Reportedly, Frank Lucas' death occurred Thursday, May 30. Rolling Stone states that Lucas' nephew, Aldwan Lassiter, confirmed the kingpin's passing, also mentioning that he died of natural causes. He's survived by his seven kids. "I bought Harlem, I owned Harlem, I ran Harlem," Lucas noted, according to Rolling Stone. And in Frank Lucas' death, many people can attest to those words. If you remember Denzel Washington's epic portrayal of Frank in "American Gangster," you have an idea of the person Lucas was while alive.

Accordingly, long before his death, Frank moved to Harlem from North Carolina — after witnessing his cousin's murder at the alleged hands of the Ku Klux Klan.

Lucas mentioned this incident as the influential factor fueling his lifestyle change. Rolling Stone says Frank, at a later time, became protégé to then-Harlem-mob-boss Bumpy Johnson. However, after Johnson's 1968 death, Frank Lucas picked up the torch and formed his own empire. It was notoriously known as the "Golden Triangle." Lucas was able to effectively cut out the "middle-man" and directly smuggle narcotics into port — from which he coined his particular line of heroin, "Blue Magic." And of course, the "middle" entity was the mafia.

Before Frank Lucas' death, he was sentenced to 70 years

Reportedly, Frank Lucas' imports were so controversial because he'd use coffins for his smuggling endeavors from dead United States soldiers.

At the time, a lot of military personnel died due to the Vietnam War. And "coincidentally," Lucas' drugs were coming from Southeast Asia, according to TMZ. Likewise, Lucas' "dead coffin" strategy also included replicas of the soldiers' caskets. According to Rolling Stone, Frank reportedly stated: "Who the hell is gonna look in a dead soldier’s coffin?" Lucas said he had 28 government coffin replicas created for his operation.

However, they weren't like the others. In Frank's caskets, they were equipped with "false bottoms, big enough to load up with six, maybe eight kilos."

As aforementioned, Frank tacked on a hefty sentence once arrested in 1975 by DEA agents.

Lucas was sentenced to 70 years for his crimes. However, after exchanging information for his freedom — info leading to several drug-related arrests — he was released early, in 1981. But it wasn't long before Frank was back in jail. Reportedly, Lucas was involved in another drug bust three years later, and it violated his parole. So, the kingpin spent seven more years behind bars for the situation.

Net worth confusion at the time of Frank Lucas' death

At the time of arrest, prior to Lucas' death, he owned property in Chicago, Miami, Detroit, New York, New Jersey, North Carolina, and Puerto Rico, according to TMZ.

However, all of his assets were seized during and after the raids. Upon Frank Lucas' death, it's reported that he had accumulated a net worth of $52 million. However, for some reason, Investopedia notes that it's more to the tune of $30 billion, having allegedly sold $1 million in cocaine per day.

Nevertheless, this hasn't been confirmed by Frank Lucas' estate or family.
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