Gangland TV - Only in Your State online -
A gang that terrorised an entire city. Born in prisons and unleashed on the streets. Los Solidos, the solid ones. Their agenda: total domination by any means necessary. They fear no-one. Gangland s3e8: Blood in the Streets, History 2008
Hartford has about 120,000 residents; of those, hundreds claim Los Solidos. ibid.
Modelling themselves after the Mafia, Los Solidos also called themselves the Family. ibid.
By 1992 Los Solidos outnumbered the powerful Latin Kings, but they still had to share the same streets. ibid.
Los Solidas’ biggest money-maker though was the sale of cocaine and crack. ibid.
Back in the 1950s, New Haven was a gangster’s paradise. The city was full of mafia-run businesses, from standard mobster fare like illegal gambling and loan sharking to more wholesome businesses, like running the Easter flowers and watermelon trades (yes, those are real examples). With a little help from government officials, mobsters were unstoppable.
The mafia had a friend in Richard C Lee, elected mayor in 1953. Under his leadership, the mobsters felt free to run their very profitable ‘ice cream shop.’
Under his leadership, New Haven received more urban renewal money per capita than any other city in the nation. Because the mafia ran the city’s construction businesses, the money went to them.
When he had his license taken away, friend-to-the-mobsters political leader Arthur Barbieri wrote letters to government officials to get it restored. Annunziato’s driving was dangerous, but so were his fists. When the former boxer beat up anyone who got in his way, victims and witnesses were terrified to testify. Even when they did, juries acquitted him and judges were lenient. Everyone feared his wrath.
In the late 1950s and early 1960s, the FBI targeted organized crime. The mafia’s power in New Haven suddenly and significantly decreased. Only In Your State online article 28 August 2017