Sex, Drugs and Shinto: How the Yakuza’s Only Woman Found Redemption
When Mako Nishimura, the yakuza’s only female member, fell in love with a rival gangster, it would send her on a long and painful path from drug and sex trafficking, to painkiller addiction and finally a role helping ex-yakuza go straight. Her journey would mirror the downfall of ...Show more
On this week's Stash House: A fugitive Dutch cocaine kingpin dodges capture off the coast of West Africa. An Irish gang boss trades gangland warfare for electoral politics. Mexican officials accused of working for the Sinaloa Cartel surrender to U.S. authorities. A violent mafia ...Show more
When people started saying that John D. Rockefeller Jr. was responsible for the deaths of two women and 11 children near a coal mine in Colorado, he decided to do something unusual. He hired “the father of public relations.” Scott Martelle's book is Blood Passion: The Ludlow Mass ...Show more
Kathy Boudin and David Gilbert were once members of the radical activist group the Weather Underground. In 1981, they helped members of the Black Liberation Army rob a Brink’s armored car at the Nanuet National Bank. Their son, Chesa Boudin, was 14 months old at the time. He spen ...Show more
Skidmore, Missouri is a very small town. In the '70s, there was only one bar, one grocery store, and one bully. Ken McElroy was so ruthless and intimidating that even police officers looked the other way. He terrorized the town for decades, until they finally fought back. We spok ...Show more
In 1991, two police officers stopped Tupac Shakur for jaywalking. He said he was knocked unconscious during his arrest, and sued the city of Oakland for 10 million dollars. His lawyer says many of the police brutality cases he's worked on started with jaywalking stops. Peter Nort ...Show more