JIMMY COONAN
Jimmy Coonan
James Coonan was born in 1947 to a middle class family in the Irish slum of Hell's Kitchen, New York. Both of his parents were accountants. Coonan's father was extorted by Michael "Mickey" Spillane's Irish Mob, which ruled Hell's Kitchen at the time. Hiis mother who was half German had a very open affair with Spillane which destroyed Coonan's fathers reputation. Coonan also had an older brother John Jr. and Eddie. Coonan at the age of eighteen years old once fired a machine gun from the top of a Hell's Kitchen tenement, he was aiming at Mickey Spillane and a number of his top men.


Coonan at the young age of eighteen instead of trying to excel in the legitimate world, decided on a criminal career earning himself a reputation on the other side of the tracks and taking on the Spillane gang in a bid for supremacy, seeing that as a way to exact some revenge for his father. He recruited some of the most violent and ruthless members of the Hell's Kitchen younger criminal element. He was able to recruit his older brother John Coonan, Jr. along with Edward Coonan as well as Edward Sullivan an upper East Side mobster who already had two felonies on his rap sheet, William "Billie" Beattie, Richard "Mugsy" Ritter, William "the Indian" Bokun, John "Johnny" Halo, Richard "Richie" Ryan and Tommy Hess. Later to follow would be Edward "Eddie the Butcher" Cummiskey, Thomas "Tommy" Collins and the most famous member of Coonan's crew Francis "Mickey" Featherstone.

It wasn't long before Coonan became the new leader of the Hell's Kitchen criminal elite. As the Jacob Javits Center was being built Anthony "Fat Tony" Salerno, the boss of the Genovese Crime Family at that time wanted full control over the center which at the time was controlled by Spillane's Irish Mob. Salerno hired an Irish hitman from Queens Joseph "Mad Dog" Sullivan to take out three top members of Spillane's crew, Tom "the Greek" Kapatos, Tom Devaney and Edward "Eddie the Butcher" Cummiskey. Coonan did not know if the hits were leading toward him or Spillane, because at this time Coonan was becoming almost as dominant a figure as Spillane in the Westside rackets, also Cummiskey was now primarily working for Coonan and Devaney was also switching sides, so Coonan made a shrewd move and made an alliance with the Gambino Crime Family, through Roy DeMeo's crew. In 1974 Coonan became official boss as Spillane retired off to the Irish neighborhood of Woodside, Queens. Although some still believed Spillane was the boss it was widely accepted that Coonan ran the rackets and in April of 1977 when Spillane was shot to death, it was official.  The old days of Irish gangsterism were dead. It was now officially the time of the gun-toting, alcoholic, cocaine abusing new breed of thug to take the helm in Hell's Kitchen.
Working with the Gambino's the Westies were able to make some new business moves, they now kicked up ten-percent of their criminal profit to the Gambino Family boss Paul "Big Paulie" Costellano, in return the Gambino's allowed the Westies to work rackets in the Broadway district selling narcotics and extorting Broadway shows. Coonan had his alliance with the Gambino's and he had a new right-hand man Francis "Mickey" Featherstone. In the summer of 1975 Patrick "Paddy" Dugan, one of Coonan's violent gang members, murdered his best friend and fellow gang member Denis Curley,  Coonan wanted retribution. Dugan although a gang member like Curley and a "good guy" by Westside standards,  had to go. The main reason Coonan decided on this was due to Eddie "the Butcher" Cummiskey. Cummiskey was an older feared and respected Westside Gangster, everyone no matter who they were or what side they were on either respected or feared Eddie Cummiskey. Cummiskey had looked on Denis Curley as being like a kid brother, Cummiskey wanted the satisfaction of murdering Dugan himself. Coonan saw the opportunity for a new violent recruit and also gaining one of Spillane's top enforcers into the bargain so he offered Dugan up to Commiskey as a peace offering and favor. Coonan and Cummiskey not only murdered Dugan together, but Cummiskey also taught Coonan the art of body dismemberment. Coonan's niece Alberta Sachs was involved, she was  told to wash up the blood that had dripped onto the hallway floor as the body was moved from the tenement building.



Not long after this Eddie the Butcher Cummiskey would be no more. He was murdered by Genovese Crime Family Associate Joseph "the Mad Dog" Sullivan. Now it was Coonan with his right-hand man Featherstone leading the Westies but after the murder something had to be done. The next big move Coonan would make, wasn't just retaliation for Eddie Cummiskey, although it may have had a little roll to play it was not a large one at all. Charles "Ruby" Stein, a Jewish loanshark who was an associate of the Genovese Crime Family and who put Coonan to work as a driver and shylock collector had to go. Partially because Salerno had ordered the murder of Cummiskey, but why take out a hitman when they could take out a huge earner for "the cigar chompin' guinea" plus, Coonan was into Stein for close to $50,000 as well as Gambino Family Soldato Danny Grillo, a member of Roy DeMeo's crew, was in for $40,000 and other members of the Westies were into Stein for similar debts. Coonan, Richie Ryan, Billie Beattie, Danny Grillo and Francis "Mickey" Featherstone, clipped Stein. Coonan lured Stein to his club on the Westside, when Coonan arrived with Stein, Billie Beattie was pretending to be on the pay phone near the door, once the door closed, Beattie locked the door and closed the blinds, Richie Ryan was playing pin ball and Mickey Featherstone was sitting at a bar stool, Coonan sat down and then got Stein to sit, then Danny Grillo bursts out of the kitchen with a silenced pistol and pumped six shots into Stein, after the hit, Coonan, Beattie, Featherstone and Ryan would all add an additional bullet to make them all accomplices. After the hit, Coonan would teach the others how to dismember a body, like he had learned from Eddie Cummiskey.

Just about a week later, Stein's bullet riddled and chopped up torso would hit the shore in Brooklyn. Jimmy had forgotten one of the most important parts of dismemberment, slicing open all of the organs to release all of the air in the body so the body doesn't float! Now, there was a corpse, which meant that there would be an investigation, and now the Genovese Crime Family new that Stein didn't go on the lam or whatever that had thought, they knew that someone had enough balls to go against them and murder one of their loansharks. Just a few months after Stein's body floated up Jimmy Coonan was called to a sit-down with boss of the Genovese Crime Family Anthony "Fat Tony" Salerno. Coonan instructed all of his men to stay at a flat a couple of blocks away from the restaurant, in case it was a hit. Mickey Featherstone, Jackie Coonan, Jimmy McElroy, Billie Beattie, Richie Ryan and about a half dozen other Irishman known for their brutality where in a flat armed to the teeth with an arsenal that these men could probably scare the Middle East with. On Coonan's orders, if they did not hear from him within thirty-minutes, kill everything over five feet tall. But, The Westies in all reality were not the brightest guys in the world. A few, especially Jackie Coonan, were in all probability clinically "slow", if not retarded in some way, but violent none the less. At the meeting, within fifteen minutes Coonan realizes its not a hit, he asks to be excused to make a phone call, and Salerno screams "Show some fucking respect, no one interrupts a sit down to make a phone call...", for the next 15 minutes Coonan tries to end the meeting one way or another.

Back at the flat, the story goes Jackie Coonan says its time to roll, but, some say Featherstone out of confusion, but, more likely Beattie(who wasn't the toughest or most ruthless gangster on the Westside), out of a desire to confuse Jackie and the lack of a desire to murder half of the second largest Cosa Nostra family in the country, said "We're supposed to wait for the call". By the time Salerno stood up to end the meeting and he and Coonan got to the door all of Coonan's men were half way down the block wearing bullet proof vests, and gloves, holding handguns, assault rifles, shotguns, sub machine guns...suprisingly enough their were no RPG's involved. They see Jimmy and turn back realizing it wasn't a hit. The story goes Salerno began to laugh and told Coonan "I hope you never plan on starting a war with me Jimmy, 'cause I'll crush you like an ant.".

A few years down the road Jimmy and his right hand man Francis "Mickey" Featherstone would both be sent to prison. Jimmy was sent to state prison on Possession of an Unregistered Firearm charge, while Featherstone, went to federal prison on a Counterfeiting rap.

When Featherstone was released Coonan was still locked up in Upstate NY, Featherstone became a bar tender and wanted to get out of the street life, he also wanted to move into a nice house and asked Jimmy for a loan because of everything Featherstone had done for the gang. The men he had murdered, the money he had earned, the secrets he had refused to share when arrested for Counterfeiting. Coonan told his wife Edna, who surprisingly enough had been running the gang in Jimmy's absence, to tell him if he murdered three men for Coonan that he could have the loan. Now, Mickey was expecting to pay vig, not as much as normal Joe Schmo, but still vig. Now he had to kill three men and pay vig! The three men were Vincent "Vinnie" Leone, an Italian who worked for the Westies on the West Side Docks, Billie Beattie for "making advances" on Jimmy's wife, when Edna was making the moves on Billie and Mickey as well, and one another man. Featherstone turned down the deal. Billie Beattie was never killed because he was on the lam from Hell's Kitchen because he knew Jimmy wanted to see him dead. Vinnie Leone would later be killed anyway, at the hands of Kevin Kelly.


Once Jimmy was released from prison, everyone in the West Side Criminal Circles knew there was about to be a showdown. Between Coonan and Featherstone, so, men started to choose sides. Jimmy McElroy, Billy Bokun, Richie Ryan and Billie Beattie became staunch supporters of Featherstone, they wanted to see Jimmy C dead and Featherstone as the new boss of the West Side. While Bosko Rondonjich, Kevin Kelly, Kenny Shannon and Tommy Collins were staunch Coonan supporters. But, before an all out gang war broke out in Hell's Kitchen, which would undoubtedly become the most infamous and bloody Mob War in the streets of New York, unless either Coonan or Featherstone were the first one hit, to make sure it was over quick, Bokun murdered a construction worker by the name of Michael Holly.

Wait? A low ranking member named Billy Bokun murders a construction worker named Michael Holly? How does that stop an all-out Irish Mob War? Simple, Bokun murdered Holly because he believe that Holly had brought Bokun's older brother to his death, so, of course Bokun wanted pay back...but, the murder was sanctioned by Jimmy Coonan, and Jimmy Coonan told them to rent a white van just like Mickey's and to dress up a certain way. Bokun was told to dress up like this because of Bokun's large birth mark on his face, making him always have to dress up to perform his murderous deeds, but, Coonan got Bokun to dress up just like Mickey Featherstone. Just days later Featherstone was brought into Central Booking in Queens and was charged with the murder of Michael Holly.
Featherstone was later found guilty of the murder and sentenced to 25 years to life imprisonment. Just months into his imprisonment, Featherstone began to realize that he was not a valued member of the Westies any longer. His wife and four children were not being taken care of by Jimmy or any of the other gang members, and not only that, one of the witnesses to the murder was a black construction worker that was working at a site in Hell's Kitchen, if Mickey was still a valued member of the Westies, the construction worker would have slipped and fell off of the building and there would be only two witnesses at the trial instead of three, and the coincidence of a witness that works construction falling of the building he was working on may just scare one or both of the other two into not testifying.

Shortly, there after Featherstone began co-operating and so did his wife. Featherstone and his wife as well as Bobby Haggard and Billie Beattie brought about a huge Racketeering Indictment against the Westies. Jimmy Coonan, Jackie Coonan, Billy Bokun, Jimmy McElroy, Tommy Collins, John Halo, Kevin Kelly, Kenny Shannon and Edna Coonan were all indicted. Jimmy and Edna went on the run but were found within the first month and placed under arrest, Kevin Kelly and Kenny Shannon also went on the run, they would turn themselves in in 1990 and face the charges brought up against them, Kelly was able to run Hell's Kitchen after Coonan was sent to prison in 1988, until he turned himself in 1990. Featherstone's testimony, along with Bobby Huggard who was able to tell the story of Jimmy Coonan murdering William "Whitey" Whitehead, because Jimmy's brother Jackie was called a "fag" by Whitehead, Mickey's wife, and Billie Beattie, who was able to tell of murders, labor racketeering and loanshark operations, they were able to send the Westies away. Kenny Shannon agreed to a plea bargain of 20 years in 1990, he was released on parole in February of 2001, Kevin Kelly was sentenced to 40 years imprisonment in 1990, he's scheduled to be released in September of 2011, if he's released on parole, John Halo was acquitted on all charges, Jimmy McElroy was sentenced to 10 to 60 years imprisonment, he was released in November of 1993 after a little over five years in prison, Edna Coonan was sentenced to fifteen years in prison, she was released in August of 1998, Billy Bokun was sentenced to 25 years, he was released in March of 2001, Jackie Coonan died of AIDS before the trial was finished, a disease which he caught from IV Needles, because of his heroin habit, Jimmy was sentenced to 75 years, he is up for release in November of 2036, if he lives to be 89 years of age.