From Apalachin to the Buffalo Project: Evolution of the Strike Force Program, 1958-1967.

Ten years after the mob's Apalachin conference in upstate New York, implementation of a new strategy for prosecuting leading racketeers was undertaken by the United States Justice Department. The 'Buffalo Project' evolved in 1966 from an organizational template innovated by Attorney General Robert Kennedy. Its success introduced creation of the Strike Force program. This paper discusses historical pathways leading to the first Strike Force unit in Buffalo, New York in January 1967. It summarizes previous initiatives to concentrate intelligence and investigatory resources, reflects upon contributions of Attorneys General Nicholas Katzenbach and Ramsey Clark and Henry Petersen (Chief of the Organized Crime and Racketeering Section (OCRS)), and discusses some of the early cases prosecuted by Buffalo Strike Force chief Robert Peloquin and his staff of attorneys and investigators. This celebratory paper is based on extensive research of the Strike Force program, soon to be published in a comprehensive history, and the experiential reflections of many attorneys, investigators, and Justice Department officials who worked in the program over its 23-year run. William S. Lynch was one of those dedicated officials, serving nearly seven years as Chief of OCRS from 1969 to 1975, directing the program through years of expansion and consolidation. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]