The Company

The Company, also called the Hawaiian Syndicate, is the name given to an organized crime syndicate based in Hawaii that controlled criminal activities in the state from the late 1960s to the mid-1990s. History Through the 1960s organized crime in Hawaii was controlled primarily by local Asian criminal organizations, mainly Chinese Triads, Japanese Yakuza, Korean Kkangpae, and Samoan criminal outfits. The first change came when a local Korean named George Chung formed his own criminal organization in 1962, recruiting among local Koreans, Japanese, Chinese, Samoans, and Native Hawaiians. The smaller ethnic gangs all vied for control of organized crime, leading to disorganized clashes, over time Chung was able to create an environment where every gang could do business. In July 1967 Chung was shot to death in a Honolulu gambling den. Chung's death led to a power vacuum of organized criminal activity in the islands, with crime bosses rivaling over control. A primarily Samoan mob under the leadership of Alema Leota briefly took over. In 1969 Wilford Pulawa, a Native Hawaiian and lieutenant of Leota, decided to recruit primarily among other local criminals of Native Hawaiian heritage and form the statewide crime syndicate that would become known as The Company. Wilford "Nappy" Pulawa Under Pulawa's leadership, The Company extended a firm hold over the criminal rackets on the island, resorting to extreme violence when necessary. The organization became involved primarily in illegal gambling, prostitution in the islands' resort hotels, racketeering of local labor unions, the extortion of local legal and illegal businesses, and in the wide-scale illegal trade in Chinese white heroin. Under Pulawa the organization extorted a tribute from anyone wanting to do business in Hawaii, such as mainland mafia members, bookmakers, and gambling operators. The Company was able to exert some of its criminal control into Hawaiian communities on the mainland, mainly in Nevada and California. The syndicate made connections with figures in the American mafia, but in some other cases also had a rivalry with some of them. Rumor has it that when once two Chicago mobsters active in Las Vegas were sent to Hawaii to teach a local Hawaiian gang leader a lesson for muscling in on illegal gambling rackets in Nevada, The Company killed the two mob thugs and returned their chopped-up bodies to the mainland in the back of a trunk with a note attached: "Delicious, send more."