Mickey Cohen: The Life and Crimes of L.A.'s Notorious Mobster

by Tere Tereba Narrated by Kate Reading

Overview

Mickey Cohen: The Life and Times of L.A.'s Notorious Mobster is a seductive, premium-octane blend of true crime and Hollywood lore that spins around a wildly eccentric mob boss. When Bugsy Siegel was executed, ruthless Mickey Cohen, a former pro boxer and cunning provocateur, took over criminal activity in L.A., a move sanctioned by Meyer Lansky and Frank Costello. Attaining immense power and dominance, from the late 1940s until 1976 the semi-literate Angeleno became an above-the-fold newspaper name, accumulating a remarkable count of more than 1,000 front pages in Los Angeles papers alone, and hundreds of articles in national and international periodicals.

Cohen's story and the history of mid-century L.A. are inextricably intertwined, and author Tere Tereba delivers tales full of high life, high drama, and highly placed politicians, among them RFK and Richard Nixon, as well as revelations about countless icons, including Shirley Temple, Lana Turner, Frank Sinatra, and the Reverend Billy Graham. Meticulously researched, this rich tapestry presents a panoramic look at the Los Angeles underworld and immerses the listener in a dark, decadent, and dangerous side of Hollywood that has not been fully revealed until now.

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

Tereba brings the bantamweight crook back to vivid life … This is a remarkable biography.” — Booklist

“Ms. Tereba brings flair and a tone of appalled fascination to her thorough and lively study of ‘the man who plundered Los Angeles.’” — The Wall Street Journal

“Tereba spent more than 10 years researching and writing her book; she tells Cohen’s story swiftly and assuredly. Her page-turning and entertaining narrative neither glamorizes nor judges its subject.” — Film Noir Blonde

“Rough, florid, lively, and detailed, with plenty of celebrities in supporting roles and lots of Hollywood scandal. Tereba sums Cohen up as ‘a dangerous man, full of bluster, violence, charm, greed, grandiosity, obsession, deception, chutzpah, and occasionally self-realization.’ Unlike many of his brother gangsters, Cohen loved the limelight, so Tereba has had plenty of material to draw upon.” —The Dispatch

“As a study of a man of violence-fittingly illustrated throughout, with a beneficial Cast of Characters, ample end notes, and Selected Bibliography — Mickey Cohen is a meticulously-documented biography and incisive social history of breadth and depth. It is a cohesive, cogent, and well-structured exploration of both an obsessive mobster and his inextricable link with the city in which he made his home and caused some harm.” — Seattle PI

Booklist

Tereba brings the bantamweight crook back to vivid life in this biography, along with the night clubs and race tracks he frequented and the no-holds-barred L.A. in which he flourished. This is a remarkable biography.

Library Journal - Audio

Tereba presents a fascinating account of the interconnection among organized crime, politics, and Hollywood. Mickey Cohen (1913–76), a rough kid who unsuccessfully tried his hand at boxing, later became involved in organized crime and rose through the ranks in the Cleveland, New York, and Los Angeles mobs. When Benjamin "Bugsy" Siegel was murdered in 1947, Cohen stepped in and took control of most of the criminal activity in L.A. The colorful Cohen enjoyed fancy clothes, publicity, gambling, and rubbing shoulders with movie stars and producers, the police, and politicians. However, he was hampered by infighting among mobsters and constantly hounded by federal investigations that resulted in his being jailed twice for tax evasion. Another inmate attacked Cohen during his second prison stay, leaving him permanently disabled. This fascinating audiobook provides an excellent overview of racketeering and how it shaped L.A. during the middle of the 20th century. Narrator Kate Reading does an excellent job of presenting the story. VERDICT This work is recommended to anyone interested in true crime. ["For readers who revel in old movies, stories about gangsters in double-breasted suits, and midcentury Los Angeles," read the review of the ECW hc, LJ 5/1/12. Sean Penn's new film Gangster Squad about the life of Cohen should attract attention to this title as well.—Ed.]—Stephen L. Hupp, West Virginia Univ. Parkersburg Lib.

Library Journal

Fedoras, tommy guns, and brutal public assaults are the province of the silver screen, but they were at one time a fixture of Hollywood life. Journalist and fashion designer Tereba's biography of Los Angeles mobster Mickey Cohen (1913–76) sets out to reveal the true story behind the glitzy legends and traces Cohen's influence through Tinseltown and beyond. The number of people in Cohen's life was so great that Tereba includes a "cast of characters," not seen for this review. Although the writing sometimes veers into film noir territory, it's hard not to get caught up in the descriptions of the opulent lifestyle maintained by the gangster and his cronies, despite the heavy toll it took on them, financially and physically. Cohen's personal habits and predilections are given particular attention, and the author channels Cohen's calm when recounting explosions, beatings, and the burials of bodies in lye. VERDICT For readers who revel in old movies, stories about gangsters in double-breasted suits, and midcentury Los Angeles. Recommended.—Kate Sheehan, Bibliomation, Middlebury, CT

NOVEMBER 2012 - AudioFile

Tere Tereba goes beyond the headlines of a notorious Jewish gangster of Hollywood's early days who managed a million-dollar crime empire despite the fact that he was illiterate and baffled by even rudimentary arithmetic. It’s a chilling story about a criminal kingpin who terrorized a city. Shirley Temple, Frank Sinatra, and Lana Turner interact with the ruthless killer in 1940-50s Hollywood. Kate Reading delivers the story with the unwavering ear of a television reporter. Reading is so good that listeners won’t notice that a woman is playing the roles of hardened gangsters who would as easily kill a man as talk to him. M.S. © AudioFile 2012, Portland, Maine

Product Details

BN ID:	2940171267841
Publisher:	Tantor Audio
Publication date:	09/10/2012
Edition description:	Unabridged
Sales rank:	951,885

Read an Excerpt

Two years earlier, in 1947, Mickey Cohen had become Los Angeles’s most prominent underworld figure. Standing five-foot-five in his custom-made elevator shoes, the pudgy, squat-legged former prizefighter was now as much a part of the local color as movie stars, palm trees, and smog. Having grown into a figure of immense fascination to the public, his exploits were constant headline-makers. L.A.’s Capone – he seemed able to get away with murder. Many assassinations were ascribed to him, and in the past year alone, there had been multiple heavily publicized attempts on his life. Cunning, ruthless, and flamboyant, at thirty-five, Mickey Cohen was at the center of an ongoing underworld war and major political upheaval.

Police, political figures, and members of the underworld had all heard the story: Cohen was again slated for assassination. The local Mafia wanted him dead, while another rival offered an apartment house as compensation for accomplishing the deed. A cadre of rogue cops had vowed to kill him, and members of his own gang were eager to displace him. Threatening to end the careers of an array of LAPD brass and prominent officials, he was scheduled to appear before a grand jury investigating police corruption.

After dining with a lobbyist considered to be California’s political kingmaker, Mickey turned up at Sherry’s. It was common knowledge the no-frills, smoke-filled restaurant was his favorite last-round hangout. Resplendent in an impeccably tailored pigeon gray suit, he settled into his regular spot, booth #12. Back to the wall, he sat surrounded by members of the press. The journalists he entertained were following him, anticipating high drama. While satisfying his addiction to chocolate ice cream, Mickey held court, kibitzing with them in his unique patois of fractured grammar and four-syllable words. Florabel Muir, the veteran newswoman who had become his covert advocate, asked him if it was dangerous to be clubbing.

“Not as long as you people are around,” the mobster told her. “Even a crazy man wouldn’t take a chance shooting where a reporter might get hit.” Knocking wood, he added, “You’re too hot.”

It was nearing 4 a.m. when plans for his exit began. Flanking the exit were plainclothes police, a sergeant from LAPD’s Gangster Squad, and Special Agent Harry Cooper, the high-ranking state officer who, in a stunning move, had recently been assigned – by California’s attorney general – as Cohen’s bodyguard. Seeing the lawmen at the door, journalist Muir jokingly said to them, “What are you standing out here for? Trying to get yourself shot?”

Given an all-clear signal, Cohen and his party, accompanied by a phalanx of bodyguards from both sides of the law, moved onto the neon-lit Strip. Muir lagged behind, stopping to buy the morning edition of the Examiner. As she picked up the paper, the journalist heard a volley, then another. Looking out the door, what she saw unfolded like a movie.

A few feet away, a screaming man and young woman lay sprawled on the sidewalk. As the fusillade continued, she watched Cohen, blood darkening the shoulder of his jacket, shout commands. Then the state officer was hit. Clutching his stomach, Special Agent Cooper was still gripping his revolver as Cohen’s men struggled to pull him into a car. The wounded mob boss took charge, hoisting the hulking cop into the back seat as the big sedan roared into the night.

This was the sixth of eleven attempts on the Hollywood mobster’s charmed and violent life. Nearly thirty years later, at the end of nearly sixty years of crime, Mickey Cohen would die peacefully in his sleep, outliving many formidable assassins and all his prominent enemies, as well as his legendary sponsors, Bugsy Siegel, Frank Costello, and Lucky Luciano, as the most brazen and colorful gangster of them all.

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