Underworld #1

Two Brooklyn brothers thought they were too clever for the law, but after years of robberies and payroll heists, Andy and Bill Batlen's luck ran out on a brutal January day in 1941 when a bank messenger's murder sent the police closing in. Cornered and desperate, the Batlen brothers made their final, fatal mistake—one that proved there's no outrunning the electric chair.

Eddie Bendix, a young errand boy with a baby face and big ambitions, decides to prove himself by robbing his boss Tony Minelli's gambling joint—a heist that sets him on a brutal path through Chicago's underworld. As Bendix climbs the criminal ranks, he courts Maizie away from rival thief Bugs Warren and steals from him to keep up the charade of success, but his violence and recklessness soon make him the most wanted criminal in the city. With the law closing in from all sides, Bendix finds himself cornered and out of options in a shabby rooming house where his youthful face can no longer protect him.

When Billy Curtis discovers his own partner Hart stealing from their shipping company, he turns to an old neighborhood acquaintance—the ruthless Dutch Morgan, head of the criminal enterprise Killers Inc.—to solve his problem. But Curtis's attempt to hire a murder sets off a chain of betrayals and power grabs that puts the entire operation in jeopardy, leading Dutch and his crew down an increasingly desperate path. As their criminal ambitions grow, their complete lack of legitimate business knowledge becomes their fatal weakness.

Convicted crime boss Marge Morrow swears she won't serve her sentence—and she makes good on that promise, staging a daring prison escape and arming herself for the road ahead. Once free, she returns to her old ways, pulling off a series of audacious hijackings that leave Captain William Bentley and detective Tommy scrambling to catch her before she strikes again. When Tommy sets a trap using himself as bait on the very road where Marge operates, the confrontation between cop and criminal finally comes to a head.

A gang of cut-throats pulls off an armored truck heist at the Peerless Steel Company in 1939, making away with over a million dollars in a getaway that seems flawlessly executed. But when Sleepy, one of the crooks, decides his partners aren't worthy of a cut and eliminates them to keep the whole score for himself, his newfound wealth and changed priorities set off a chain of betrayals that draws the attention of both the law and someone from his past.