Joe Masseria
The war ended with his murder on April 15, 1931, in a hit ordered by his own lieutenant, Charles "Lucky" Luciano, in an agreement with rival faction head Salvatore Maranzano.[6] Forty-eight hours later, on August 11, Valenti attended a meeting in a cafe at the corner of Second Avenue and E. 12th Street, where he was murdered as he tried to flee.[8] Masseria, the leader of a gang that emerged from the old Morello crime family, was selected to replace D'Aquila as the new capo dei capi that winter.Nicolo Schiro tried to replicate the strategy of neutrality he used to deal with D'Aquila with Masseria but he was vigorously opposed by Salvatore Maranzano and Buffalo boss Stefano Magaddino.[14] During the Castellammarese War, between 1930 and 1931, Masseria and Morello fought against a rival group, based in Brooklyn, led by Salvatore Maranzano and Joseph Bonanno.[6] One of the first victims of the war, Morello was killed along with associate Joseph Perriano on August 15, 1930, while collecting cash receipts in his East Harlem office.[15][16] Joseph Valachi, the first made man in the American Mafia to turn state's evidence, identified Morello's killer as a Castellammarese gunman he knew as "Buster from Chicago".[19] On April 15, 1931, Luciano lured Masseria to a meeting where he was murdered at a restaurant called Nuova Villa Tammaro on Coney Island.[18][20] While they played cards, Luciano allegedly excused himself to the bathroom, with the gunmen reportedly being Albert Anastasia, Vito Genovese, Joe Adonis, and Benjamin "Bugsy" Siegel;[21] Ciro "The Artichoke King" Terranova drove the getaway car, but legend has it that he was too shaken up to drive away and had to be shoved out of the driver's seat by Siegel.