Buchalter's order for the Rosen hit had been overheard by Abe Reles, who turned state's evidence in 1940 and implicated Buchalter in four murders.

In 1940, Reles was implicated in a number of killings.

Reles ' information also implicated Harry " Pittsburgh Phil " Strauss, Mendy Weiss, Harry " Happy " Maione, Frank " The Dasher " Abbandando, and even Reles ' childhood friend Buggsy Goldstein.

Anastasia would send Cosa Nostra murder contracts to mobster Louis " Lepke " Buchalter, the boss of Murder, Inc. Capone would recruit the individual hitmen from the Reles and Maione gangs.

To protect the New York crime families from exposure, boss Frank Costello reportedly raised $ 100, 000 to bribe these guards to kill Reles.

Originally headed by Louis " Lepke " Buchalter, and later by Albert " The Mad Hatter " Anastasia, Murder, Inc. was responsible for between 400 and 1, 000 contract killings, until the group was exposed in the early 1940s by informer and group member Abe " Kid Twist " Reles.

Abe Reles ( Falk ) and Bug Workman ( Warren Finnerty ), two killers from Brooklyn's Brownsville district, meet in the Garment District to meet with Louis " Lepke " Buchalter, kingpin of an organized crime mob, who hires them as the syndicate's hit men.

In September 1931, Abbandando reportedly helped Buchalter and gang member Abe Reles eliminate The Shapiro Gang, rivals from the Lower East Side of Manhattan who were trying to take over some of the men's rackets.

After Abbandando's conviction, six other members of Murder, Inc., including Buchalter and Maione, were also convicted of murder and executed based on Reles ' testimony.

Murder Inc. consisted of two factions, The Jewish Brownsville Boys headed by Abe " Kid Twist " Reles ( who reported to Lepke Buchalter and Gurrah Shapiro ), and the Italian Ocean Hill Hooligans led by Harry " Happy " Maione who reported to Albert Anastasia.

He was cast in the supporting role of killer Abe Reles, in a film based on the real-life murder gang of that name, that had terrorized New York in the 1930s.

With Rudolph's testimony, O ' Dwyer secured first-degree murder indictments against Abe Reles, Martin Goldstein and Anthony Maffetore.

Soon after Reles agreed to cooperate, numerous first-degree murder indictments were issued in Brooklyn, ( The ) Bronx, and in upstate Sullivan County ( Catskills ).

The next day, Catalano, who drove the automobile with Rudnick's body, corroborated Reles ' account of the murder.

Goldstein's former bodyguard / driver Seymour Magoon corroborated the story, as he testified that on the night of the murder, Goldstein told him that he along with Reles and Strauss had murdered Puggy Feinstein and that shortly after the crime was committed, Goldstein and " Duke " Maffetore burned the body.

Irving " Knadles " Nitzberg, who was " imported " by the Brooklyn " Combination " from ( the ) Bronx, was put on trial for the January 9, 1939, murder of Albert (" Plug ") Shuman in Brooklyn based on the testimony of three accomplices, Abe Reles, Albert Tannenbaum and Seymour Magoon.

Reles also testified that he helped plan the murder of Shuman with Lepke, who was a fugitive at the time, and Mendy Weiss and that Lepke received approval from Albert Anastasia to use a person who lived outside Brooklyn to help with completing the assignment.

Tannenbaum and Nitzberg then exited the murder car to join Reles and another gangster in the getaway car and departed from the crime scene.

Reles had ordered Rudnick's murder because he had received information that Rudnick was a police informant.

Facing a murder charge, Reles became a government witness and began implicating his fellow gang members.

In May 1940, based on information from Reles, Abbandando was indicted for the 1937 Rudnik murder.

In jail on a pending 1933 murder charge, Reles gave in to pleas from his wife and agreed to help prosecute Capone and the rest of the organization.

In early 1941, as a result of Reles ' assistance, Capone was indicted in the Penn murder.

Reles became so adept at using the ice pick that many of his murder victims were thought to have died of cerebral hemorrhages.

Following these convictions, Reles ' next target was Albert Anastasia, who had been co-chief of operations of Murder, Inc. Reles was to implicate Anastasia on the murder of union longshoreman Pete Panto.

With the 1941 arrest of Abe Reles on murder charges, law enforcement finally dismantled Murder, Inc. Reles was a gang leader from Brownsville, Brooklyn who had been supplying Anastasia and Murder, Inc. with hitmen for the past 10 years.

Fearful of prosecution, Anastasia offered a $ 100, 000 reward for Reles ' murder.

Previously that year, the Shapiros had unsuccessfully tried to murder Reles and Goldstein.

Reles visits Joey and threatens to kill him and his dancer wife Eadie ( May Britt ) if they tell anyone about the murder.

It has never been established for sure if Reles ' death was murder, accident or suicide.

Largely headed by former mob enforcers Benjamin " Bugsy " Siegel and Meyer Lansky, it also had members from Buchalter's labor-slugging gang ( in partnership with Tommy " Three-Fingered Brown " Lucchese ) as well as from another group of enforcers from Brownsville, Brooklyn, New York, of the late 1920s led by Martin " Buggsy " Goldstein and Abe " Kid Twist " Reles, based out of an unassuming candy store known as Midnight Rose's.

Abraham Reles, the son of Austrian Jewish immigrants, was born in the Brownsville section of Brooklyn, New York on May 10, 1906.

During the Prohibition days of the 1920s, while still teenagers, Reles and friend Martin " Buggsy " Goldstein went to work for the Shapiro brothers, who ran the Brooklyn rackets.

After leaving school, Reles began hanging out at pool rooms and candy stores in and around Brownsville.

The official ruling was that Reles died trying to climb down bedsheets to the street below ; however, it was rumored that the Cosa Nostra raised $ 100, 000 to bribe Reles's guards to shove him out the window.

Falk, who played Reles again in the 1960 TV series The Witness, was nominated for a Best Supporting Actor Academy Award for his performance in the film.

After the three were indicted, O ' Dwyer learned from Special Prosecutor John Harlan Amen that Rudolph was reportedly offered a $ 5, 000 bribe by another prisoner, on behalf of the syndicate, to " put Reles and Goldstein on the street ".

Reles was next to cooperate with the District Attorney's office.

The testimony of " Kid Twist " Reles was particularly important to the prosecution, as he was a more senior gang member, and he is considered the key to the downfall of Murder, Inc ..

Abe Reles fell to his death from a room at the Half Moon Hotel in Coney Island on November 12, 1941, even though he was under police guard.

On May 15, 1940, Abe Reles testified that Rudnick was marked for death after Strauss claimed he had obtained information that Rudnick was a " stool pigeon for the police.

After Rudnick was believed to have been murdered, Abbandando called for Reles and summoned Angelo " Julie " Catalano to the garage to assist with moving the body.

Abe Reles, the chief prosecution witness, testified that Feinstein was murdered on orders of Albert Anastasia, since he supposedly " crossed " Vincent Mangano.

Reles testified that Shuman was killed since he cooperated with the authorities who were conducting an inquiry of Lepke's involvement in labor racketeering.

However, on December 10, 1941, the conviction was overturned on a 4 – 3 vote by New York's Court of Appeals, which questioned the use of testimony of non-accomplice witnesses who were promised leniency to support the testimony of Reles, Tannenbaum and Magoon.

The indictment was dismissed after the death of Abe Reles, the sole witness.

* Abe " Kid Twist " Reles – Potential witness, who was murdered before he could give evidence against other members of Murder, Inc. in the early 1940s