John Scalise

Both men remain, to this day, the prime suspects in the November 1924 murder of Dean O'Banion, boss of Chicago's North Side Gang.

During the ensuing gun battle, Chicago Police officers Harold Olsen and Charles Walsh were killed and Michael Conway severely wounded.

It was later said that when they were initially spotted by the detectives, Scalise and Anselmi were speeding south towards Chicago city limits in order to discreetly murder Mike Genna, who had allegedly been marked for death by the pair's secret employer, Al Capone.

At the pair's arraignment on March 8, 1929, their attorney Thomas Nash asked the arresting officer, Sergeant Fred Valenta, if he had "just and reasonable grounds" for believing Scalise and Anselmi committed the massacre.

In the early morning hours of May 8, 1929, the bodies of Scalise, Anselmi and Giunta were discovered on a lonely road near Hammond, Indiana.

However, this theory was discounted a few days later when informants stated that the three men were lured to a banquet with their Sicilian friends and, while trying to break up a quarrel that was being staged for their benefit, were themselves attacked and killed.

Years later, a more popular story emerged that Al Capone had discovered that Scalise, Anselmi, and Giunta were conspiring with rival mobster Joe Aiello to betray him.

During a charade concocted for their benefit, Capone staged an argument with Rio in front of Scalise and Anselmi and then slapped his bodyguard, who ran from the room.

At the climax of a dinner thrown in their honor, Capone produced a baseball bat and beat the three men nearly to death, before two or three gunmen stepped in to finish the job.