Leo Lanzetta was born in

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...

in 1895. Leo had five other brothers, with whom he formed the bootlegging and

drug trafficking A drug is any chemical substance that causes a change in an organism's physiology or psychology when consumed. Drugs are typically distinguished from food and substances that provide nutritional support. Consumption of drugs can be via insuffla ...

Lanzetta Brothers gang. He and his brothers were also called "the Lanzetti brothers" (due to incorrect documentation and newspaper retrieving incorrect information).

Early life

Leo Lanzetta was born in

Washington Washington commonly refers to: * Washington (state), United States * Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States ** A metonym for the federal government of the United States ** Washington metropolitan area, the metropolitan area centered on ...

District of Columbia ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

on December 22,1984 to

Italian American Italian Americans ( it, italoamericani or ''italo-americani'', ) are Americans who have full or partial Italian ancestry. The largest concentrations of Italian Americans are in the urban Northeast and industrial Midwestern metropolitan areas, ...

parents Michele and Ignatius Lanzetta. Leo had five other brothers: Ignatius, Pius, Willie, Teo, and Lucien; Leo being the oldest and Pius being the second oldest.

Prohibition

Leo formed the Lanzetta Gang with Ignatius, Pius, and their other brothers in the early 1920s. Leo, Ignatius, Pius, and their other brothers ran the gang. The brothers controlled bootlegging in Little Italy. They were allied with Italian gangsters Michael Falcone and Louis "Fats" Delrossi and their rivals included:

Polish mob Polish-American organized crime has existed in the United States throughout the 20th and 21st centuries. Although not as well known as Italian, Irish, Russian mafias, the Polish Mob has a presence in many urban Polish American communities. Prohib ...

boss Boss may refer to: Occupations * Supervisor, often referred to as boss * Air boss, more formally, air officer, the person in charge of aircraft operations on an aircraft carrier * Crime boss, the head of a criminal organization * Fire boss, a ...

William Michael Cusick,

Sicilian Mafia The Sicilian Mafia, also simply known as the Mafia and frequently referred to as Cosa nostra (, ; "our thing") by its members, is an Italian Mafia-terrorist-type organized crime syndicate and criminal society originating in the region of Sicily a ...

and Bruno crime family boss Salvatore Sabella, Jewish mob boss Max "Boo Boo" Hoff, and Italian Mafia made man and rival dope peddler and bootlegger Joseph Bruno. The Lanzetta brothers ran their gang with extreme violence and expanded into

and numbers writing.

Death

Leo and Ignatius murdered Joe Bruno on August 18, 1925, at 8th and Catherine Streets. Four days later, as Leo left a barbershop at 7th and Bainbridge Streets, an unknown assailant killed him in retaliation for the murder of Bruno. Sabella is Leo's suspected killer.

Television adaption

In the first season of the

HBO Home Box Office (HBO) is an American premium television network, which is the flagship property of namesake parent subsidiary Home Box Office, Inc., itself a unit owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. The overall Home Box Office business unit is ba ...

series ''

Boardwalk Empire ''Boardwalk Empire'' is an American period crime drama television series created by Terence Winter and broadcast on the premium cable channel HBO. The series is set chiefly in Atlantic City, New Jersey, during the Prohibition era of the 1920s and ...

'', Leo Lanzetta and his brothers are the inspiration for Nucky Thompson's main rivals the ''D'Alessio brothers''. In the series, Leo is the inspiration for ''Leo D'Alessio'', the co-leader of the D'Alessio gang. In the series, his brothers are: Ignacius, Matteo, Lucien, Sixtus, Pius, and another brother in

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...

who is a

dentist A dentist, also known as a dental surgeon, is a health care professional who specializes in dentistry (the diagnosis, prevention, management, and treatment of diseases and conditions of the mouth, oral cavity and other aspects of the craniofaci ...

; the brothers also have several more sisters. In the last episode of season one, Leo's throat is cut by Nucky's

bodyguard A bodyguard (or close protection officer/operative) is a type of security guard, government law enforcement officer, or servicemember who protects a person or a group of people — usually witnesses, high-ranking public officials or officers, w ...

James "Jimmy Irish" Darmody in November 1920.

References

{{Authority control 1890s births 1925 deaths American bootleggers Murdered American gangsters of Italian descent