Black Kingpins Who Made Millions And Never Got Caught HT

 

The rule of the streets has always been simple. You either go to prison or you go to the grave. Every kingpin in history has fallen into one of those two categories. Except for the 10 people on this list. These are the kingpins who made millions, real millions, and never spent a day behind bars for it.

 Some of them walked away. Some of them vanished. Some of them retired. and some of them are still breathing right now. This is number 10 to number one. And the man at number one disappeared over 50 years ago and has never been found. Number 10, Alberta Green, Jamaica, Queens, New York. 1930s. Most people have never heard of Alberta Green.

 That’s exactly how she wanted it. In the 1930s, Green was known as the policy queen of South Jamaica, Queens. She employed between five and 10 collectors and several runners, operating a numbers bank that generated thousands of dollars a day in an era when most black families were surviving the Great Depression on pennies.

 She was arrested once in 1935. After that, she disappeared from the public record entirely. No trial, no conviction, no prison sentence. She simply faded out of the headlines and into quiet wealth. In a world where every male numbers operator in New York eventually went to prison or got killed, Alberta Green walked away clean.

 A black woman running an illegal gambling empire in the 1930s and the system never caught her. Number nine, Casper Holstein, Harlem, New York, 1920s. Casper Holstein didn’t just run the numbers racket in Harlem. He invented the modern version of the numbers game. Born in the Virgin Islands, Holstein came to New York as a teenager and figured out that if you tied the winning number to the last three digits of the New York clearing houses daily financial totals, nobody could fix the results.

 That one idea turned the numbers game from a smalltime hustle into a multi-million dollar industry. At his peak, Holstein was making $12,000 a day in the 1920s. He owned nightclubs. He funded scholarships for black students through Opportunity magazine. He donated money to build Harlem’s first Elks Lodge. He was one of the most important black philanthropists of the Harlem Renaissance.

 In 1928, white mobsters kidnapped him and held him for a $50,000 ransom. He was released after 3 days. Instead of going to war, Holstein did something nobody expected. He started pulling back. By the time Dutch Schultz came to take over Harlem’s numbers in the early 1930s, Holstein was already gone. He died in 1944, a free man.

 No prison, no murder conviction, no drug charges. The man who built the blueprint for black organized crime in America simply walked away and lived out his years in peace. Number eight, Stephanie St. Clair, Harlem, New York. 1920s to 1930s. They called her Madame Queen. She earned it. Stephanie Stlair arrived in Harlem from the French West Indies with almost nothing.

 Within a few years, she had built one of the most profitable numbers operations in the city. She employed over 50 runners. She took out ads in the Amsterdam News, Harlem’s biggest black newspaper, to publicly attack corrupt police officers by name. When Dutch Schultz tried to take over her territory, she did not fold. She hired Bumpy Johnson as her enforcer and waged a war that killed over 40 people.

 When Schultz was finally gunned down in a New York restaurant in 1935, St. Clare sent a telegram to his deathbed. The message was simple. As you sow, so shall you reap. She did 8 months in a work camp for possession of policy slips. That was it. 8 months for a woman who ran one of the largest gambling operations in Harlem for over a decade.

 She was never convicted of drug trafficking. never convicted of violence, never spent a day in a real prison. She retired in the late 1930s and moved to a mansion on Long Island. She never touched the numbers game again. She died in 1969 at approximately 72 years old. The numbers Queen beat Dutch Schultz, beat the NYPD, beat the system, and walked away clean.

Number seven, Edward Jones, Chicago Southside, 1930s to 1940s. Edward Jones built a $25 million policy gambling empire on Chicago’s Southside, making him one of the wealthiest black men in America during the 1930s and the 1940s. The Jones brothers, Edward, George, and McKisac, ran the largest policy operation in Chicago.

They employed hundreds of runners across Bronzeville and the surrounding neighborhoods. They invested their profits into legitimate businesses. They funded community organizations and they donated to the NAACP. Then the Italian mob came calling. In 1946, Sam Gianana and the Chicago Outfit kidnapped Edward Jones and demanded $250,000 and the keys to his entire policy operation.

Teddy Row negotiated the ransom on behalf of the Jones family. The money was paid, Jones was released, and then Edward Jones did the smartest thing any kingpin on this list has ever done. He took his entire family and moved to Mexico. He did not try to fight the mob. He did not try to rebuild. He took his millions and left the country.

 Edward Jones died free, never convicted, never imprisoned. He saw the ending before it came and chose a different one. His granddaughter made a documentary about his life in 2022 because even his own family did not fully know the story until decades later. Number six, Teddy Row, Chicago Southside, 1940s to 1952. After Edward Jones fled to Mexico, Teddy Row took over Chicago’s black policy racket.

 And unlike Jones, Ro refused to give an inch to the Italian mob. Sam Gianana wanted Ro’s operation. Ro said no. They tried to bomb his house and he survived. They sent men to kill him and he survived. For years, Teddy Row was the only black man in Chicago, openly defying the Italian mafia, and he lived to talk about it.

 On August 4th, 1952, Ro was ambushed outside his home. Two men with shotguns caught him getting into his car. He was killed on the spot. But here is what matters for this list. The law never got Teddy Row. He was never convicted of a crime. He was never indicted. He never spent a single day in prison.

 He died from a rival’s bullet, not from a judge’s sentence. The streets killed him. The system could not. Number five, Pee-Wee Kirkland, Harlem, New York. 1960s to 1970s. Richard Kirkland was one of the most talented basketball players to ever come out of New York City. He was recruited by two different NBA franchises and he turned them both down. The streets paid better.

By his early 20s, Kirkland was making millions in Harlem’s heroine trade while dominating the legendary Rucker Park basketball tournaments during the day. He was a folk hero, the man who could have gone pro, but chose the game instead. But Peewee did something that almost nobody in his position has ever done. He walked away.

 He transitioned out of the drug trade. He was never convicted on drug charges. He never served a prison sentence for trafficking. He became a youth basketball coach in New York City, using the same courts where he once recruited to now keep children away from the life he left behind. Peewee Kirkland is alive today. He has been free his entire adult life.

 He made millions in the most dangerous trade in America and never paid for it with a single day behind bars. Number four, Azie Faison, Harlem, New York. The 1980s, three kings ran Harlem’s crack trade in the 1980s. Rich Porter, Alpo Martinez, and Azie Faison. Their story became the 2002 movie Paid in Full, one of the most important crime films ever made.

 By 21, Azie was making over $10 million a year. He had the cars, the jewelry, the lifestyle. He was one of the biggest distributors in the entire state of New York. Then his partners started dying. Rich Porter was murdered by Alpo in January 1990. Rich’s 12-year-old brother, Donald, was kidnapped and killed. Alpo was arrested, confessed to 14 murders, and entered witness protection.

 In 2021, Alpo was shot and killed on Halloween morning in Harlem. The streets eventually collected on both of them. Azie Faison is the only one who survived. He quit the game. He produced a documentary called Game Over. He wrote a book. He became an anti-drug activist. He was never convicted of drug charges.

 He never spent a day in prison for trafficking. Two out of three kings are dead. The third one is alive, free, and telling the story. AZ Faison beat the game by being the only one smart enough to stop playing it. Number three, Red Top Walter, Harlem, New York. The 1970s. Maxine Red Top Walter was 16 years old when she became one of the biggest dealers in Harlem.

16, a girl running a multi-million dollar operation in a world run by grown men. At her peak, Red Top was moving $300,000 a month. She ran her operation from the same blocks where Nikki Barnes’s council operated. She was known for her red hair, hence the name, and for the respect she commanded from dealers twice her age.

 She was never arrested. She never spent a day in jail. The law never caught her, but the streets did. At 16, Red Top was accidentally shot and killed by one of Nikki Barnes’s bodyguards. Sammy Davis Jr. attended her funeral, $300,000 a month at 16 years old, and she died before she was old enough to vote. Red Top Walter made this list because the law never touched her.

 But the tragedy is that she never got the chance to spend what she earned. She is the cautionary tale inside the victory story. You can beat the system and still lose everything. Number two, George Edward Wright, New Jersey to Portugal, 1972 to present. In 1962, 19-year-old George Wright robbed a gas station in New Jersey and killed the attendant over $70.

 He was sentenced to 15 to 30 years. In 1970, he escaped from Bayside State Prison. He stole the warden’s car on his way out. On July 31st, 1972, Wright boarded Delta Flight 841 from Detroit to Miami, disguised as a priest under the alias Reverend Larry Burgess. He had a gun hidden inside a hollowedout Bible. He demanded $1 million in ransom.

The FBI delivered the cash. An agent walked onto the tarmac in swim trunks to prove he was not armed. Wright released the passengers, forced the crew to fly to Algeria, and disappeared. He obtained a Portuguese identity, married a Portuguese woman, and had two children. He lived in a quiet beach town near Lisbon for nearly four decades.

In 2011, the FBI found him through his sister’s phone records. He was arrested at age 68. He admitted his identity. Portugal refused to extradite him. He was a citizen. The statute of limitations had expired. He was released. George Edward Wright is alive and free today. He escaped prison. He hijacked a plane dressed as a priest with a gun in a Bible.

 He demanded $1 million. He vanished for 40 years. He got caught and the country that caught him refused to extradite him. His hijacking led to the creation of modern security at airports. Every time you take your shoes off at the airport, you can thank George Edward Wright. Number one, Frank Matthews, Brooklyn, New York. From 1973 to the present.

 On July 2nd, 1973, Frank Matthews was supposed to appear in a Brooklyn courthouse. He was facing 50 years, six counts of tax evasion and conspiracy to distribute heroin and cocaine. He never showed up. He took $20 million in cash. He took his girlfriend, Cheryl Denise Brown, and he vanished from the face of the earth.

 Matthews had been the biggest black drug trafficker in America. His operations spanned 21 states. He was earning $77 million a year in today’s money. He organized the first national summit of black dealers. He defied the Italian mafia to their faces. He paid steartesses $1,000 a month to smuggle product in their flight bags. His Brooklyn drug mills were fortified with steel walls and armed guards.

 The FBI placed a $20,000 bounty on his head, the highest since John Dillinger. They searched every country they had access to. They followed every lead. Nothing. 53 years later, Frank Matthews has never been found. No body, no sighting, no fingerprint, no confirmed contact with family.

 His girlfriend, Cheryl Brown, has never been found either. Nobody in his organization across 21 states has ever said a word. 53 years of silence. Every other kingpin in history has the same ending. Prison or a casket. Frank Matthews wrote a third option. He picked up his money. He took the one person he trusted. And he disappeared so completely that the FBI eventually stopped looking.

 That is why he’s number one. Not because he was the richest, not because he was the most violent, but because in a game where everybody gets caught, Frank Matthews is the only one who never did. And if he’s still alive, he would be 82 years old somewhere with $20 million and 53 years of silence behind him.

 The greatest disappearing act in the history of American crime.