Ray's Pizza Hid Heroin Headquarters

In 1959, a Little Italy mobster named Ralph "Raffie" Cuomo opened Ray's Pizza at 27 Prince Street as a front for their drug dealing. It soon became headquarters for the Lucchese crime family's Prince Street crew. The mobsters handled heroin and cash in the unfinished basement directly beneath the pizza ovens while the restaurant built a famous name upstairs. Police caught Cuomo with $25 million worth of heroin in 1969, but he returned to Ray's after prison and resumed dealing. In 2011, his heirs sold the building for $5.9 million, making its real estate almost as profitable as the drug business.

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