Frank Gusenberg was a mobster who was involved in the (in)famous St. Valentine’s Day Massacre in Chicago. He was shot 14 times but did not die. In fact, he as the only one alive at the scene when police arrived. Among the police was Sergeant Clarence Sweeny who had grown up in the same neighborhood and immediately recognized Frank.
Sweeny (of course) asked “Who shot you?“ Gusenberg replied "No one….nobody shot me.” Gusenberg was observing the southern Italian code of silence, Omertà, which places high value on not talking to authorities or outsiders. He was taken to a hospital, where he again refused to say who shot him. Gusenberg died of his wounds about 3 hours after the massacre began.
