.
Under the influence of an addiction to cocaine
Cocaine
Cocaine is a crystalline tropane alkaloid that is obtained from the leaves of the coca plant. The name comes from "coca" in addition to the alkaloid suffix -ine, forming cocaine. It is a stimulant of the central nervous system, an appetite suppressant, and a topical anesthetic...
, Litif became more violent beginning in the late 1970s
1970s
File:1970s decade montage.png|From left, clockwise: US President Richard Nixon doing the V for Victory sign after his resignation from office after the Watergate scandal in 1974; Refugees aboard a US naval boat after the Fall of Saigon, leading to the end of the Vietnam War in 1975; The 1973 oil...
. In 1975 he was arrested and convicted for pistol whipping an individual with a .357 Magnum
.357 Magnum
The .357 S&W Magnum , or simply .357 Magnum, is a revolver cartridge created by Elmer Keith, Phillip B. Sharpe, Colonel D. B. Wesson of firearms manufacturer Smith & Wesson, and Winchester. It is based upon Smith & Wesson's earlier .38 Special cartridge. The .357 Magnum cartridge was introduced in...
which he carried in the waistband of his pants and pulled out whenever he had the urge.
Eventually, Boston newspapers reported that Litif was suspected of shooting a man named Lip Mongelio six times in the alley outside Hap's Lounge, the bar Litif co-owned with fellow bookmaker, James Matera. The doctors at Boston City hospital were fortunate enough to be able to save Litif's alleged victim.
According to Weeks, Litif had never shot anyone before and began walking toward the police station, intending to turn himself in. However, he was intercepted by Bulger, who calmed him down and drove him home.
According to Weeks,
"The Jimmy sent Alan Thistle... to talk to Lip in the hospital. Thistle pursuaded Lip not to testify against Louie and everything was dropped. After all, Louie was also a good moneymaker. No reason to send a profitable bookmaker away for attempted murder. A few days later, however, Louie decided he wanted to kill Alan Thistle for no other reason than he just didn't like him. But Jimmy told him he couldn't. 'He just talked the kid out of pressing charges against you and now you want to kill him?' Jimmy said, 'He did you a favor.' And that was the end of that."
The murders of Matera and Conrad
According to Kevin WeeksKevin Weeks
Kevin Weeks is a former mobster of Irish-American descent and a longtime friend and confidant to James J. Bulger, the infamous boss of the Winter Hill Gang, a crime family based out of the Winter Hill neighborhood in Somerville, Massachusetts.After his arrest and imprisonment in 1999, he became a...
Litif began stealing from his partners in the bookmaking operation and using the money to traffic cocaine
Cocaine
Cocaine is a crystalline tropane alkaloid that is obtained from the leaves of the coca plant. The name comes from "coca" in addition to the alkaloid suffix -ine, forming cocaine. It is a stimulant of the central nervous system, an appetite suppressant, and a topical anesthetic...
. To the fury of Bulger, Litif refused to pay a cut of the profits. Litif also became addicted to the drugs he was selling.
According to Weeks,
"But a month or so later, Louie made things more complicated again when he got into an argument during another cardgame, this time with his partner, Jimmy Matera. Matera caught Louie cheating and slapped him in the face during the game. About a week later, they were having problems at the bar with an outrageous water bill, and Louie convinced Matera that there must be something wrong with the water meter. When the two of them went into the cellar, Louie told Jimmy to look at the water meter, which he said was broken. While Matera was staring at the meter, Louie shot him in the head for slapping him."
Unfortunately, for Litif, bartender Robert Conrad was working that night and witnessed the crime. Shortly thereafter, Conrad disappeared. According to Kevin Weeks,
"Conrad, who was about fifty, was a nervous wreck over what he had seen, so Louie wined and dined him in Las VegasLas Vegas metropolitan areaThe Las Vegas Valley is the heart of the Las Vegas-Paradise, NV MSA also known as the Las Vegas–Paradise–Henderson MSA which includes all of Clark County, Nevada, and is a metropolitan area in the southern part of the U.S. state of Nevada. The Valley is defined by the Las Vegas Valley landform, a ...
. Then he took him up to a little place he had in Nova ScotiaNova ScotiaNova Scotia is one of Canada's three Maritime provinces and is the most populous province in Atlantic Canada. The name of the province is Latin for "New Scotland," but "Nova Scotia" is the recognized, English-language name of the province. The provincial capital is Halifax. Nova Scotia is the...
, where he promised to hide him till everything blew over, assuring him that everything would be alright and that there was nothing to worry about. He killed him there, took him to the back of the house in a wheelbarrow, and buried him. He ended up hiding him so well that thanks to the law in CanadaCanadaCanada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
limiting their access to search for bodies, the DEA and the State Police couldn't find him."
As Robert Conrad's daughter later recalled in court, when she went to the FBI searching for answers about her father's disappearance, John Connolly told her bluntly what had happened. "Honey," he said, "Your father's dead. They knifed him. But don't worry. They got him drunk first." She later recalled herself asking him in a 2001 newspaper account, "I saw it", he said. John Connolly told her that if she went to the Boston police, it might jeopardize some very important informants in the Boston underworld. The daughter's problem was that her family badly needed the money from her father's life insurance policy, but couldn't collect the money without a death certificate. John Connolly straightened everything out with a single letter to the insurance company on FBI stationary. Two decades later, the Conrad family was able to produce a letter from the carrier stating that the missing persons case had been resolved thanks to the efforts of, "Agent Connolly."
Litif's murder
According to Kevin Weeks, Bulger was infuriated that Litif had been committing murders without his permission. Litif also began arguing with "Joe the Barber," his partner from the bookmaking operation. One week before his murder, Litif entered South Boston's Triple O's saloon and told an outraged Bulger that he was also going to kill Joe, whom he accused of stealing money from the bookmaking operation. Bulger refused to sanction this, but Litif continued to insist. Seething with hatred, Bulger informed Litif that he had, "stepped over the line," and was, "no longer just a bookmaker."At the time Kevin Weeks was about to get married to his longtime girlfriend. A short time before the wedding, Weeks informed Bulger that he was having difficulty seating Louis Litif. "Don't worry about it," Bulger responded. "He probably won't show."
According to Weeks,
"Personally, I liked Louie. Every Sunday night, he'd come down to Triple O's and we'd play cards or pinball, twenty bucks a game. He was loud but funny, and he'd always been a major moneymaker for Jimmy. He should have just stayed a bookie and not tried to jump from the minor leagues to the majors. And now he wanted to kill a friend of Jimmy. There was no way that would be allowed. Shortly after that, a week or so before my wedding, Louie was found stuffed into a garbage bag in the trunk of his car, which had been dumped in the South End. He'd been stabbed with an ice pick and shot. 'He was color coordinated,' Jimmy told me. 'He was wearing green under wear and was in a green garbage bag.' At the wedding, when I went around to greet his table, Jimmy pointed to the empty chair beside him and said, 'Say hi to Louie.' Stevie picked up a napkin and made a show of wiping his face. 'He keeps on drinking and it keeps on leaking out of him,' he said, reminding us that Louie had been shot in the head and any drink he might have put in his mouth would pour right out of his face. And they all broke out laughing."
Legacy
In 1982, South Boston drug dealer Edward Brian Halloran approached the FBI and claimed to have witnessed the murder of Louis Litif. He stated that he had dropped Litif off that night and watched Bulger and Flemmi stab and shoot the bookie to death.According to Kevin Weeks,
"Strangley enough, Jimmy, told me, 'Louie's last words to me were a lie.' Apparently, Louie had insisted that he'd come by himself and that nobody had driven him over. It was hard to figure out why Louie lied to Jimmy that night. If he'd told Jimmy that someone had driven him, he might have gotten a pass. But it wouldn't have lasted long, since Jimmy had no intention of letting Louie run wild."
The FBI, however, eventually decided that Halloran was an unreliable witness. After being refused a place in the Witness Protection Program, he made the mistake of returning to South Boston. There, Halloran was ambushed on the waterfront and machine gunned to death by Bulger, Flemmi, Kevin Weeks, and a third man whom Weeks refuses to name. Stephen Flemmi has alleged that the fourth assassin was South Boston mobster Patrick Nee
Patrick Nee
Patrick Nee is an Irish-American immigrant, former member of the Mullen Gang, Vietnam vet, and the bestselling author of the memoir A Criminal and an Irishman; The Inside Story of the Boston Mob-IRA Connection.-Early life:Nee was born in Ros Muc, an Irish language speaking village in the...
. Nee denies the allegation.
A week or so after Litif's death, Boston Herald
Boston Herald
The Boston Herald is a daily newspaper that serves Boston, Massachusetts, United States, and its surrounding area. It was started in 1846 and is one of the oldest daily newspapers in the United States...
reporter Paul Corsetti began researching an article about the murder and Bulger's suspected involvement in it. After several days of reporting the story, he was approached by a man who told him, "I'm Jim Bulger and if you continue to write shit about me, I'm going to blow your f---ing head off."
Corsetti attempted to seek out help from the Patriarca crime family
Patriarca crime family
The Patriarca crime family, also known as the New England crime family and the Providence crime family, is an Italian-American organized crime syndicate based in New England, specifically Providence, Rhode Island and Boston, Massachusetts, and is part of the Italian-American Mafia or "La Cosa Nostra"...
, but was informed that Bulger was outside their control.
According to Kevin Weeks,
"The next day, Corsetti reported the meeting to the Boston police. He was issued a pistol permit within twenty-four hours. The cop who gave him the permit told him, "I'm glad my last name is not Corsetti.' A couple days later, Jimmy told me about the scene with the cop and was glad to hear how uncomfortable he'd made Corsetti."
Further reading
- The Brothers Bulger: How They Terrorized and Corrupted Boston for a Quarter Century by Howie Carr
- Deadly Alliance: The FBI's Secret Partnership with the Mob by Ralph Ranalli
- Brutal: My Life in Whitey Bulger's Irish Mob, by Kevin WeeksKevin WeeksKevin Weeks is a former mobster of Irish-American descent and a longtime friend and confidant to James J. Bulger, the infamous boss of the Winter Hill Gang, a crime family based out of the Winter Hill neighborhood in Somerville, Massachusetts.After his arrest and imprisonment in 1999, he became a...
- www.wrko.com