Chiapetta was born in Poggioreale, Sicily. Upon his arrival in the United States, he and his brother Marco settled in Missouri where they became active in organized crime in both Kansas City and St. Louis. Chiapetta was involved in petty crime from a very early age. His earliest known arrest came in 1908 for extortion, along with future Los Angeles crime family founder and boss Vito Di Giorgio, who at the time was going by the alias of Joseph Caronia. Di Giorgio would later put out a murder contract on Chiapetta for unknown reasons, it is only known that it concerned an unresolved issue between the two of them. Sicilian mobster Nicola Gentile traveled to California to talk to Di Giorgio and have him call off the murder contract on Chiappetta. Chiapetta became a naturalized U.S. citizen in