She didn't have any Mafia connections. She had no idea that her father was connected to organized crime until after he died. She met some of her father's connected friends (almost all Jewish mobsters) when she was a kid, but she only knew them as her father's friends. Her father, by the way, was Davy Berman. She met Lansky and a good family friend was "Icepick" Willie Alderman, a former Murder Inc. killer turned Las Vegas businessman. She went to USC and studied journalism then rediscovered her roots. She was law-abiding, but became a bit paranoid. You know what they say, Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're not really coming to get you, except in her case it was a whacked-out millionaire who killed his wife.