Mob FilesPublic-domain archive of American organized crime
First page of an FBI New York memo dated September 12, 1955, headed General Investigative Intelligence File, Abner Zwillman, Top Hoodlum Coverage, with a list of his names and several redacted lines.
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FBI Vault, Abner Zwillman, Part 02: "Top Hoodlum Coverage" memoranda, 1955 to 1956

Second part of the FBI's released Zwillman file, 141 pages of New York and Newark memoranda headed "General Investigative Intelligence File, Abner Zwillman, Top Hoodlum Coverage," including the Newark office's note that his 1956 income-tax trial ended when the jury failed to agree.

Date
1955/1956
Kind
case-file
Source
FBI Records: The Vault
Retrieved
2026-10-12
Rights
Records of the Federal Bureau of Investigation released under the Freedom of Information Act. A federal work, public domain in the United States under 17 U.S.C. § 105. Redactions are as released by the FBI. The stored image is the first page of the part as the Vault viewer serves it.

The Vault viewer shows 141 pages. The stored image is page 1: a New York memorandum dated September 12, 1955, headed “General Investigative Intelligence File” and “Abner Zwillman, Top Hoodlum Coverage.” It lists his names, including “Abe Zwillman,” “Longy Zwillman,” “George Long” and “A. Spitzel,” and introduces itself as a “supplementary summary of information” since a summary dated March 31, 1955. The first items are redacted informants’ reports of his movements and meetings.

Later pages are New York and Newark memoranda through September 1956. A Newark memorandum records that early in 1956 Zwillman went to trial before Judge Reynier J. Wortendyke, Jr., in the United States District Court at Newark on charges of evading income taxes for 1947 and 1948, and that “the jury failed to agree and was dismissed February 29, 1956.” Another forwards an anonymous letter that makes accusations against named officials; this archive does not repeat them, because an anonymous letter in a file is not evidence.

The text is read from the viewer’s OCR, which is poor; only the first fourteen pages and selected later pages were read. The 1959 inquiry into whether jurors in that trial had been approached is in Part 05 and Part 06.

itemFBI Vault, Abner Zwillman, Part 01: Newark and New York files, 1935 to 1956First part of the FBI's released Zwillman file, 140 pages: 1935 memoranda on a federal judge's complaint about Newark racketeering, a June 1950 summary memorandum on Zwillman built from informants of varying reliability, and 1951 to 1956 "Top Hoodlum Coverage" memoranda. Read from a poor OCR.itemFBI Vault, Abner Zwillman, Part 03: Newark report, December 1957 to early 1958A Newark anti-racketeering report on Zwillman: his background, residences and businesses, associates he acknowledged in a 1938 interview and in 1951 testimony, and the status of his income-tax case after the 1956 hung jury. Read from a poor OCR.itemFBI Vault, Abner Zwillman, Part 04: Newark requests for technical surveillance, 1958Newark memoranda of 1958 asking FBI headquarters for a "confidential surveillance transmitter" in the car that carried Zwillman and for a microphone at a Newark beverage company, on the stated ground that his operations "are extremely circumspect."itemFBI Vault, Abner Zwillman, Part 05: microphone memoranda of January 1959 on the 1956 juryFBI memoranda of January 1959 reporting that a microphone installed in a Newark beverage company office picked up a conversation indicating that jurors in Zwillman's 1956 tax trial had been approached; the Justice Department asks the Newark office to investigate.itemFBI Vault, Abner Zwillman, Part 06: "Bribery" and "Obstruction of Justice" memoranda, 1959FBI memoranda of 1959 headed "Bribery" and "Obstruction of Justice" about the jury in Zwillman's 1956 tax trial. The first page reports that a press release on "Abner 'Longie' Zwillman, et al." was given to the wire services on February 16, 1959. Most of the OCR is unreadable.itemFBI Vault, Abner Zwillman, Part 07 (Final): a page of notes headed "U.S. v. Zwillman"The last part of the FBI's released Zwillman file is a single scanned page of notes marked "U.S. v. Zwillman," recording information given by a visitor about votes "for acquittal" and "conviction." It is undated and only partly legible.