Bøger af Ron Chepesiuk

Now in paperback, this well researched book chronicles the rise of the gangster in Miami and the history of crime in one of America's most exciting and edgy cities. Known as the Magic City, Miami has been the home for a colorful variety of gangsters from its early days to the modern period. They include the notorious smugglers of the Prohibition era (infamous mobsters such as Al Capone and Meyer Lansky) who helped make Miami a gambling mecca, the Cuban Mafia which arrived after Cuba fell to Castro, the Colombian cartels during the cocaine explosion, the Russian Mafia after the fall of the Soviet Union, and the street gangs that plagued Miami after the advent of crack cocaine. Gangsters of Miami digs beyond the headlines and fantasy to provide a close-up look at the real role that mobsters, gamblers, hit men, con-men and other gangsters have played in developing Miami into America's most fascinating playground for international tourists. As he has done with several of his earlier works, investigative journalist Ron Chepesiuk shows that fact can be more riveting than fiction.

Henry Louis Wallace terrorized Charlotte, North Carolina, from May 1992 to March 1994. Wallace preyed on lower economic class Black women between 17 and 35 years old. He knew most of his victims, some through his job at Taco Bell, and gained their trust with his friendly demeanor and gentle nature-concealing a monster fueled by drug abuse and rage against women. A rarity in that he was an African American serial killer, his murderous rampage spurred controversy throughout the city. Community members accused local police of ignoring the murders because of the victims' race. Wallace attended the funerals of many of his victims and offered condolences to families. The ensuing investigation became the largest in North Carolina's history. Wallace was eventually found guilty and convicted of nine counts of murder, but he admitted to more killings while incarcerated; he is potentially responsible for anywhere from 20 to 90 deaths of Black women. Wallace continues to appeal and awaits his execution at Central Prison in Raleigh. BAD HENRY: The Murderous Rampage of 'The Taco Bell Strangler' by Ron Chepesiuk offers valuable insight into the psychology of serial killers and sheds light on issues surrounding race and policing.

Sergeant Smack chronicles the story of North Carolina's Leslie "Ike" Atkinson, an adventurer, gambler and one of U.S. history's most original gangsters. Under the cover of the Vietnam War and through the use of the U.S. military infrastructure, Atkinson masterminded an enterprising group of family members and former African American GIs that the DEA identified as one of history's ten top drug trafficking rings. Ike's organization moved heroin from Thailand to North Carolina and beyond. According to law enforcement sources, 1,000 pounds is a conservative estimate of the amount of heroin the ring transported annually from Bangkok, Thailand, through U.S. military bases, into the U.S. during its period of operation from 1968 to 1975. That amount translates to about $400 million worth of illegal drug sales during that period. Born in Goldsboro, North Carolina, Ike Atkinson is a charismatic former U.S. Army Master Sergeant, career drug smuggler, scam artist, card shark and doting family man whom law enforcement nick-named Sergeant Smack. He was never known to carry a gun, and today many retired law enforcement officials who had put him in jail refer to him as a "gentleman." Sergeant Smack's criminal activities sparked the creation of a special DEA unit code named CENTAC 9, which conducted an intensive three-year investigation across three continents. Sergeant Smack was elusive, but the discovery of his palm print on a kilo of heroin finally took him down. In 1987, Ike tried to revive his drug ring from Otisville Federal Penitentiary, but the Feds discovered the plot and set up a sting. The events that follow seem like the narrative for a Robert Ludlum novel. Atkinson was convicted again and nine years added to his sentence. Ike was released from prison in 2006 after serving a 31-year jail sentence. Atkinson's story is controversial because his ring has been accused of smuggling heroin to the U.S. in the coffins and/or cadavers of dead American GIs. As this book shows, the accusation is completely false. The recent movie, "American Gangster," which depicted the criminal career of Frank Lucas, distorted Atkinson's historical role in the international drug trade. Sergeant Smack exposes the lies about the Ike Atkinson-Frank Lucas relationship and documents how Ike, not Lucas, pioneered the Asian heroin connection. "Drug kingpin Ike Atkinson, is the real deal, and not the stuff of Hollywood legend. The author delivers an eminently readable book about a genuine Mr Big who knows that no fictional makeover is required for his compelling story - the truth is more than enough." -Steve Morris, Publisher, New Criminologist "Sergeant Smack is meticulously researched and its prodding for the truth by author Ron Chepesiuk makes it an excellent non-fiction crime story. Along with a compelling history of Ike Atkinson's life and criminal career in drug smuggling, the author has managed to put the truth to numerous falsehoods contained in the major movie, American Gangster, about the life of Frank Lucas." -Jack Toal, retired DEA agent who worked the investigation of Frank Lucas "Finally, the real story. I've waited 40 years for this book." -Marc Levin, Director of the documentary, "Mr. Untouchable" "Ron Chepesiuk has gone from publishing the Black gangster classics, Gangsters of Harlem and Black Gangsters of Chicago, to crafting Sergeant Smack, an astonishing masterpiece." -David "Pop" Whetstone, Owner, Black Star Music and Video "Sergeant Smack forcefully debunks the urban legend of Black family groups smuggling heroin from Southeast Asia in the bodies of dead GI soldiers while recounting the colorful saga of the authentic American gangster. Highly recommended." -Gary Taylor, journalist and author of the award-winning true crime

Since its founding in 1886, Winthrop University has stood as one of South Carolina's premiere state institutions, providing education and opportunity to generations of women and men throughout the state and across the country. Education pioneer David Bancroft Johnson had the unique vision of establishing a school for training female teachers in response to a teacher shortage in Columbia and worked earnestly to acquire the necessary funds from Peabody Education Board chairman Robert C. Winthrop, for whom the school is named. Under Johnson's guidance and care, Winthrop University moved from Columbia to Rock Hill and developed into a university with a national reputation for excellence.Containing over 200 black-and-white photographs chosen from the Dacus Library's extensive archives, Winthrop University explores the school's impressive history, from its founding in the late nineteenthcentury to the present. This volume allows readers to meet prominent faculty members throughout the college's history, stroll along the picturesque campus with its inspiring architecture and historic structures, such as Main Building, Carnegie Library, and Phelps Hall, to name but a few, view the fashionable uniforms and diverse activities of some of the college's early female students, and relive some of Winthrop's special traditions of yesteryear, like Classes Night, Rat Week, Greek Day, and Halloween Happening.

Chicago's notoriety as one of the nation's most corrupt cities is well deserved, and few locales have been the setting of as many factual and fictional crime tales. As early as 1906, illegal gambling was being spearheaded by the "Negro Gambling King of Chicago," Mushmouth Johnson. Johnson, who would become the iconic black gangster, ushered in a century long era of underground gambling halls, political bribery and election fraud that continues to this day. In this fascinating narrative history, author Ron Chepesiuk profiles the key players in the nation's largest black organized crime population and traces the murderous evolution of the gangs and rackets that define Chicago's violent underworld.

This true crime memoir is both a ';high-speed train trip through the modern cocaine trade' and a story of reform, redemption and family (Gerald Posner, and author of Pharma). Born in 1960, Jesus Ruiz Henao wanted to be rich like the drug dealers he saw as he grew up in the cocaine-producing region of Colombia's Valle of the Cauca. In 1985, he moved to the quiet London suburb of Hendon, where he and his wife held down mundane cleaning and bus driving jobs. At least to outward appearances... While keeping a low profile, Henao built a drug trafficking network reaching from Colombia to England and across Europe. It was a risky business with law enforcement on one side and ruthless competitors on the other. By the summer of 2003, he decided to get out. But then he made the one mistake that would get him caught. It cost him a seventeen-year prison sentence, with more tacked on when he tried to make one last deal from behind prison walls. Co-written by Henao with bestselling author Ron Chepesiuk, The Real Mr. Big is the story of how an ambitious Colombian immigrant became known to law enforcement as ';the Pablo Escobar of British drug trafficking.'

A historical account of Theodore "Teddy" Roe who courageously fought the Chicago Mafia aka The Outfit, for control of the lucrative Policy/Numbers racket. During the time when the mob was muscling in on the Policy/Numbers game that for decades had been a staple in the African-American Community many knuckled under the pressure. However, Roe was one who didn''t fold. He famously told mob bosses that he''d rather die first than give up control of his operation. This book details Roe''s courageous battle.

Now a summer 2023 ViX Original series based on this book by Ron Chepesiuk. Carlos Lehder is one of the most important and fascinating individuals in the history of drug trafficking and the U.S. War on Drugs. Lehder was the drug kingpin who developed the transportation system that helped flood the flood the U.S. with drugs from Latin America. This is the first biography of Lehder. Born in 1949, Carlo Lehder rose from a struggling, small time pot dealer to become a major godfather in the Medellin cartel, the crime syndicate largely responsible for initiating the cocaine epidemic plaguing American society since the late 1970s. Federal U.S. prosecutor Robert Merkle, who successfully prosecuted Lehder in 1988, said that the drug lord "was to cocaine transportation what Henry Ford was to automobiles" because he was the mastermind behind the transportation network that revolutionized the international drug trade. Lehder's genius was to devise a sophisticated transportation system that allowed the Medellin cartel to transport huge quantities of cocaine from Colombia, the source country, to the U.S., the world's major illegal drug market. By 1987, the DEA and the Colombian government had put Lehder's net wealth at more than $3 billion. A great admirer of both Nazi icon Adolph Hitler and Marxist Che Guevara, Lehder hated the U.S. and viewed cocaine as a kind of atomic bomb that could destroy Uncle Sam from within. Lehder got the nickname, "Crazy Charlie," because of his bizarre and often unpredictable behavior.

In recent years, a new wave of investigative journalists have become prominent. In their own words, a selection of investiogative journalists journalists provide insight to their jobs and the role of investigative journalism in American society.

Reflects on the seminal events that dominated the sixties and discusses the major issues and problems facing America.

Here is the whole story of the world of drugs-from the infamous Opium Wars to the legal availability of narcotics in the United States during the past century; from the unexpected boost given to illicit drugs by Prohibition to the great success of the French Connection.