Full episode
179: Cicero
Act Two

The Inevitable

In the 1970s and 1980s, a wave of non-white migration into Cicero begins, this one primarily Mexican-American. The head of the political machine is named Betty Loren-Maltese, whose husband, now deceased, was convicted for mob-related activity. She responds to the newcomers with some of the intimidation tactics of the past, but also with some new ones that no town anywhere seems to have tried. (13 minutes)