The Black Hand was the name for groups of extortionists who preyed upon Italian immigrants in the United States from about 1890 to 1920.
It was active in cities such as Chicago, Kansas City, New Orleans, and New York.
The Mafia, an older and more complex criminal organization, originated in Sicily in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
In some phases of its history, it provided a system of justice in a Sicily ruled by despotic regimes.