CHICAGO (AP) - A mobster who spent years in the witness protection program emerged today to testify in Chicago at the trial of 5 alleged underworld figures.

Robert Siegel told jurors that -- when he set out on a life of crime in the 1950s -- mob members rarely went to prison. The 71-year-old admitted stickup man and killer says that's because "most of the police were on the payroll."

Siegel -- whose nickname on the streets of Chicago was "Bobby the Beak" -- described how one officer who rose to become Chicago's chief of detectives got about a thousand dollars every month from the mob.
Cops were on the payroll in the old days, mobster says


Siegel is testifying at the trial of 5 men charged with taking part in a racketeering conspiracy that included illegal gambling, loan sharking and 18 mob murders. They've pleaded not-guilty.

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