The legendary New York mobster Henry Hill who turned government informant, and whose life was the basis for the classic movie Goodfellas, died Tuesday in California. He was 69.
Philadelphia Inquirer mob writer George Anastasia wrote:
More than any other mob figure in the late 20th century, Hill changed both the perception and the reality of Mafia life in America. His story, first told in the book Wiseguy by Nicholas Pileggi, laid bare the treachery and deceit that was at the core of the underworld.
Honor and loyalty, the virtues celebrated in popular fiction like The Godfather, were not part of the life that Hill and his associates lived. Hill began cooperating in 1980 and after testifying at a number of trials, disappeared into the Witness Security Program where he and his wife lived for nearly a decade in fear of mob retribution.
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