Louis "Lepke" Buchalter: Gangster




Louis "Lepke" Buchalter was born 6 Feb 1897 in New York City to Barnett Buchalter (1856-1910) A Russian Immigrant  and Rose de Woltoff (1858-), they had 10 children and Louis was the 3rd to youngest. Barnett was a Dealer Cutting....A person who cuts the cards in gambling establishments in 1900 then in 1910 he had a hardware store. Barnett and Rose divorced he married again  to Gertrude Regoff.  His mother was Jewish.

Louis was called "Lepkeleh" by his mother, which means Little Louis in Yeddish. His father died when he was about 12 and he was sent to live with one of his older sisters. This is when he began his life of crime.

He started out doing burglaries and as he became an adult he was a full fledged member and leader of a MOB along with a childhood friend, Jacob Shapiro.  



You can see his long list of known crimes.






Louis married first 10 Apr 1913 in Illinois to Nettie Kite They had 5 children: 
Esther 
Abraham
Ettie
Zelda
Muriel

2nd he married 20 Aug 1931 in NY Beatrice "Betty" Wasserman, they had a son.
Harold.


He has a FBI file and his FBI #222228







Here's 2 Papers from the FBI files











He was friends with Bugsy Siegel 
He started a labor racketeering scheme and Murder Inc.



Some photo's from his last trial in 1933 before he was sentenced to be executed.











These are Associated Press cards I found on Ancestry.







He was on the lamb for a while before turning himself in.

Here's something I really don't understand, it's about his 1/2 brother Jacob Buchalter and his wife Zilpah Newhall.






Louis said he took care of his family.  











Louis Buchalter died 4 Mar 1944 at Sing Sing Prison in NY

He is buried in Mount Hebron Cemetery in Flushing, NY


He was a gangster and mobster, murderer, ect.... He lived in a time when the speakeasy was hiding around every corner and the police were corrupt and paid to turn a blind eye.

The one thing Louis didn't learn which many mobsters don't, is do not trust anyone, not even your best friend or family.  Many mobsters were taken down by these reasons. 

But in the end Louis got pretty much what he deserved as well as Bugsy siegel, Jacob "Gurrah" Shapiro and many others.

Who was left after they all died. Wives, children and families. What happened to them?

Louis wife Betty married again in 1945 in Florida to Arthur Jarwood, she died in 1983.

His first wife Nettie Kite died in 1980 she never remarried.

All his children have passed away the last one dying in 2013.



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