202 Man and Shark 



dreds of samples of blended oil under different brand names were picked 

 up throughout the Middle Atlantic states. They were all tested, and 

 many sample showed the marked squalene. The FDA spread out farther 

 . . . from the dealers to the packers ... to the shadowy leaders of the 

 racket ... to an olive oil dealer who refused to talk because, he told 

 an agent, "If I talk, I'll get splattered all over the street." 



It was a big and vicious racket. Using powerful persuasive techniques, 

 the racketeers terrorized many packers and dealers. G. S. Goldhammer, 

 director of the FDA's Division of Regulatory Management, Bureau of 

 Enforcement, estimates that the racketeers had perpetrated a nearly 

 $1,000,000 fraud before the racket was smashed. And a top-level racke- 

 teer had been caught in the shark-baited trap. He was Joseph Profaci, 

 reputedly "untouchable" crime boss. He rarely appeared in public, let 

 alone in a courtroom. But the FDA brought him in. He pleaded guilty 

 and was fined $8,000. When Profaci died of cancer in 1962, U.S. At- 

 torney General Robert F. Kennedy assessed the FDA's catch. Profaci, 

 the Attorney General said, had been "the most powerful" figure in the 

 U.S. underworld. 



