Covering the Mob," claims TIME'S New York-based Correspondent Sandy Smith, "is as safe as covering a Sunday-school picnic." The principal reporter for this week's cover story on "The Mafia at War," towering, jovial Smith has exposed much of organized crime's invisible empire, and in the process has become one of the best-known crime reporters in the nation.

Smith has made the Mafia his beat since the early 1950s, when he covered Chicago's underworld as a pavement-pounding police reporter, first for the Chicago Tribune and then the Chicago Sun-Times. During that period he cultivated unrivaled sources on both sides of the law. Smith also became known for the unorthodox tactics he used in his dogged pursuit of the Mob, which included crashing gangland soirees. When Smith showed up uninvited at a $20,000 wedding reception for the daughter of Sam ("Mooney") Giancana, the reputed Mafia chieftain pleaded for privacy. "Look at that kid," said Giancana, pointing to his new son-in-law. "Now everybody is going to hook him up with me. No one will hire him. I'll have to give him a .45 and put him to work for me." The plea made lively reading on the front page of the next morning's Tribune.

As a crack investigative reporter for LIFE between 1967 and 1969, Smith wrote a two-part expose of the Mob that won an award from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. Since joining our staff two years ago,

he has also done stories on corruption in government and radical protest. But his main beat remains the Mafia. Says Smith: "Everyone thinks there's something very special about covering organized crime, but there really isn't. It's like any other reporter's job; you roll up your sleeves and do it." Smith was not the only expert on the story. The task of reporting was shared by New York Correspondent John Tompkins, a co-author with Criminologist Ralph Salerno of a recent book on the subject, The Crime Confederation.

For the 16 people who write, edit and research the Nation section, the story brought a change of subject but not of pace. They have turned out four cover stories in the past five weeks and eleven in the past six months. This week's cover story was written by B.J. Phillips and William Barnes. Phillips, a native Georgian, found the Mafia's "concern for violent retribution in many ways reminiscent of the Ku Klux Klan."

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