Sam Destefano was a Mob loan shark, enforcer, extortionist, hijacker, sadist and hit-man. It is said that Destefano was the worst torture murderer the Mob ever had.

Destefano grew up in southern Illinois and moved with his parents to Chicago when he was a teenager. He became a member of the '42' Gang with the likes of Sam Giancana and 'Milwaukee Phil' Alderiso. Many of the young hoodlums in the '42' Gang became top mobsters in the Chicago Mob but not Sam DeStefano. DeStefano was too unstable to warrant any kind of top position in the Mob. He did, however, have his uses.

Living in a nice far west side suburb of Chicago with his wife and three children, Sam DeStefano looked everything like the normal family man. If his neighbors only knew what horrors took place in his basement. Sam's basement was sound proofed and contained all kinds of torture tools. One of DeStefano's favorite weapons of choice was an ice-pick - a wooden handle with a six inch long steel spike at one end, much like a thin screwdriver. This would be used to soften up the victim with stabs in the throat, stomach and testicles. One of Sam's victims died during this softening up process. Artie Adler was a local restaurant owner who had been on the juice, had borrowed money, from Mad Sam. One week Adler couldn't pay and was brought to Sam's basement. Sam went to work with the ice-pick and Adler had a heart attack. The body was dumped into a sewer near North Sayre and Harlem on the far west side and there it stayed, in the frozen winter waters of the sewer until the spring thaw. The Department of Sanitation got a call in the spring about a backed up sewer and Adlers perfectly preserved corpse was discovered causing the blockage.

Not all of Sam's victims were given the ultimate discipline. One time, one of Sam's collectors tried to run off with some of the money due to Sam. He was promptly caught and brought to Mario DeStefano's restaurant in Cicero. The poor guy was stripped naked and handcuffed to a boiling radiator. Sam then phoned the man's family and invited them all to a luxurious dinner at the restaurant in the man's honor. That Saturday, the whole family turned up at Mario's place and were given a multi-course Italian dinner. The guest of honor was not there at the table but Sam assured the family that he would be there soon. Once the meal was finished, the naked and severely burned man was brought before his family and thrown at the feet of his mother. All of his family was forced to urinate on him before he was released. Sam figured that this would make a suitable example to others who thought they could steal from him.

Another murder attributed to Sam was that of Leo Forman. Forman was a Jewish mobster in Sam's employ. As well as being a real estate agent, Forman collected juice for DeStefano. One day in November 1963, DeStefano paid a visit to Forman's real estate offices and Sam started an argument. The quarrel ended with Forman throwing Sam out. Forman was later lured to the Cicero home of Sam's brother Mario by Tony Spilotro and Chuckie Crimaldi. Forman went on the false pretense that Sam wanted to kiss and make up about their earlier argument. Once in the house, Leo was coaxed into the basement where he was grabbed and tied up by Spilotro, Mario DeStefano and Crimaldi. The three of them proceeded to beat up Forman - soften him up a bit before the arrival of Mad Sam. Foreman was beaten with a hammer on his knees and beaten about the head, ribs and crotch. Sam applied his normal technique with his ice-pick stabbing Leo twenty times. He was also shot repeatedly in the buttocks and sections of flesh were cut from Leo's body. The coup de grace was finally applied by Mad Sam in the form of a gun shot to Forman's head. The body was later found in the trunk of an abandoned car. I guess it doesn't pay to argue with Mad Sam DeStefano.

Foreman's murder would come back to haunt Mad Sam in later years. In 1972, the FBI turned Chuckie Crimaldi. Tony Spilotro and the DeStefano brothers Mario and Sam were indicted for the murder of Leo Forman on the evidence given by Crimaldi. The three of them were incarcerated pending the trial which was set for May 1973. At the pre-trial, Sam DeStefano made a circus of the proceedings, acting as his own attorney. Sam began to alienate the judge and jury. Making the trial such a high profile media event was an obvious mistake. It would be very hard to influence the judge and jury with bribes or other forms of corruption if the trial was front page news. So, Mario and Spilotro devised a plan to keep Sam quiet - for good.

Mario and Tony went to Sam telling him that they had located the safe house where Chuckie Crimaldi was being held by the authorities. Sam was ecstatic. What fun he would have exacting revenge on Crimaldi the stool pigeon. Mario and Tony told Sam that the guards covering Crimaldi had been bribed to turn their backs that Saturday and the three of them could whack Chuckie there and then. It was all set. Saturday came around and Sam was out in his garage at his home. Mario came up the driveway followed closely by Tony Spilotro. As the three got to within a few feet of each other, Mario stepped aside and Spilotro pulled out a double barreled shot gun he had been hiding. Spilotro fired both barrels in quick succession, the first shot removed Mad Sam's arm and the second hit him with full force in the chest. Sam was dead before he hit the ground.

The final outcome of the trial found Mario guilty but Tony Spilotro was acquitted.