Al Capone and The Untouchables

Al Capone and his Mafia chiefs ruled over Chicago for years through corruption and fear. If they had been allowed to continue, there was a distinct danger that the rot would have spread and spead. Drastic measures were therefore needed to defeat Capone and the Mafia. Many had tried and failed. But against all odds, ten men, who came to be known as the Untouchables, brought down the hitherto invincible Capone and his henchmen. So remarkable was this story that it has subsequently been immortalised in blockbuster movie of the same name, starring Kevin Costner, Robert De Niro and Sean Connery.

The man given this unenviable task was Eliot Ness. Ness launched an attack on Capone's stills. As his alcohol empire began to crumble, Capone became desperate. He tried to bribe Ness, and when unsuccessful, tried to bump him off by planting dynamite in his car. Eventually Ness outwitted Capone and he was found guilty of twenty one counts of tax evasion. Capone was sentenced to 11 years in jail.

The dramatised story of the Untouchables is similar to real life events. But there is one major error. The assumption throughout is that Al Capone was the main man. We reveal in this documentary, using Capone's biographer, Laurence Bergreen, that Capone was not the true boss of Chicago Mafia. He was merely a front. The real power was a group known as the Outfit. They kept a deliberately low profile – and it was they who gave Capone his orders. Their insistence on anonymity meant that while Eliot Ness was in constant pursuit of Al Capone, they were free to run the Chicago underworld.

We interview surviving Mafia bosses about the role of Capone and the Outfit to demonstrate the nature of this relationship. We hear how the Outfit rewarded the Capone family generously, in return for their silence about the identity of the real power of the Chicago underworld. Using interviews, footage and dramatic reconstruction, we will tell the remarkable story of how Ness courted Al Capone, but how ultimately it was the Mafia who had the last laugh.