- Became a professional boxer as a teenager, but a bad loss to featherweight world champ Tommy Paul ended his career as a pugilist when he was knocked senseless by the champ. He wound up hustling in Chicago where he fell in with Al Capone's criminal gang (The "Outfit"), thus beginning his life in organized crime before he was old enough to vote.
- Born in the Brownsville section of Brooklyn, NY, a breeding ground for Jewish gangsters.
- Harvey Keitel was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role for his portrayal of Cohen in Bugsy (1991).
- Interred at Hillside Cemetery in Culver City, CA.
- Youngest of six children.
- Dropped out of school when he was 15.
- A protege of L.A. mobster Bugsy Siegel. When Siegel was murdered in 1947, Cohen took over as rackets boss of the West Coast.
- His parents were poor Jewish emigrants from Russia who spoke little English. His father died when Cohen was just a small child, and his mother moved to Los Angeles with him to prevent him from growing up to be a gangster like many of the neighborhood boys did.
- Cy Schindell, a hulking former boxer who became an actor and spent much of his career as a villain menacing The Three Stooges, once worked for Cohen as a "debt collector" for his loan-sharking and gambling operations.
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