By David Amoruso for Gangsters Inc.

Joseph Andriacchi was a prime example of how one grows from foot soldier to leader in a criminal organization. He started at the bottom as a thief and climbed his way up to the boss position thanks to a mixture of things, including a close bond to one of the Chicago Outfit’s most legendary figures.

In the 1960s Chicago’s La Cosa Nostra family, known by all as The Outfit, was at the top of its power. Andriacchi mingled with its members and associates as he started out as a criminal. He was a safecracker who got the nickname “The Sledgehammer” for how he got these safes open.

Brute force is appreciated in the violent underworld, and especially in the Outfit of those days, where many of its members had worked with or for Al Capone. Another thing they appreciate is keeping your mouth shut. When Andriacchi was busted in the late 1960s he knew the rules and quietly went to prison.

After his release, he was viewed as a standup guy, a man that could be trusted. He was on the fast track now. Leaders of the Chicago Mafia were observant and ran a tight ship. They were the sole Cosa Nostra family in the city and controlled every inch of it.

Cousin Joey the Clown

What also helped Andriacchi’s rise up the ranks was that his cousin was Joseph “Joey the Clown” Lombardo, one of the Outfit’s top hitmen and a man primed for a leadership position within the crime family.

Lombardo was kept under surveillance at all times due to being convicted of skimming Las Vegas casinos – a racket made famous by the movie Casino, directed by Martin Scorsese – in 1982. After he was released, he relied on Andriacchi to relay his messages to underlings and others Chicago gangsters. This helped cement Andriacchi’s position as one of the family’s leading figures.

By the 1990s, Andriacchi had shed his old nickname and was now called “The Builder,” due to his involvement in construction. Mobsters learned a thing from Capone’s tax case and knew that a legitimate company helped explain their income. Andriacchi showed he had evolved with the times. Brute force is nice, but without the brains it’s like hitting a steel wall with a baseball bat.

Chicago’s last mob hit

Once on top, things don’t become easy, though. As the disappearance of Chicago underboss Anthony Zizzo indicates. On August 31, 2006, he kissed his wife goodbye and left his home for a lunch with colleagues. He has not been seen since. Authorities found his empty Jeep Cherokee parked nearby a restaurant in Melrose Park two days later, but no sign of Zizzo.

Though at first it was unclear whether it was a hit or whether Zizzo simply had gone on the lam to evade possible criminal charges. At the time of his disappearance, the Chicago Outfit was under huge pressure thanks to the Family Secrets case which saw its top bosses and hitmen under indictment and two of its own testifying against them.

More recently, authorities came to the conclusion that Zizzo was most likely whacked and that the mob made his body disappear. Andriacchi was pointed at as someone who possibly was involved, though this was never proven. Nor was it clear exactly why Zizzo had to die. A serious feud with mob leader Michael Sarno about video poker machines, might’ve been a motive, but it is all guesswork.

If he was involved, Andriacchi managed to get away with it. He was never charged and went about his business. A considerably less violent business as mob experts agree that the slaying of Zizzo was the last Chicago Mafia hit.

As other leading figures went to prison or died of natural causes, Andriacchi was seen more and more as a leading influence within the family. But his age and health were an issue in the final years. He suffered from dementia and cancer, Chuck Goudie reported for ABC 7 Chicago. He passed away in his sleep, a free man, at age 91, last weekend.

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