[4] Dropping out of De Witt Clinton High School after two years, the 15‐year‐old Lewis enlisted in the Marine Corps, but was found out and released.

[6] As portrayed in his 1957 biographic film, The Joker Is Wild, Lewis started out as a popular crooner in a gang-owned speakeasy during the prohibition years of the 1920s.

After refusing, because he had been offered more money by a rival gang to appear at their own club, "The New Rendezvous", he was assaulted in his 10th floor Commonwealth Hotel room, on November 8, 1927, by three enforcers sent by McGurn.

[8] The enforcers, who included Sam Giancana and Leonard "Needles" Gianola, mutilated Lewis (his throat and tongue were cut) and left him for dead.

"[12] Lewis, who had been in a diabetic coma,[13] died of a heart attack in 1971, aged 69, and was buried in Cedar Park Cemetery, Emerson, New Jersey.