author of The Hoffa Wars and Confessions of a Guerrilla Writer, along with eight other books
A collection of DEM's online materials about the disappearance of Jimmy Hoffa
On the disappearance of Jimmy Hoffa on July 30, 1975
Where was he killed? Who killed him? Where was his body disposed?
DEM: Facebook posts about Jimmy Hoffa since 2014
What happened to Jimmy Hoffa? (Part 1)
DEM, Fox News, "Has Jimmy Hoffa's grave finally been found?" November 21, 2019
What happened to Jimmy Hoffa? (Part 2)
DEM, The Mob Museum, "Finding Jimmy Hoffa," July 8, 2020
What happened to Jimmy Hoffa? (Part 3)
DEM, The Mob Museum, "Zeroing In On Jimmy Hoffa's Unmarked Grave," Jul 21, 2020
What happened to Jimmy Hoffa (Part 4)
DEM, Moldea.com, "Jimmy Hoffa's alleged burial site and the EPA," July 23, 2020
What happened to Jimmy Hoffa (Part 5)
DEM, Deadline Detroit, "Is this enough evidence to obtain a search warrant for Jimmy Hoffa's grave?" July 30, 2020
What happened to Jimmy Hoffa (Part 6)
DEM, The Mob Museum, "The Jimmy Hoffa Disapperance: The 46th Anniversary," July 28, 2021
Also see:
Scott Burnstein, The Mob Museum, "Following the Facts to Possible Hoffa Hit House," July 31, 2020.
DEM: Did Jimmy Hoffa, Carlos Marcello, and Santo Trafficante
arrange and execute the murder of President Kennedy?
The Hoffa Wars:
Teamsters, Rebels, Politicians and the
Mob (1978)
The Hoffa Wars, published by Paddington Press in August 1978, chronicled the rise and fall of former Teamsters general president Jimmy Hoffa. In this book, according to the Associated Press, Moldea was the first to present the case that Hoffa and two Mafia figures--Carlos Marcello of Louisiana and Santo Trafficante of Florida--were involved in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. A year after Moldea's work was published, the U.S. House Select Committee on Assassinations came to the same conclusion in its final report. In January 1992, Frank Ragano, the attorney who represented Hoffa, Marcello, and Trafficante, confessed that he was a principal in the Hoffa-Marcello-Trafficante murder plot against the president. Newsweek also credited the first reporting on this matter to Moldea, "who made the Teamsters-JFK-Ragano link in his 1978 book, The Hoffa Wars."
Moldea also revealed new details about the CIA-Mafia plots to murder Cuban premier Fidel Castro, as well as excerpts from his exclusive interviews with the men identified by the FBI as Hoffa's killers, including Salvatore Briguglio, the alleged triggerman. Further, the book explained the turbulent history of the rank and file reform movement within the Teamsters Union.
A blatant attempt to suppress Moldea's book--detailed in a June 29, 1978, New York Times article--was unsuccessful. Times literary writer Herbert Mitgang wrote, "Publishing lawyers said that the attempted delay of the Moldea book was one of the first examples of [a] possible loss of independence--with implicit censorship--where there is a conflict on a controversial nonfiction book."
Despite the controversy, The Hoffa Wars was selected by the Book-of-the-Month Club and syndicated by the New York Times. The book was published in mass market paperback by Grosset and Dunlap in September 1979 after three hardcover printings. It has also been translated into French, Italian, and Japanese. Retitled, The Hoffa Wars: The Rise and Fall of Jimmy Hoffa, the book was re-released in January 1993.
Commenting on The Hoffa Wars, the Chicago
Tribune described it as being "as extensively
researched a volume as one is likely to come across in the
field." The Wall Street Journal wrote, "Mr.
Moldea's view of [the Hoffa] wars, which reached its
greatest intensity when Robert Kennedy was Attorney
General, may explain not only Mr. Hoffa's disappearance
but the assassination of John Kennedy as well." The
Washington Post stated, "If Moldea were a
prizefighter, he would be a kind of Rocky Graziano.
He never, never quits punching. Moldea never
relents." New York magazine wrote that it
was "passionate, detailed, and coherent. . . .The
superiority of the Moldea book lies in the inherent drama
of the unfolding history." The Christian Science
Monitor called it, "well-documented, detailed, and
terrifying." The Village Voice said that the
book was "a fascinating inside history of the union, its
triumphs and corruption." The Houston Post
stated that The Hoffa Wars was "definitive and
will likely serve as the touchstone for all future
speculation and books exploring Hoffa's fate." Convoy,
the voice of the Teamsters' rank and file reform movement,
added, "Moldea provides a very valuable
contribution. He helps explain the rank and file
tradition for today's reform movements. He
understands that tradition, because he's no outsider to
it."
DEM's blog:
The Dan Moldea Investigative Journalism Collection
at George Mason University
Chapters, articles, television appearances, and kudos
DEM: Chapter One
of The Hoffa WarsDEM: The Playboy magazine excerpt of The Hoffa Wars
DEM: "My afternoon with Jimmy Hoffa's alleged killer"
DEM: The Lineup (Open Road Media, July 28, 2015): "What Really Happened to Jimmy Hoffa"
DEM on the rise & fall of Jimmy Hoffa (1978): Part One and Part Two
DEM's 1979 letter to the editor of the New York Review of Books about Hoffa and the JFK murder
The 40th anniversary of Hoffa's disappearance: DEM: What happened to Jimmy Hoffa?
July 20, 2018: Who is Vinnie Ravo?
The JFK Murder and Hoffa, Marcello, and Trafficante: Crediting The Hoffa Wars for saying it first
The Kwitny Report, "The Assassination of of JFK," November 1, 1988
DEM in the Washington Post about the movie, Hoffa: "Tales of Hoffa: Why Does Hollywood Make Thugs Into Heroes"
DEM: On Rolland McMaster and Frank Sheeran
DEM: The Lineup (Open Road Media): "What really happened to Jimmy Hoffa?"
The Hoffex Memo: Unredacted (January 27-28, 1976)
Interviews:
WDIV-Detroit interview with DEM (August 11, 2015)
Dan Moldea: First Drafts of History (March 25, 2017)
DEM on the death of Thomas Andretta (Fox News, February 3, 2019)
Additional interviews:
