POV: You Are an FBI Agent During the Mafia Wars

POV: You Are an FBI Agent During the Mafia Wars For years, the man at the top of the Bureau has said the same thing in public. There is no national Mafia. Just local gangs, local crooks, a problem for city police. Then one November morning, state troopers stumble onto a meeting at a country house in upstate New York. Dozens of men in expensive suits and polished shoes run into the woods to escape. They come from cities all over the country. They're not local. And they were all at the same meeting. You're 26 years old, three months out of training, and the next morning you're assigned to a squad that officially investigates something your own agency swore didn't exist. The squad room is a borrowed corner of an office, four desks pushed together, a filing cabinet with one drawer that sticks. Your supervisor hands you a list of names and a map of the city with pins stuck in it. Each pin is a social club, a restaurant, a bar, a car lot. Learn them, he says. Learn who goes in, who comes out, who kisses who on the cheek. Nobody's going to tell you anything. You're going to have to watch until you understand it yourself.