Frank Carroll

Frank Carroll is an Associate Producer at WETA. He is a recent D.C. transplant who writes about ethnic histories, social movements, and, occasionally, the mafia.

Posts by Frank Carroll

"Dow Shalt Not Kill": The Story of the D.C. Nine

1/23/2020

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in DC by Frank Carroll

Four men are led out of a building by several police (source: Washington Area Spark)

“Nine persons broke into the Washington offices of Dow Chemical Co. at 15th and L Streets nw. yesterday, poured what they said was human blood on furniture and equipment and threw files out a fourth floor window,” read the front page of the Washington Post on Sunday, March 23, 1969. The images which accompanied the article showed a chaotic scene: one protestor heaving files out of a broken window; papers scattered, as if struck by a tornado, across the pavement below. But these were not your ordinary criminals.

“This is Serious, These Guys Will Kill You”: Salvatore Cottone and the True Story of the Short-Lived D.C. Mafia

11/5/2019

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in DC, Virginia by Frank Carroll

Bassin's Café before and after the Cottone's had it torched in 1978. (Photo credit: Library of Congress)

A mafioso walks into a restaurant in D.C. — and sets up an international crime syndicate in the FBI's backyard. Two arsons, a faked murder, and hundreds of thousands of dollars-worth of cocaine later, the FBI got their man.