Heirlooms from estate of Al Capone sell at auction in Sacramento for over $3 million

Heirlooms from the estate of famed gangster Al Capone sold at auction in Sacramento for more than $3 million.

Witherell’s auction house sold nearly 200 pieces from the Capone family Friday at the Sutter Club in Sacramento, with some items fetching for hundreds of thousands of dollars.

The top seller was a .45-caliber Colt pistol, Capone’s favorite gun, which garnered a winning bid of $860,000. The next-highest seller was a .38-caliber Colt pistol, which went for $200,000.

“We expected that Al Capone’s personal gun would be the top-selling item because we immediately received multiple six-figure bids when we announced the auction back in August,” Brian Witherell, co-founder of Witherell’s said in a prepared statement. “The final selling price, along with the record number of registered bidders, completely exceeded our expectations. It really speaks to the notoriety and allure of Al Capone, who is more widely known today than he was 100 years ago.”

Capone rose as a Chicago crime boss in the Prohibition era, was convicted of tax evasion in 1931 and served part of his prison sentence at Alcatraz Island. After his release in 1939, he lived a quiet life in Florida until his death in 1947.

Diane Patricia Capone, granddaughter of Al Capone and Placer County resident, said in a statement provided by Witherell’s that the pieces put up for sale reveal a personal side of the infamous figure.

“We decided that it was time to part with these family heirlooms and to reveal a very different side of Al Capone that most people would never imagine,” she said. “To us, he was Papa. He was a very loving and doting husband, father and grandfather who would run around the house playing with us as small children. He was clearly a complex man, and that’s evident if you examine the years after his imprisonment at Alcatraz.”

Some of the pieces put up to auction are what you’d expect of the infamous gangster — guns, knives, diamond crusted jewelry. But many others showcase a more private Capone — in letters, home movies and family photographs. A letter written by Capone to his only son, Sonny, while he was imprisoned, was among the top sellers. It sold for $45,000.

Other noteworthy pieces included in the auction were a platinum and diamond pocketwatch, which sold for $190,000, and a pocketknife of the same material sporting the monogram AL in diamond studs, which sold for $75,000.

Kevin Nagle, chairman and CEO of Sacramento Republic FC and a prominent local investor, took part in the bidding, and bought Capone’s cigar humidor for $120,000.

The high sale prices were a surprise to auctioneers at Witherell’s, which estimated that the lot would sell for between $400,000 and $700,000. Nearly 1,000 prospective buyers from around the world registered to place bids on Capone’s heirlooms. The auction house is still finalizing sales, but expects the total for the lot will exceed $3 million.