Crime Inc. Group
Estelle Carey (1909-1943)
Name: Estelle Carey (born Estelle Smith; took stepfather's name)
Nickname: "The Cinderella of the Night Clubs"
Brief Bio: Born in Chicago in 1909; orphan (fatherless, mother later remarried and brought her home); waitress turn Rush Street (Chicago nightclub district on Near North Side) dice girl; paramour of numerous gangsters; made frequent visits to Miami; brutally tortured to death (beaten and burned) in her apartment in Chicago on February 3, 1943, allegedly on the orders of the leadership of the Chicago Outfit. Once told her mother, "Don't worry about me, mother. I can take care of myself." Believed to have been killed to intimidate Chicago mobster "Nicky Dean" Circella into keeping his mouth shut about the so-called "Hollywood Extortion Case." A friend later summed her up: "She dressed beautifully and had a tremendously attractive personality. I'd call her naive -- almost dumb, really, but always eager to improve herself." In addition to the love of her life (Nicky Dean), romantically linked to "Dago" Lawrence Mangano (murdered, 1944), Marshall Caifano, alias Johnny Marshall (natural causes, 2003), Eddie McGrath (New York mobster, head of old Irish bootlegging gang in Manhattan), among others. The last time anyone knew her spoke to her was a friend she talked to on the telephone early on the day of her murder, to which she said before hanging up: "Shall I marry or go to business school? We'll talk it over later." Courtroom testimony later linked her murder to Gerald J. (Gerry) Covelli, a Near North Side mob enforcer linked to numerous mob hits in 1940s and '50s who became a cooperating witness in the early 1960s and who was car-bombed while in hiding in California in 1967. He would have only been 21 at the time of her murder. Her murder was never solved.
Estelle Carey (1909-1943)
Name: Estelle Carey (born Estelle Smith; took stepfather's name)
Nickname: "The Cinderella of the Night Clubs"
Brief Bio: Born in Chicago in 1909; orphan (fatherless, mother later remarried and brought her home); waitress turn Rush Street (Chicago nightclub district on Near North Side) dice girl; paramour of numerous gangsters; made frequent visits to Miami; brutally tortured to death (beaten and burned) in her apartment in Chicago on February 3, 1943, allegedly on the orders of the leadership of the Chicago Outfit. Once told her mother, "Don't worry about me, mother. I can take care of myself." Believed to have been killed to intimidate Chicago mobster "Nicky Dean" Circella into keeping his mouth shut about the so-called "Hollywood Extortion Case." A friend later summed her up: "She dressed beautifully and had a tremendously attractive personality. I'd call her naive -- almost dumb, really, but always eager to improve herself." In addition to the love of her life (Nicky Dean), romantically linked to "Dago" Lawrence Mangano (murdered, 1944), Marshall Caifano, alias Johnny Marshall (natural causes, 2003), Eddie McGrath (New York mobster, head of old Irish bootlegging gang in Manhattan), among others. The last time anyone knew her spoke to her was a friend she talked to on the telephone early on the day of her murder, to which she said before hanging up: "Shall I marry or go to business school? We'll talk it over later." Courtroom testimony later linked her murder to Gerald J. (Gerry) Covelli, a Near North Side mob enforcer linked to numerous mob hits in 1940s and '50s who became a cooperating witness in the early 1960s and who was car-bombed while in hiding in California in 1967. He would have only been 21 at the time of her murder. Her murder was never solved.