The Big Con (31 page)

There are some towns in the United States known as “sucker towns.” Here there is no fix, or at least no fix of which con men can avail themselves. Really first-rate con men would hardly take chances by grifting these places, but some mobs will. “There are sucker towns where a mob sneaks in and tears off a touch now and then,” comments one professional. “A mob might be in one of those sucker towns for a long time and never get made, but they are asking for it. If they get caught, of course they would try to fix their way out.” In towns like this, the con men sometimes approach the “fly cop” directly and fix him in advance, because the mark will probably beef to him if he beefs at all. Sometimes, when there is only one touch to be made, the mob does not fix at all, but takes off the score and leaves immediately; but it is dangerous to leave any loose end like that about.

Small towns which are not right are often very difficult to fix. Public officials have not grown up in a corrupt political machine and are likely to have very simple but very obdurate views on honesty and dishonesty. So if con men have to fix in such a place, they face difficulties which do not beset them in larger cities where the fix is an established institution. First, they try to get a good lawyer working on the case, and, if he cannot straighten matters out, they approach some prominent person in the town and, if they can persuade him to help, he is paid liberally for his trouble.

International con men working in Europe, Mexico and South America report that the fix abroad works much the same as it does in the United States, and, because of the highly centralized police systems, is reputed to be even more secure than it is here. I was somewhat surprised when a former international con man told me that he had fixed a representative of Scotland Yard while he had a
store in London, and freely named names and amounts paid. The fix in Europe, however, seems to apply only to non-violent crimes; it is almost impossible to fix for crimes of violence as is done almost universally in this country.

So much, then, for the fix as it applies to enforcement officers. In towns which are right for con men, they do not pay off to the officers directly, but leave the disbursement of illicit profits to the professional fixer. In towns which are not right, or where there is no professional fixer for con men, they may settle directly with individual officers, police chiefs or heads of detective departments. And in the large majority of con touches, the fix stops here, for the case is never allowed to come to trial.

If the local police, working under the fixer’s instructions, find it impossible to cool out the mark successfully, they may, as a last resort, refund part or all of his money. However, con men report that the police do not favor this mode of settlement—if there is any other way out—because they must “kick back” the money which the fixer has already distributed. Often they compromise on a settlement whereby the mark is given back a part of his loss and convinced that he is very fortunate to have regained even that much. Thus the mark is satisfied, the con men and the coppers make something from the deal, and the police get the credit for obtaining and returning part of the stolen money.

Refunding the mark’s money is sometimes done directly through the insideman without benefit of intermediary action by the police. This type of settlement is made only when the mark, sure that he has been swindled and threatening to be dangerous, returns and finds the insideman or the roper whom he accuses. If there is no
other way out, and all persuasion fails, the insideman may admit the accusation and agree to refund his share of the score (though of course he does not kick back his full share) provided the mark will not prosecute, or take any vengeful action. He explains to the mark that the rest of the money has already been divided up and the other participants have fled with their shares, so that the mark loses all hope of recovering more. Sometimes the fixer may also arrange this type of settlement.

Some con men, once the mark insists on prosecuting, offer him his money back in installments. Says the roper, “I’m sorry I swindled you because you are such a fine fellow. You can bring me to trial if you want to, but that will cost you money and you will never get any of your losses back. But if you will settle this with me personally, you will get your money back. I have spent most of your money, but I’ll make more. So I’ll have my lawyer draw up a contract which we will both sign. I’ll pay you $750 now and $200 a week from now on until we are square.” If the mark signs this contract, the con man pays him the $750 and laughs in his face, for when the victim accepts the down payment, he forfeits all right to proceed with criminal prosecution and of course he never receives any further reimbursement.

If the con man is arrested and identified by the mark, the situation is easy to handle. The fixer immediately arranges for the con man’s release on a writ or bond. The police then explain to the mark that they are going to delay this man’s trial until they catch the other members of the mob. So the mark is to go home and take up the threads of his business, for it may take some time to catch the others; however, he is assured that he will be notified so that he can identify his swindlers when they come to trial. Since, however vigorously he may wish to prosecute the case, he cannot remain indefinitely in a strange city away from his family and business, he goes home. Shortly
after this the con man is brought to trial; the case is dismissed because the prosecuting witness does not appear. If the victim becomes too dangerous at this stage, the con man may simply jump his bond and disappear.

Occasionally when the fix fails, the case goes to the grand jury where an indictment is returned. This usually means that some powerful outside forces have entered the case and must be reckoned with when the case comes to trial. Even so, the con men do not feel discouraged for they are reassured by the fact that only a small proportion of con men ever go to prison. Those cases in which conviction is obtained are prosecuted very, very hard.

As soon as the con men see that a case is likely to go to trial, they engage the best criminal lawyer available, usually one who has represented them or their friends before. Men like Erbstein and Bachrach in Chicago could be counted upon to secure acquittals in most of the cases they handled. The fees paid lawyers of this caliber are naturally very large, but the con man either has or can raise any amount of money necessary to take care of legal counsel. A roper for the Yellow Kid tells this story about him and his lawyer, Erbstein. The Yellow Kid had swindled a mark for $10,000, found the fix inadequate, was brought to trial where, through the efforts of his attorney, he was acquitted. After the trial Erbstein said, “Kid, you owe me $7,500.”

“Oh, no I don’t,” protested the Kid. “Why I fixed the jury myself and I couldn’t lose.”

“That’s what you always say,” said Erbstein, “but it was really my legal skill and experience that got you off. And my services are worth $7,500.”

“You’re taking advantage of me,” wailed the Kid. “You’re victimizing me.”

“Bosh,” retorted Erbstein, “anybody can swindle a sucker.”

Many con men, like most other professional criminals,
deposit a large sum of money with some legitimate person whom they can trust and with whom they can get in touch immediately should they be arrested. This is known as “fall money” and is used only in emergency. Some con men can get all the credit they need but most of them feel more secure if they are able to lay the cash on the line. No one knows better than they how eloquently money talks.

Some itinerant grifters, especially pickpockets, carry their fall money sewed up in their seams. Detectives know this and sometimes shake them down for a considerable amount simply because they have it on their persons. In one town in Iowa, this procedure has become an institution known to thieves as the “hurdy-gurdy.” Pickpockets report that they are run in there and their clothes literally cut to pieces for the cash they contain.

When a con man is in distress, his lawyer plays for delay, hoping for any sort of “break” which may favor his client. The prosecuting witness may become ill or die; since the victims of big-con games are very frequently elderly men, delays and continuances work materially in favor of the con men. Then, once the mark has had time to cool off, he may be more amenable to fixing than he was immediately after being swindled; the fixer or his representative may be able to persuade him that it would be better to get part of his money back than to prosecute and get nothing. Also public opinion becomes less critical with the passage of time. The continuances which a good lawyer can always get often postpone a trial long enough to undermine the endurance of the most determined prosecution.

If and when trial becomes inevitable, the con man resigns himself. Circumstances will determine whether or not he will sign a jury-waiver. If he has some assurance from the fixer that some politician can get to the judge, he may prefer not to have a jury trial. A con man would
never approach a judge directly as he might a detective or even a police chief. He must depend upon the fixer or some other intermediary to take care of that. Judges, like coppers, are known as right and wrong. A right judge can, of course, be handled, just like a right copper—but it costs more, often up in the thousands of dollars if the con man is well-known and prosperous. A wise right judge knows how to keep his accounts with the public balanced by going easy on the professional criminal and administering stiff sentences to the amateur or unprotected criminal. If he does this carefully and covers up his tracks with sufficient fireworks in court, only those who see behind the scenes suspect that his decisions have been influenced. A con man was shown a newspaper account of the recent trial of another prominent con man in the East. The con man had been acquitted and the judge had given the jury a very severe lecture for acquitting him. “That’s how you can tell when the fix is into the judge,” commented the professional.

A judge naturally cannot guarantee an out-and-out acquittal. The evidence which gets to court in a con case is always very strong and the prosecution thoroughly embattled. But, if things look too bad for the con man, the judge can always follow the standard procedure of a St. Louis judge (“the rightest judge in the U.S.A.”) who, when the con man pleaded guilty and threw himself on the mercy of the court, gave him a sentence of one year, then probated it.

“There was one judge in Hot Springs,” says an oldtimer, “who always wore a slick Prince Albert coat. He was a terror. There was a judge for you. He’d drink all night with thieves, then in the morning fine them ten dollars apiece for being drunk. Then there was Judge—in Chicago. He would turn out any thief for two dollars—one dollar for himself and one dollar for the bondsman. But there was Judge Dunn in Frisco. He was
the squarest judge in the whole United States—the dirty bastard.”

There are other dodges, like vacated court orders, which a judge may employ on occasion to save the con man from a prison sentence while at the same time he preserves his judicial integrity apparently intact. There are cases on record in which the fixed judge went easy on the accused con man, then, by way of compensation gave the mark (who had embezzled the funds with which to play the game) all that the law would allow.

Most con men who fix never come to trial by jury, but those who find themselves in court continue to pay their way. In view of the unpredictability of jury decisions, con men feel much safer if they have at least one champion in the jury-box to hang that august body in case things look dark. This champion can be bought, as a rule, much more cheaply than a judge; he is an obscure person and suffers no danger of political repercussions; and the con men have a twelve-to-one chance of buying him. A hung jury will throw the case out of court, the only recourse being a retrial. Delays and continuances will intervene even if the prosecution decides to follow up the case, and the same methods which worked on one jury are likely to work on another. So for the price of one measly juryman the con men go free.

There are several methods used in buying juries. For the professional criminal, the police, a court official, a bailiff or a clerk performs the office. And it is not uncommon, if the lawyer for the defense can get away with it, to plant a friend or someone who has previously been bought in the list of veniremen, then succeed in placing him without challenge on the jury. But the con man, in contrast to the run of professional criminals, is a super-salesman; he buys and sells people for a living; so it is not uncommon for him to buy his own jury.

Erbstein, who won most of his own cases by fixing,
affected a dislike for the Yellow Kid personally, but admired him professionally. He has been said to declare, “The Yellow is a rascal and he’ll get you if he can. If he were going to the penitentiary for life, I wouldn’t contribute a nickel to get him out. But he certainly can pick a jury.” The Yellow Kid, with his shrewd knowledge of human nature, could pick the jurymen whom he thought he could influence when they came up for examination, give his lawyer the high sign, and, once they were placed on the jury, proceed to buy them as he would a new hat. One con man says of him: “The Yellow always chose his own jury, and he’d discard the tough babies.”

The Yellow Kid is reputed to have bought juries right in the courtroom. Says one of his colleagues: “The Kid would pick out a soft guy in the jury and smile at him. If he smiled back, he’d be the guy. Then Yellow would wink at the juror and pass some money to another grifter so that the juror could see it. Then he’d wink again, and if the juror winked or nodded, the fix would be in. He has been known to stop Attorney Erbstein in the midst of an impassioned plea or a vicious cross-examination and say quietly, ‘Don’t level so hard on them, Erpy. It’s in the bag.’ And the lawyer would know that from then on he just had to go through the motions, for the Yellow had bought the jury.” Almost as notorious as the Yellow Kid for their singular ability to buy juries were Charley Gondorff and John Henry Strosnider.

Most of the time the jury is bought outside the courtroom. The con men are free on bail and one of them follows the jury when it goes out to dinner; he stalls the bailiff who has the jury in charge while another singles out a previously selected juryman and puts the fix in in the flick of an eye. Sometimes one man does the whole trick. It is also common to “tail” the jury when it goes to lunch until the right man steps into the washroom, then to speak with him there. “When a good insideman like the
Yellow Kid speaks to a juryman,” comments a professional, “that juryman is hooked.” But few con men who know how to fix properly ever come to trial.