For years, one of New York’s most profitable criminals had no name or face, until a 100,000-dollar coat ended up marking the beginning of the downfall of Frank Lucas, one of Harlem’s most powerful kingpins in the 70s.
In 1971, Lucas arrived at a Muhammad Ali vs Joe Frazier fight wearing a luxury chinchilla coat and a style impossible to ignore. The truth is that this display of excess luxury caught the attention of the DEA, which did not even have a clear idea of who was behind the operation.
He went from being invisible to becoming a target. In time, he himself admitted it was a “massive error”. In 1975, a raid on his home in New Jersey revealed more than 584,000 dollars in cash and evidence of his criminal network. His case inspired the film American Gangster.
