- Peter von Frantizius
Peter von Frantizius ["Frantzius"] (d.
April 6 ,1968 ) was a Chicago businessman and arms dealer to the Chicago underworld duringProhibition , later dubbed by the press as "The Armorer of Gangland". An almost exclusive supplier of theChicago Outfit (although often selling to rival gangs such as theNorth Side Mob ), he was one of the first to supply "Tommy" submachine guns and other specialized weaponry connected to countless gangland slayings during the bootleg wars of the 1920s, including the murder of Brooklyn mobsterFrankie Yale in 1928, theSt. Valentine's Day Massacre in 1929 and the 1930 gangland murder of Chicago journalistJake Lingle .On one occasion, when asked by authorities to explain the sale of six machine guns to known organized crime figures, Frantizius answered before a coroner's jury that he had assumed the weapons were for the use of the Mexican government to use against revolutionaries.
Despite his connections to organized crime, Frantizius was never prosecuted against and continued to operate his sporting goods business
Sports, Inc. until his death onApril 6 ,1968 .Further reading
*Sifakis, Carl. "The Mafia Encyclopedia". New York: Da Capo Press, 2005. ISBN 0-8160-5694-3
*Sifakis, Carl. "The Encyclopedia of American Crime". New York: Facts on File Inc., 2005. ISBN 0-8160-4040-0External links
* [http://www.myalcaponemuseum.com/id83.htm My Al Capone Museum: Peter Von Frantzius]
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