I won’t spoil the film, which reaches its climax in the final few scenes, but the real-life Richard Kuklinski was arrested in a police sting in 1986. Once incarcerated, Kuklinski pleaded guilty to more than 100 counts of cold-blooded murder. As a result, Iceman received four consecutive life sentences.
As the final credits roll on the final leg, iceman In the film, several screen titles reveal that Kuklinski died under mysterious circumstances in 2006, just days before he was scheduled to testify against the leaders of the Gambino mob family.
Unlike many real-life gangsters, Kuklinski did not adhere to a code of silence after going to prison. In fact, most experts credit Iceman with murders he didn’t actually commit, either for some kind of twisted glory or to get his fellow killers off the hook. I tend to agree. For example, Kuklinski claimed to have killed Teamsters Union leader Jimmy Hoffa, but a wide range of investigators dismissed his story as a fabrication.
