Racketeering Act Of 1970

The Racketeer Influenced and Organized Crime act of 1970 might have been one of the biggest help to law enforcement in taking down the Mafia. There were other advancements that took part in taking down crime families, but this act made sure that the big leaders of the five families could be held accountable for their actions, even if it wasn’t them that had actually did the incriminating act. “RICO allows the government to target groups of criminals, and their typically insulated leaders, rather than just low-level conspirators. Under the law, if a group is involved in murder, gambling and prostitution, or a number of other crimes such as corruption, their leaders can be convicted of racketeering -- even if they personally didn't pull the trigger, …show more content…
To constitute an enterprise, a group must have an ongoing mechanism for directing the affairs of the group on an ongoing, rather than an ad hoc, basis”(Sacks, Michele). Racketeering must also be involved in group activity, or an ‘enterprise’. There has to be a leader, and some sort of structure to this group. This perfectly explains what the Mafia was doing at the time. There was a don, and then there was his goons. The Mafia was an enterprise dong illegal activity which exactly fit the racketeering …show more content…
“A criminal organization that originated in Sicily and was brought to the United States by Italian immigrants in the late nineteenth century”(“Mafia”). They dominated the game in bootlegging, such as speakeasies during the prohibition era in the United States. “The Mafia built its power through extortion (forcing tradesmen and shopkeepers to buy Mafia protection against destruction) and by dominating the bootlegging industry (the illegal production and distribution of liquor) during Prohibition”(“Mafia”). The Mafia would offer protection to business owners so that their buildings wouldn’t get torn down. This would grant the Mafia start up power in order to become the giant organization it would become. They dabbled in gambling, drug dealing or narcotic distribution and extortion. The Mafia had become something huge in a matter of years. Although today it’s nothing like it used to be, back in the mid 1900s they dominated cities such as New York city. There were multiple families, all competing for power, to be the top of the top, the cream of the corn, the family of all the families. Al Capone, one of the most famous Mafiosos was brought down before the RICO act came along. He was brought down for Tax Evasion. “In 1931, Capone was sentenced to 10 years in prison for something less associated with violent criminal masterminds: tax evasion. Capone had never filed an income tax return, and