John Acropolis had grown up in an orphanage after both his parents had died by the time he was 3, according to The Herald Statesman. He was smart and athletic and went on to attend Colgate University before getting into union organizing. He was in the U.S. Navy during World War II and by the time of his murder at age 43 he was the president of the Westchester Federation of Labor and of Local 456. The catalyst that led to his murder involved the Yonkers' garbage business. In 1950, the city government decided it would no longer be responsible for picking up the trash from local businesses, which meant private contractors would be handling the lucrative work, according to the testimony from the 1957 Senate hearing.
The mob began muscling in on the trade through an entity called Westchester Carting. They began threatening other garbage companies "to get out of the business" and burned "people's trucks and equipment," Edward Doyle testified in 1947 under questioning by Robert F. Kennedy, who was chief counsel for the Senate committee in charge of investigating labor corruption. Doyle also testified that just three weeks before Acropolis' murder Joe Parisi and Bernie Adelstein of Teamsters Local 27 threatened Acropolis. Both men were associates of the New York Mafia with long criminal records, per "Contract on America: the Mafia Murder of President John F. Kennedy."
