Dewey defamation

History books have exposed many of the corrupt politicians who did take bribes, such as former New York mayor Jimmy Walker. Thomas Dewey actually did prosecute Dutch Schultz, but a rigged jury found Dutch not guilty. Dewey didn't quit, however, and came after Dutch so aggressively that the gangster planned to murder Dewey. Lucky Luciano and the commission rejected the idea, for if a New York D.A. was killed, the federal government would wage all out war on the Mafia (plus as Mario Puzo wrote in the Godfather "a lot of hoodlums would be killed 'resisting arrest' and who was going to do anything about that?") Schultz stormed out of the commission meeting promising to kill Dewey with or without permission. That was the reason Dutch Schultz was killed, not because of an elaborate scheme set up by Bumpy Johnston.

Tom Dewey also pursued the boss of all bosses, Lucky Luciano and convicted him of being a pimp. Luciano was sent to prison; he was released for his assisting the U.S. government during the war, but was later deported.

There has never been a shred of evidence that Tom Dewey ever accepted bribes from gangsters, or formed any alliances with them.

A lot of speculation about why Dewey was able to survive during that era, some people felt he very selective about what mobsters he prosecuted and what ones he protected. History isn't just what you learn in history books and in wikipedia for that matter. You didn't accend to the level of power that Dewey did without having some "unholy" alliances.

Well now, that makes him sound a lot like Vic Mackey, of "The Shield." Of course there isn't any historical evidence of him doing such things. Seems like mostly Hollywood fantasy, epically involving Schultz, but at the same time my life has taught me that most successful people have their hands dirty somewhere.

But no matter what, the film did not commit defamation of character in the legal sense. Once a person has died they loose their right to sure for defamation or slander; and that does include their surviving family as well. That's also why Oliver Stone's JFK drags several probably innocent people through the mud (hello Clay Shaw) while changing the names of people who were still alive in 1991.