PIZZA MAFIA! Hidden in plain sight. The Sicilian Mafia Smuggled $1.6 Billion in Heroin Into America.

[00:00:00]Did you know that for years Americans ordered pizza from restaurants secretly run by the Sicilian mafia? In the early 1980s, a network of ordinary pizzeras spread across the United States. New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Illinois. Families lined up for slices while something else entirely was happening in the back. The Sicilians called it the pizza connection. Heroin smuggled from overseas was being distributed through pizza shops across the country. Millions of dollars in drug money was being laundered through the same cash registers that rang up pepperoni pies. The cover was almost genius. Nobody suspects the pizza guy.

[00:00:35]The FBI noticed something was off. They wiretapped phones, followed suspects for years, photographed meetings between men who claimed to just sell food. In 1984, 22 men were indicted. The trial that followed lasted nearly 2 years, becoming the longest criminal trial in American history. 18 of those men were convicted.

[00:00:53]The whole operation hidden in plain sight behind tomato sauce and flour.