Record
Hearing
1963-09-27
National Criminal Justice Reference Service, scan of the printed hearings (NCJ 119303)
Valachi's account of the June 1962 killing at the Atlanta penitentiary (testimony, September 27, 1963)
Valachi testified that he struck a man in the Atlanta penitentiary yard with an iron pipe, believing him to be someone sent to kill him, and was then shown he had hit the wrong man.
- Date
- 1963-09-27
- Kind
- hearing
- Retrieved
- 2026-10-12
- Docket
- Organized Crime and Illicit Traffic in Narcotics: Hearings before the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations of the Committee on Government Operations, United States Senate, 88th Cong., 1st sess., pursuant to S. Res. 17, 88th Cong., Part 1
- Rights
- A work of the United States Senate, printed by the Government Printing Office. Public domain in the United States. 17 U.S.C. § 105. The NCJRS cover sheet records reproduction permission as "Public Domain / U.S. Senate."
On September 27, 1963, Valachi told the subcommittee about the killing in the yard of the United States Penitentiary at Atlanta. The account is at printed pages 83 to 112 of Part 1, which are NCJRS PDF pages 88 to 117. He testified that he believed men acting for Vito Genovese meant to kill him in prison. Asked whether he thought they were under orders from Genovese, he answered: “Yes, a hundred percent, Senator.”
He testified that he saw a man he took to be “Joe Beck,” picked up a pipe from a construction site in the yard, and “I hit him on the head with a pipe” (printed page 105, NCJRS PDF page 110). He testified that the associate warden then showed him photographs, and that he had struck the wrong man. When Senator Edmund S. Muskie asked the victim’s name, counsel answered: “Joseph Saupp” (printed page 112, NCJRS PDF page 117).
Exhibit 7, a photograph of Joe Beck, and Exhibit 7A, a photograph of Joseph Saupp, were filed with the subcommittee and not printed. The federal court docket for the killing, from the National Archives, is filed separately. So is the FBI file.
