April 14, 1973
Sam “Mad Man” DeStefano was a bona fide lunatic. In fact, he made “Crazy” Joe Gallo seem like a sea of calm. DeStefano was a loan-shark in Chicago and though he’d never become a “made man”, he made buckets of money for the Chicago Outfit. He also put that money to use as a “fixer”, greasing the wheels whenever anybody needed to get out of a jam. He had politicians in his pocket, and often bragged that he could get anybody off any charge—for a hefty fee, of course.
What DeStefano loved most was his “juice loan” operation. He’d lend money to anyone—political figures, or drug addicts from the street. He’d then charge a huge weekly interest on the loans (this was the “juicing” part—he’d squeeze his clients dry), and if they couldn’t pay, he would have the opportunity of going to work. Truth be told DeStefano hoped and prayed that his clients wouldn’t be able to make with the funds, especially the small fry. That way he could torture them to death.
DeStefano used to go out to the pig farms to watch the animals wallowing in the mud. He dreamed of the day when he would own his own farm so that he could feed his victims’ chopped-up bodies to the swine. He also kept a soundproof torture chamber in his basement.
The list of DeStefano’s unstable and violent actions goes on and on. He used to enjoy representing himself in court, where he would show up in his pyjamas, using a megaphone to get his point across. On the orders of mob boss Salvatore Giancana, he even executed one of his own brothers. He once shoved a gun into his wife’s mouth and forced her to play an impromptu game of Russian roulette. And then there were the torture killings. DeStefano’s life story reads like something from the history of Vlad the Impaler.
Usually the mob won’t put up with such a noxious quantity as DeStefano—too much of a liability. Yet he was smart as well as crazy; his wealth and his usefulness as a fixer ensured he was around a lot longer than others might have been. Things changed when he killed Leo Foreman. Foreman was an underling of his and it was likely that he’d cooked the books and skimmed a little of DeStefano’s money from the top of some racket or other. The consequences were predictably fatal.
Ten years passed before the cops were able to tie DeStefano to the case, but when they did he was finally brought in. It was said that he promised to sing in order to get a lighter sentence. In any case, DeStefano’s usefulness to the mob suddenly came to an abrupt end and on April 14, 1973, he was executed. As a side note, one of Sam’s killers was his remaining brother, Mario. What goes around comes around.