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Abe SarkisAbraham C. Sarkis (December 9, 1913 – June 5, 1991) was an American bookmaker who oversaw Boston's numbers racket for the Patriarca crime family. Early lifeSarkis was of Syrian descent.[1] He attended Everett High School, where he was a member of the school's baseball team.[2] He and his wife, Dorothy, had two children – Charles Sarkis and Dorothy Morkis.[3] In 1940, Sarkis suffered severe cuts when a plate glass window shattered during a two-alarm fire in his apartment building.[4] Criminal activitySarkis' first arrest for bookmaking came in 1935.[3] In 1944, he and nine other were arrested in Lynn, Massachusetts for betting on a licensed boxing exhibition.[5] In 1955, he was summoned to appear before the Massachusetts Crime Commission, but refused to testify.[6] By 1967, Sarkis was supervising Boston's numbers racket in partnership with Patriarca underboss Gennaro Angiulo.[1] That year, he and his brother, Charles, were arrested on gambling charges at the 411 Lounge, which was managed by Sarkis.[7] In 1968, Sarkis pleaded guilty to tax evasion and was sentenced to nine months in jail.[3] In 1977, he pleaded guilty to bookmaking and was fined $30,000 and sentenced to three years probation. As a condition of his parole, Sarkis was required to work 60 hours a week at the Walter E. Fernald Developmental Center.[3] Following his guilty plea, deputy assistant attorney general Jack Keeney described Sarkis as "one of Boston's largest and most senior gambling ring operators" during a United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary hearing.[8] The following year, Sarkis was arrested for possession of a handgun.[9] He was given a one-year suspended sentence and two additional years of probation.[10] In 1980, he was arrested for illegal use of a gaming apparatus to register bets.[11] The complaint was dismissed by Judge John A. Pino on the grounds that the prosecution was unprepared to present its case.[12] Later that year, Sarkis, Ilario "Larry Baione" Zannino, Richard Assad, and Edward Lewis were arrested for allegedly running a three-county gambling ring.[13] In 1990, Sarkis and Wonderland Greyhound Park general manager and former Massachusetts State Police head Americo Sousa were indicted for running an illegal bookmaking operation that allegedly took in $100,000 a day in bets on races at the track, which was owned by Sarkis' son.[14] Sarkis died before the case against him could be resolved.[3] Attempts on Sarkis' lifeIn 1960, two men, one dressed as priest, arrived at Sarkis' home. His wife saw that one of the men had a gun and alerted her husband, who escaped by jumping out of a second story window.[10] The hit was reportedly ordered by Zannino.[1][permanent dead link] In 1979, he was shot in the shoulder by a masked gunman who entered his home through a bedroom window.[10] References
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