Lansky juga memimpin Murder, Inc. untuk The Commission dan bertanggung jawab atas pembangunan Las Vegas oleh Mafia dan hubungan dengan rezim Kuba korup Fulgencio Batista y Zaldívar. Meskipun Yahudi, Lansky memainkan peran penting dalam organisasi Mafia Italia dan konsolidasi dunia kriminal bawah tanah (meskipun perannya ini masih diperdebatkan).
Emigrasi dan masa kecil
Meyer Lansky lahir di Grodno, Kekaisaran Rusia (sekarang Hrodna, Belarus) dari pasangan Max Suchowlijanski dan istrinya Yetta Lansky. Tahun 1911 keluarga ini pindah ke Amerika Serikat dan menetap di Lower East SideManhattan, New York. Sementara Lansky bersekolah, ia bertemu Charles "Lucky" Luciano muda, yang mencoba merampoknya (menguras uang). Ketika Lansky menolak bayar, Luciano terpana dengan keberanian anak muda itu dan keduanya menjadi sahabat selamanya.
Lansky bertemu Bugsy Siegel ketika masih remaja. Mereka juga menjadi teman selamanya, dan bersama dengan Luciano, membentuk persahabatan abadi. Lansky berperan dalam kebangkitan kekuasaan Luciano dengan merekrut pembunuh Mafia tahun 1931 Salvatore Maranzano. Sebagai remaja mafia, Siegel menyelamatkan Lansky beberapa kali, Lansky selalu menghargainya.
Lansky adalah saudara dari Jacob "Jake" Lansky, yang tahun 1959 adalah manajer Nacional Hotel di Havana, Kuba.
Meyer Lansky 1958
Kematian
Tahun-tahun terakhir Lansky dihabiskan di rumahnya di Miami Beach. Tanggal 15 Januari 1983, ia mengalami kanker paru-paru, pada usia 80 tahun, meninggalkan seorang istri dan tiga anak.[1] Meyer Lansky tidak memiliki harta apapun. Pada waktu itu, FBI mencurigai ia menyimpan $300 juta dalam rekening bank rahasia, tapi mereka tidak pernah menemukan uang apapun.
Birmingham, Stephen The rest of us. Boston: Little, Brown, 1984
Conrad, Harold Dear, Muffo: 35 Years in the Fast Lane. New York, Stein and Day, 1982
Demaris, Ovid The Boardwalk Jungle. Bantam Books, 1986 (also about Lansky and Atlantic city and his Heir apparent Alvin Malnik)
Eisenberg, Dennis/Dan, Uri/ Landau, Eli Meyer Lansky: Mogul of the mob. Paddington Press, 1979
English, T.J. Havana Nocturne: How the Mob Owned Cuba and Then Lost It to the Revolution, William Morrow, 2008/The Havana Mob: Gangster, Gamblers, Showgirls and Revolutionaries in 1950s Cuba, 2007, Mainstream Publishing (UK edition)
Fried, Albert The Rise and Fall of the Jewish Gangster in America. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1980. ISBN 0-231-09683-6
Gosch, Martin A. / Hammer, Richard The last testament of Lucky Luciano. Dell Publishing, 1974
Joselit, Jenna Weisman Our gang: Jewish crime and the New york Jewish community 1900-1940. Bloomington: Indiana university press, 1983
Katcher, Leo The big bankroll, life and times of Arnold Rothstein. New york, Da Capo press,1958
Lewis, Brad Hollywood's Celebrity Gangster. The Incredible Life and Times of Mickey Cohen. Enigma Books, 2007. ISBN 978-1-929631-65-0.
Messick, Hank Lansky. New York: Berkley Publishing Company, 1971.
Messick, Hank Silent syndicate New york: MacMillan, 1976
Naylor, R.T. Hot Money. Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1987 (also about lansky and offshore banking and 'the loan back scam')
Pistone, Joseph Donnie Brasco: My Life Undercover in the Mafia. Signet, 1987
Rockaway, Robert A. But He Was Good to His Mother: The Lives and Crimes of Jewish Gangsters. Jerusalem: Gefen Publishing House, 1993.
Summers,Anthony Official and confidential: The secret life of J.Edgar Hoover. GP Putnam's Sons, 1993 (also about Lansky and the FBI and Lansky's blackmails on Hoover)
Stuart, Mark A. Gangster: the story of Longy Zwillman: the man who invented Organized crime. Lyle Stuart, 1985
Ferrara, Eric. Gangsters, Murderers & Weirdos of the Lower East Side; a self-guided walking tour, 2008
Catatan kaki
^"Meyer Lansky is Dead at 81". Associated Press in New York Times. January 16, 1983. Diakses tanggal 2007-09-25. Meyer Lansky, the reputed financial genius of the underworld, died today of cancer at Mount Sinai Hospital here. He was 81 years old. Mr. Lansky was admitted to the hospital Dec. 31 suffering from dehydration, according to Joyce Clark, a spokesman for the hospital. Mr. Lansky lived in the Imperial House, a high-rise waterfront condominium in Miami Beach. ... Mr. Lansky was married twice. His first marriage, in 1929 to the former Anna Citron, ended in divorce in 1946. The couple had two sons, Bernard and Paul, and a daughter, Sandra. In 1948 he married Thelma Schwarz, a manicurist at a midtown Manhattan hotel. She survives him.Periksa nilai tanggal di: |date= (bantuan)
