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Disbanded in 1994 by order of former Pennsylvania Attorney General Ernest Preate, the Commission was composed of lawyers, civilians and some retired law enforcement, yet police and federal agents were the critics on why this office had to be shut down. Taxpayers funded the publications, which implicated many innocent people and labeled others as criminals without convictions, just on suspicions. The reports’ contents had changed from one decade to another on the early beginnings of the LCN in Philadelphia. No sources were cited, just allusions that the information came from law enforcement. Some books were in the bibliography that ranged from immigration on Italians in America’s cities to early hypotheticals on organized crime and poverty and ethnic bias. But none were directly on Philadelphia. The Commission’s office was located last in Conshohocken, about 15 miles outside of Philadelphia. In 1972, Columbia University professor Francis A.J. Ianni wrote A Family Business in which he gave his first supposed exposure to “organized crime” figures: They were working in Norristown, about 2 miles from Conshohocken, where they also lived with their families and those with whom they associated. (p.177). The Crime Commission never wrote about this. But they did write that the mob boss Salvatore Sabella was “deported” without double-checking a death certificate that said that Sabella died in Philadelphia and was buried about 10 miles away from the Commission office. Records found in Philadelphia’s City Hall, that could be located by anyone not in law enforcement would also prove many errors to this history. Maybe 50% of the Pennsylvania Crime Commission’s work is accurate. The reader would have to check every fact before using it. |
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 Gun Shot Wounds |
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| 2008 PhillyMafiaHistory.com |
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