Frank Carroll

Frank Carroll is an Associate Producer at WETA. He's a a D.C. transplant who writes about ethnic histories, social movements, and, occasionally, the mafia.

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“Nine persons broke into the Washington offices of Dow Chemical Co. at 15th and L Streets nw. yesterday, poured what they said was human blood on furniture and equipment and threw files out a fourth floor window,” read the front page of the Washington Post on Sunday, March 23, 1969. The images which accompanied the article showed a chaotic scene: one protestor heaving files out of a broken window; papers scattered, as if struck by a tornado, across the pavement below. But these were not your ordinary criminals.

A mafioso walks into a restaurant in D.C. — and sets up an international crime syndicate in the FBI's backyard. Two arsons, a faked murder, and hundreds of thousands of dollars-worth of cocaine later, the FBI got their man.

Frank Carroll

Posts by this Author

"Dow Shalt Not Kill": The Story of the D.C. Nine

“This is Serious, These Guys Will Kill You”: Salvatore Cottone and the True Story of the Short-Lived D.C. Mafia

"DC" Really Stands for Demon Cat... Which Haunts the U.S. Capitol

From the Mixed-Up Files of the Smithsonian Museum of American History: The Heist of 1981

The "Capitalsaurus": How a Dinosaur That Never Existed Became an Official Mascot of D.C.

How the B&O Railroad Almost Gave Kensington, Maryland its Name

Encore: How the Tivoli became the Epicenter of a Debate over Urban Renewal

Mighty Yet Stubby: A Four-Legged War Hero Takes D.C. By Storm