February 14, 2025 • 35 mins
The St. Valentine's Day Massacre exemplifies the bloody clashes between organized crime factions during the Prohibition era, highlighting the impact such violence has on public perception and law enforcement response. This chilling act of gang warfare not only shocked a nation but also prompted significant shifts in societal attitudes towards crime, showcasing the far-reaching consequences of Prohibition and the persistent challenges that remain in combating organized crime today.
• Examination of the Prohibition era and its effects on organized crime
• Detailed recounting of the events leading up to and during the massacre
• Analysis of the public's reaction and misconceptions about gangsters
• Discussion on the aftermath and evolution of law enforcement in response
• Reflection on the cultural relevance and legacy of the massacre in today’s society
• Consideration of broader implications surrounding criminal justice and policy development
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 2 (00:39):
So imagine you're taking your loved one out, it's
Valentine's Day, you're lookingforward to going to that
speakeasy because probation'sgoing on, and lo and behold, you
find out that earlier that daythe supplier for your little
speakeasy has been shot up by arival gang.
So this week being Valentine'sDay weekend, we wanted to do a
(01:02):
special episode, which we willbe covering the St Valentine's
Day Massacre.
I'm Richard.
Speaker 3 (01:09):
I'm Heather.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
And this is Deviant Criminology.
So in 1929 Chicago it was acity gripped by gang warfare.
So there were rival factionsvying for control of the
lucrative bootlegging trade.
So Chicago is kind of known atthis time period as almost one
of the biggest hubs in the worldor a prohibition era.
Alcohol at the this time movingin all across the Midwest and
(01:33):
the beginning of the interstatesystems kind of helped this.
So the two main players in thisviolent drama were Al Capone's
South side gang, known as theChicago outfit, and the North
side gang led by George BugsMoran, both very known names at
this time If you studiedanything about Chicago
Prohibition era gangs.
These are the two big players.
(01:53):
So these groups had been lockedin a bitter struggle for
dominance since the early 1920s,with the rivalry intensifying
as Prohibition fueled the riseof organized crime.
Speaker 3 (02:04):
The implementation of Pro prohibition in 1920 created
a perfect storm for the rise ofgangsters in Chicago.
With the manufacture, sale andtransportation of alcohol banned
, the massive black marketemerged and criminal
organizations stepped in to meetthe demand.
Chicago became a major centerof bootlegging, with speakeasies
(02:26):
and illegal bars proliferatingthroughout the city.
This illicit trade providedenormous profits for gangs,
allowing them to expand theiroperations and influence.
Speaker 2 (02:38):
And this was a lot of people that were making money
in this.
Politicians, we see theKennedys kind of rose out of
Prohibition era.
A lot of the episodes we seemto do came going back to the
1920s, 30s, 40s, because thiswas like a really kind of the
big era of popularization ofcriminals.
Al Capone probably mostfamously known for being at
(03:00):
Alcatraz and being so able toskirt the laws with corruption
and everything that the FBI andIRS had to work together.
The only way they could get himwas taxes.
So Al Capone is kind of a realknown figure here.
A lot of great movies that areabout this time period, and the
incident we're talking abouttoday is kind of one that really
impacted the development of lawenforcement's aggressiveness
(03:23):
towards ending these groups ofcriminals.
Speaker 3 (03:26):
I think it was also where the anti-establishment
feelings were greatlyexaggerated, because alcohol had
been something that was legal.
And then all of a sudden,somebody comes in and says, well
, that's not legal anymore.
And like, why do you get to saythat Again?
Who are you to decide where theline is for what's moral or
immoral, or legal or illegal?
Speaker 2 (03:47):
And I think it's actually kind of an era that
helped create the glorificationof crime in the United States,
because again it did make folkheroes and the media didn't help
that of you know.
You banned and you startprohibition at the same time
that you're having this greatdepression where you know maybe
(04:07):
a couple people want to have adrink and people are seeing
these criminals rise up with allthis money because of this and
it's like you know, I, why am Inot doing what these guys are
doing?
To have money.
I'm over here working my assoff and losing my farm or I can
just go rob a bank and take my50-50 chance.
So it was very even.
Law enforcement wasn't paidwell, if paid at all, and it was
(04:30):
very easy to turn a blind eyeto like, hey, give me a little
bit of money, which we see againin this case as we move forward
.
So in 1929, chicago was abustling metropolis with a
population of approximately 3.4million people already.
But that's insane.
I grew up in Indianapolis.
We didn't even have a millionpeople in the 90s and 2000s.
So I think that even by 1929,chicago was already over 3
(04:53):
million people.
The city had experienced rapidgrowth in the 20th century, with
its population increasing byover 500,000 people between 1910
and 1920.
However, by the late 1920s thisgrowth had begun to slow.
Part of that definitely had todo with the Great Depression,
and the cost of living inChicago even at that time would
have started to be a littlerough.
(05:13):
The city was very diverse, withlarge immigrant communities
including Italians, irish andEastern Europeans, many of whom
had arrived in the previousdecades.
Little shout out to about thistime period.
A little bit before here yousaw Hull House, which was Jane
(05:36):
Addams, who's kind of like themother of social work and the
mother of another area that Istudy sports social work where
she was very big on trying touse sport and community to bring
these immigrant groups together.
So you saw people at this timetrying to provide the resources
to these immigrant groups thatwere being repressed and weren't
as well off and people tryingto keep them out of crime
through these different programsand then social outreaches.
(05:58):
So this was a time that, yes,saw the rise of prohibition, saw
the rise of criminalorganizations, but also saw kind
of a rise of the outpouring ofsocial justice and advocates in
my field of social work.
Speaker 3 (06:11):
The road to the St Valentine's Day massacre was
paved with numerous violentconfrontations between rival
gangs.
One significant event occurredin 1924, when Dean O'Banion was
the previous leader of the NorthSide Gang was murdered in his
flower shop.
This killing, believed to havebeen orchestrated by Johnny
(06:32):
Torino Torrio, al Capone'smentor, sparked a series of
retaliatory attacks.
In June 1925, johnny himselfwas ambushed and seriously
wounded, leading him to handover control of his organization
to Capone.
Under Capone's leadership, theviolence escalated.
(06:52):
The period from 1925 to 1926was known as the Beer Wars, with
133 gangsters murdered in justtwo years.
Gangsters murdered in just twoyears.
Notable incidents included anattack on capone's headquarters
at the hawthorne hotel in ciceroin september 20th 1926 and the
(07:12):
murder of imy weiss, o'bannon'ssuccessor, on october 11th of
the same year.
These events furtherintensified the hatred between
the north and south side gangsthese guys are just murdering
the shit out of each other.
Speaker 2 (07:26):
Like this was an extremely violent time in
Chicago and you know it's kindof weird like studying criminal
justice and looking at likemurder statistics and right now,
like there's a lot of if youdidn't look at the media like
you would think violent crimewas on the rise in the United
States right now and actuallyit's down like almost 16% again
this year from the pandemic time.
But Chicago, like violence, isjust kind of part of their
(07:49):
history.
So even here this is just 133gang members from these two
gangs that were killed in thattime period.
This isn't even other homicidesthat are going on in Chicago at
that time.
So this is a very bloody time,a very violent time.
But the difference is, up untilthis point, 1926, going into
1927, a lot of these are smallattacks.
(08:10):
There are one or two peoplekilled here, a retaliatory
shooting here and as we see,this continues to escalate up
until Valentine's Day, 1929.
So the St Valentine's Daymassacre itself took place on
the morning of February 14th1929.
Obviously there wasn't a lot oflove in the air between these
two, so it's odd that they chosethis day.
(08:32):
But the setting was at a garageat 2122 North Clark Street
which served as a liquorwarehouse for the Moran Gang.
Capone's men, allegedlyincluding machine gun Jack
McGurn, had carefully plannedthe attack.
A lot of people in like the1920s, the 1940s, involved in
(08:52):
organized crime or bankrobberies and stuff, had machine
gun as their name oddly Like Iguess the Tommy gun had really
taken over at this point, butyou had machine gun Kelly.
Now you've got machine gun JackMcGurn.
The Italians especially, like Ihave Italian heritage on my
mother's side and stuff, andwe're just not really good at
nicknames Like Fat Tony isreally like the smallest guy in
the group and the smallest guyslike Slim Joe.
(09:14):
It's just really not good atthese nomenclatures or acronyms
that we give people.
So two of the hitmen weredressed as police officers,
likely to ease any suspicionfrom their targets.
Speaker 3 (09:27):
Around 1030 am, seven men associated with the
Northside gang were inside thegarage.
They included five of Moran'smen brothers Frank and Peter
Gusenberg, albert Eschlelik, akaJames Clark, and Adam Heyer and
Albert Weinschenk.
Also present were ReinhardSchwimmer, who was an
(09:50):
optometrist who frequented gangcircles not an association you
would necessarily think of andJohn May, a mechanic who was
working on one of the gang'svehicles.
Speaker 2 (10:01):
There seems to be a thing with, like gang members or
criminal elements havingassociates with really bad like
medical, because doc holiday wasa dentist, I believe.
I think so yeah, and then thisguy is an optometrist hanging
out like I really just want tofit in with some group because
the medical people don't take meseriously, the gangs don't take
(10:24):
me seriously, so I'm just goingto hang out at this corner
bootlegging place.
I just want to feel like I'mpart of something.
So this was a bad day for himthey might also had good pay.
I mean, if you need to getstitched up and you can't go to
the hospital well, but at thesame time again now that I'm
thinking about this this is justputting this together alcohol
was legal if it was used as amedical like, if it was
(10:47):
prescription, that's true so, asan automacist, I wonder if he
was able to prescribe so, if hewas actually maybe even funding
or a distributor for booze atthat time.
Now I want to look more intothat.
So, um, yeah, this guy could beinteresting, but that's not
today's topic.
So the attackers entered thegarage pretending to be
(11:08):
conducting a police raid, whichvery well orchestrated.
That's actually very geniusapproach, really hard to get
away with now.
But at the time it was easy tobuy police uniforms.
They probably just paid acouple officers off or went in
and took them.
This was a very bad time for lawenforcement in chic, as we've
talked about in other episodes.
Law enforcement at this timewasn't what we think of it now.
(11:29):
It wasn't until 1933 in theKansas City organized crime
shootings that killed a coupleof federal agents, that you see
this rise of organizing lawenforcement with stronger
trainings and stuff here.
It's just very easy to pay offa couple cops, give them some
uniforms.
So they ordered the seven mento line up against the wall.
Then, using two Thompsonmachine guns and two shotguns,
(11:52):
they opened fire, firing theirvictims with bullets.
The attack was brutal andthorough.
They continued to fire evenafter all seven men had fallen,
shooting to their corpses asthey laid on the ground, and
then two shotgun blasts wereused to obliterate the faces of
May and Clark.
So again, this is definitelypersonal.
I don't know what man Clark haddone specifically to piss them
(12:14):
off, but they were definitely umtwo main targets.
Speaker 3 (12:17):
Uh, just by the excessive damage it was it made
somebody mad enough to shootthem in the face.
Speaker 2 (12:23):
Yeah, that was definitely sending a message to
other people.
Um, because even at this time,like you usually didn't want to,
just because there was some aslike moral, of like respect for
the dead respect for the deadand respect like the families,
like let them have a funeral.
So shooting the face was justan extra like punch to the gut.
Speaker 3 (12:45):
In the immediate aftermath, the killers exited
the garage with the men who werein the civilian clothes,
pretending to be under thecustody of the men who were
dressed as officers.
The only survivor inside wasFrank Gusenberg, who, despite
having 14 bullet wounds, managedto survive for three hours but
refused to identify the killersbefore he died.
Speaker 2 (13:06):
Which kind of makes sense again this time, like if
he would have talked, they wouldhave gone after his family, and
he knew that.
So, and he probably did knowhis killers.
Speaker 3 (13:14):
If he was going to reveal it to anybody, it would
have been to his fellow gangmembers.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
Yes, definitely not to law enforcement, because,
again, the law enforcement thatshowed up may have been on the
payroll.
So you don't you're just givinginformation and then they just
go rat you out.
Um, it was just such a volatiletime in chicago.
Uh, this massacre sentshockwaves through chicago and
the entire nation.
Uh, it drama, dramatized theintense rivalry for the control
(13:40):
of the illegal liquor trade andbecame a symbol of violence of
prohibition eras.
The brutality of the illegalliquor trade and became a symbol
of violence of prohibition eras, the brutality of the killings
shocked the public and began toturn opinions against or
romanticize images of gangstersthat had prevailed in some
quarters.
So you're talking about goingfrom, like I said, like these
one or two hits, like, oh, we'llgo pop off one or two guys, to
(14:00):
this very well orchestratedbroad daylight gunning down way
overkill.
Like said uh, frank had 14bullet wounds, they're shooting
people in the face just so theycan't be identified like.
There's obviously suchbrutality and escalation that
this is when you start seeing,as I just said, the turn against
(14:21):
gangsters like they wereromanticized in these books.
We see this again time aftertime with bonnie and claude and
all these others that even intothe 1960s and 70s like they were
making movies, kind of makingthem these folk heroes, but it
was incidents like this thatwere starting to turn people
like no, they're not folk heroes, they're just killers and
murderers.
Speaker 3 (14:43):
And just like with Mad Dog, where that child was
hit by a stray bullet and killed, I think that this type of
escalation made people start toworry.
Well, how is this going toimpact the rest of us?
Are one of us going to getcaught in the crossfire?
Speaker 2 (14:57):
Yeah, and this kind of and we're going to talk about
it in a second as well butreally is what got the FBI
focusing on Al Caponespecifically?
The FBI focusing on Al Caponespecifically because this
incident A showed the power hehad and the connections he had
and the links he was willing togo to, but showed that he was
probably the most powerful inthe time in Chicago.
So they really focused on goingafter him.
Speaker 3 (15:20):
In the aftermath, police initially focused their
attention on Detroit's PurpleGang, based on eyewitness
accounts from landladies who hadrented rooms to suspicious men
just before the massacre.
However, this lead ultimatelywent nowhere.
The case remained unsolved forfour months until a breakthrough
came in December of 1929, whenFred Killer Burke was identified
(15:43):
as a suspect in the murder of apolice officer in Michigan.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
When police raided Burke's home, they found two
Thompson machine guns that werelater linked to the massacre and
I would really like to know howthey linked them to the
massacre, because I don't reallythink ballistics were at the
height of anything at that time,but I mean, maybe they were.
But to me that just seems likeoh, we have two Tommy guns, how
do you know those are the rightones?
(16:08):
But despite this evidence, noone was ever successfully
prosecuted for the StValentine's Day massacre.
Al Capone widely believed tohave ordered the hit and again,
this makes sense because thesetwo gangs have been going at it
for almost 10 years now.
He had the most to gang from it, but he was in Florida at the
time of the killings and had asolid alibi, which of course
(16:28):
he's the.
He's the head of the, the gang.
He's not going to do everythinghe can to not be associated
with such a massive massacre.
Uh, jack mcgurn, another primesuspect, was arrested but later
released due to lack of evidence.
And there's kind of depictionsof this in different gang movies
and stuff.
Um, I think probably theuntouchables is the most
(16:48):
well-known.
That depicts Al Capone and thebattle that Al Capone had with
the FBI as they were reallystarting to close in on him.
Speaker 3 (17:07):
States.
It marked a turning point inpublic attitudes towards
gangsters, where they once hadbeen seen as some exciting or
glamorous figures.
The brutality of the killingshocked the nation and began to
erode any remaining publicsympathy for the organization.
The event also spurred lawenforcement to take more
aggressive action againstorganized crime.
Federal authorities, includingthe Bureau of Prohibition and
the Bureau of Investigation,which was the predecessor to the
(17:30):
FBI, intensified their effortsto bring down major crime
figures.
The increased pressure wouldeventually contribute to
Capone's downfall, as he wasconvicted of tax evasion in 1931
.
Speaker 2 (17:43):
And this is kind of what the FBI originally was Like
.
The original head of the Bureauof Investigations was a tax
person Hoover I believe it wasHoover when he was brought over
actually came from like thelibraries section.
Like these weren't lawenforcement people, these were
actually people more trained todo taxes and investigate
(18:04):
financial issues.
So even at this time in 1931,when they talk about the Bureau
of Investigations like doingthese things, these were unarmed
, untrained law enforcementofficers.
They were really trying to usethe laws more civil side and
these financials and they werelike going after criminal
activity.
So it's very interesting toread it and look at this and
(18:27):
they're talking about like theBureau and the Bureau of
Prohibition was the ones thatbrought them down.
But the FBI and even thedepictions in some movies show
the FBI is like armed guystaking that.
That was not who they were atthis point.
They were just kind of likepencil pushers.
Speaker 3 (18:40):
Well, it kind of makes sense as far as the pencil
pusher aspect of it and goingafter the tax evasion side of it
.
You know, when you have thishuge crime and the guy's alive
with 14 bullet wounds andrefuses to identify who did it,
how are you going to make a caseon that?
You can't.
And on the flip side of it,well, al Capone has all this
money.
He never reported any of histaxes.
(19:01):
It obviously came fromsomewhere.
That's an easy case to make,because now, all of a sudden you
have all this money and youdidn't declare it on any tax
form anywhere.
You know as a pencil pusher.
Well, it's all numbers.
Numbers are easy to show, toshow improve.
Speaker 2 (19:14):
No, and I think another like takeaway for me
from this is you've, if I hadbeen shot 14 times, I would want
justice Like you've, got threehours to think about this.
He was conscious.
I would want justice Likeyou've got three hours to think
about this.
He was conscious.
He feared the gangs evenknowing he was going to die more
than he trusted law enforcementto get justice.
And I think that even there waskind of a turning point in
(19:37):
America and that was a smallexample of why At the time,
people just didn't trust thegovernment.
They were more fearful of thegangs than they were thinking
that law enforcement and thegovernment was going to do
anything to protect them.
And I think there's still a lotof cynicism like that that
exists today.
But that's just a small exampleof a much wider problem at the
time, which is why you wereseeing big figures like bank
(20:01):
robbers and gangsters beromanticized, because there was
a lot of this no trust that thegovernment, law enforcement,
everybody was going to be thereto protect you.
Speaker 3 (20:09):
And I think, like you said, it even goes to today.
And you see that, because ifyou have somebody who turns on a
gang or you know, as they say,turn states evidence and is
going to testify againstsomebody, how do you protect
that person?
Typically, long term, thatmeans something like witness
protection, which means you giveup everything.
Speaker 2 (20:26):
You give up your friends, your family, your life
and move someplace else andstart over, and it's not a fun
experience people that went intowitness protection in the 70s,
(20:48):
80s and 90s because they turnedstate evidence against these
organized crime organizationsthat are now just like leaving
witness protection, writingbooks and kind of like just
being left alone because overtime they kind of became folk
heroes in their own route aboutbeing willing to turn coat and
turn state's evidence and thensomehow come out and not be
targeted.
I can't there's so manyexamples but I'm so focused on
(21:09):
like this concept I can't thinkof their names right off the bat
, but it is kind of interestingif I can read those stories now
that those people have come out.
And, um, the guy from thegoodfellas is based on I can't
remember his name, but he's oneof them like went into witness
protection and then just whenthey came out and just started
telling the truth, uh, and gaveup witness protection because he
was like you know what, I'mgonna get killed.
(21:29):
I'm gonna get killed, but mightas well try to make some money
off of it if I can.
So yeah, but back at this timethis guy would rather die than
tell the police because he justdidn't see that it was going to
be beneficial to him.
That's.
That says a lot about the timeframe.
So the saint valentine's daymassacre remains one of the most
famous events in americancriminal history.
It has been the subjects ofnumerous books, films and
(21:51):
documentaries, cementing itsplace in popular culture.
The garage where the killingstook place became a macabre
tourist attraction until itsdemolition in 1967, which
surprises me that theydemolished it, because dark
tourism I guess maybe in the 60sand 70ies wasn't as popular as
it is now.
But I today that would becomelike a historical landmark.
(22:12):
Nobody would let that go.
Dark tourism is just such athing now where people like to
go to these old murder houses,old murder scenes and stuff A
little odd to me, but at thesame time just somebody that
investigates this stuff.
I enjoy going for theinvestigative side, like looking
at the scene trying to get abetter understanding of it, not
like, oh, I want to stand wherethis person stood, creeps me out
(22:34):
.
Speaker 3 (22:35):
And I think there's also a big difference between
when you're actually at anactive crime scene versus being
someplace where somethinghappened happened.
It's, at least in my opinion,not very fun when you're
actually at an active crimescene, seeing what has happened,
(22:56):
versus a historical context ofsomething happened here 50 years
ago that my grandparents talkedabout and now I actually get to
see what this place looked likewhen they were describing it.
Speaker 2 (23:03):
It's really interesting because I've have
been to both.
But when you go to like theones that like Lizzie Borden's
house and stuff and they stillare original, like with over 150
years ago, like the originalfurniture and stuff in years,
it's like there's so many thingsabout this that are creepy to
me, like to me there's not asense of like, oh ah, it's more
of like.
This is like sadness and justtrying to understand what
(23:24):
happened.
Yeah, being on a real crimescene, I think people, the
gawkers, think it's cool to comeand kind of see what's going on
.
A don't fucking do that, you'regetting in the way in law
enforcement, you're making itharder on them to do their jobs.
But on the flip side, whenyou're there, it's not like a
glamorous situation.
It's not like this fun,exciting.
It's usually a lot of standingaround waiting for crime techs
to do their job and everythingelse.
(23:46):
So even back then, like thiscrime scene would have been a
nightmare to try and process.
Try and process where thingsand they weren't doing nearly
the level we are today.
But this just became like atorch point for things and in
the decades since, the massacrescontinued to fascinate the
public and historians alike.
(24:18):
It serves as a stark reminder ofthe violence and corruption
that characterized theProhibition era and the dangers
of associating with organizedcrime and allowing them to gain
a foothold in society, kind oflike finding strongholds and
Chicago is notorious for this ofhaving these like pockets that
are so heavily gang affiliatedand held down that law
enforcement just can't get inthere.
But it's just a battle that wefought kind of since then.
Before that there were littlegangs, but not on this scale
(24:40):
with this much control.
The events also highlighted thechallenges by law enforcement
in combating well-organized andwell-funded criminal enterprises
.
We still see that Even when wetalk about 50, 60 years later.
When the federal government wastrying to go after organized
crime in New York and Chicago,they couldn't do it.
When you look at the peoplethat have been prosecuted,
(25:00):
besides Gotti, they never gotahead of any of these families.
They never really got high up,so it's always low-level people,
because these are sowell-funded, so well-connected,
so well-organized that you'renot even today, we're still not
able to infiltrate them like wewant.
Speaker 3 (25:16):
And you have to look at consequences too.
If I turn state's evidence,what happens to me?
What's going to happen to me ifI don't?
You're going to put me inprison and my family's just fine
, and I keep my mouth shut andmaybe I do my time.
Maybe I get out, maybe I don't,but if I do die in prison, it's
either going to be from naturalcauses or something that
happens pretty quickly you knowbefore the guards can show up
(25:39):
and stop something.
Speaker 2 (25:40):
Exactly, um, and I I think it's interesting because
I'm designing courses onorganized crime and stuff but
just the reach that theseorganizations had Like the
Chicago organizations wereconnected to the Philly ones, to
the New York ones andeventually out to the Vegas ones
(26:03):
.
These were national andinternational organizations that
had far reach.
As a local law enforcement,especially in the 1920s, 1930s,
you didn't have connections withthe department in the city next
to you, let alone how organized.
It was so easy to commit acrime in Chicago and quickly get
out of there and nobody wouldever be able to catch you.
(26:24):
So when they were talking aboutlinking those guns in Detroit,
part of me is like like even nowit would be hard, even with our
technology sometimes it's hardto land You're linking them a
hundred years ago.
It's just impossible.
And just to think the reachthat they had then and how easy
it was to get away with stufflike this.
And yet they we sit here andlike how did they not catch
(26:46):
people that did this?
Think about the connections andhow far that these gangs went.
Speaker 3 (26:51):
The resources.
Yeah, so that legacy of the StValentine's Day massacre extends
beyond its immediate impact onthe gang's warfare in Chicago.
It played a significant role inshaping public perception of
organized crime and contributedto the eventual repeal of
Prohibition in 1933.
Yay for all of us.
Speaker 2 (27:25):
The nature of the killings helped to galvanize
public opinion against thelawlessness that had flourished
under prohibition, ultimatelyleading to a reassessment of the
policy that you can't havesomething, especially something
that you had, and then you'vetaken it away.
It's like giving a small childan iPad, letting them play for a
while and then taking it fromthem and saying you can't have
it.
They've gotten so much pleasureand enjoyment from it.
(27:46):
It's become part of their lives.
They're going to throw a fit InProhibition.
We kind of saw that.
But you also gave rise tocriminal elements.
We saw even an example when Iwas in the military.
You would have chewing tobaccoNot illegal in the United States
.
You could buy it on base andeverything else, but you
couldn't have it on our ship.
So when we deployed, suddenly ablack market developed because
(28:09):
you couldn't buy it on the ship.
We're out to sea for months, sopeople would have their loved
ones send logs of chewingtobacco and people would sell
them for $25, for a 10.
The back of the states was liketwo, three dollars at the time
at the most.
You've created an enterprisewhen you tell people they can't
have something.
And one of the odd things to meis we didn't learn from
prohibition when it comes todrugs, but like even marijuana.
(28:32):
Now, for 100 years there's beenthis dark black market for
marijuana sales and a lot ofviolence has spawned from it
because you've outlawedsomething instead of regulating
it and we continue this cycleand, in a way, prohibition
created all these gangs.
They wouldn't have had thepower if it would all just been
(28:55):
legal.
And there were so manyjurisdictions across the U?
S and law enforcement that wereso small and embraced
speakeasies and bootleggersbecause it was safer for them.
We saw that in St PaulMinnesota.
It was easier for them toembrace it and almost became
safe havens than to try and bustit Cause you risk getting
(29:15):
killed.
So I think it says a lot abouthow, in a way, governments and
too much overreach andlegislation and regulation in
certain areas can cause moreharm than good.
Same thing you see with humansex trafficking now, like if you
allow sex workers to do theirjob openly and not have to fear
(29:38):
getting arrested or anythingelse, would you see almost a
decrease in human sextrafficking?
Because I can just, people canjust go do it.
It's not I have to seek it outand to try and get around laws
or get around getting busted bygoing to the streets.
Now I can use these sextraffickers to find somebody in
a more dark, secretive way.
Speaker 3 (30:00):
Less risk.
Speaker 2 (30:01):
Yes.
Speaker 3 (30:01):
If I have less risk and I can go buy it legally, why
would I not do that?
Yes, so then you take thatprofit margin out of the illegal
behavior.
Speaker 2 (30:12):
Exactly, and then what's the reason to put
yourself out there?
What's the reason to putyourself out there?
So, in the realm of criminaljustice, the massacre
underscored the need for moresophisticated and coordinated
law enforcement efforts tocombat organized crime.
It spurred the development ofnew investigative techniques and
led to increased cooperationbetween local, state and federal
law enforcement agencies.
That's something we see withwhen we we talked about bank
(30:34):
robbers at the time.
Like you committed a crime inIndianapolis and you just shot
right over to Cincinnati, therewas no conversation.
There was no talking.
And even later on, after the1930s, 40s, up until 2025, there
wasn't always good cooperationbetween local, state and federal
.
Like there was stepping on eachother's toes.
Who was in control?
So this is since the dawn ofmodern law enforcement has still
(30:58):
been an issue with thatjurisdiction.
But even then, the creation ofthe fbi's crime laboratories in
1932 was in part of response tothe challenges posed by
investigating complex,high-profile crimes like the
saint valentine's day massacre,like trying to find ways of
fingerprinting, like we've nowfingerprinting for a while.
But the creation of fbi crimelaboratory allowed for more
(31:19):
storing and large scale analysisof fingerprints.
So if you did have a crime inchicago, you could see those
fingerprints to um I think itwas quantico at the time.
I may be wrong.
You could send it to this fbilab and they had an index of all
these different fingerprintsand they could go through and
try and find it.
If you've ever seen pictures ofthat, it's insane.
This was a massive room withthousands, of hundreds of
(31:43):
cabinets of fingerprints on fileand they would go through and
have to look through each one totry.
It's amazing, but this wassomething that came right out of
that, because we've got tostart having better,
scientific-based ways of linkingpeople.
Speaker 3 (31:57):
And even sharing information, like we have NCIC
now, which they didn't have backthen.
Speaker 2 (32:02):
No, and God, we trust everybody else.
We run through NCIC.
Speaker 3 (32:06):
The event also had a lasting impact on Chicago's
reputation and identity.
While the city had already beenassociated with gangster
activity, the massacre cementedits image as the epicenter of
organized crime in America.
This reputation, while notalways welcome, had become an
indelible part of Chicago'shistory and continues to attract
interest from tourists andhistory buffs alike.
Speaker 2 (32:29):
And I think like one of the interesting things about
this is like we don't know thevictims here.
We obviously know the peoplethat gunned them down, but there
was also like it was two gangslike.
So I think it's interesting atthat time that so much attention
was given this when it was veryeasy to say, well, it was just
two gangs killing each other,why do we care it?
It really did have this impact.
So I think it also started toshow more humanized that even
(32:54):
though you're a criminal, you'restill a human being and you
didn't deserve to be murdered.
But as we celebrate thisValentine's Day weekend, I think
it's important to also kind ofremember the St Valentine's Day
massacre as a pivotal moment inthe history of organized crime
in America.
It marks the bloody climax ofChicago's gang wars and shock to
the nation's conscience andultimately contributed to
(33:16):
significant changes in lawenforcement and public policy
and would be what kind of ledthe steps to the formation of
the modern FBI, cemented againin that Kansas City shootout.
But nearly a century later itremains a powerful symbol of the
violence and excess of theprohibition era, serving as a
cautionary tale about theconsequences of allowing
(33:38):
organized crime to flourishunchecked.
And I do think it's odd that westill romanticize this era,
because even now, like there'sjoking like the roaring 2020s
now, where people are throwinglike prohibition era parties now
and you see a lot of places Igo to a couple every time I go
to different cities that are oldspeakeasies and that's kind of
(33:59):
their claim to fame like, andpeople like, oh, we've got to go
to that because we still havethis kind of romanticized view
of that time period when really,in the end, it was just a bunch
of criminals killing criminalsand a lot of innocent people
caught in the crossfire so happyvalentine's day happy
valentine's day.
we love you.
I want to thank you all so muchfor listening to our little
(34:21):
podcast.
This is created with.
So happy Valentine's Day.
Happy Valentine's Day, we loveyou.
I want to thank you all so muchfor listening to our little
podcast.
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(34:41):
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(35:02):
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So again, thank you for takingthe time to listen and have a
good week.
Thank you.
So imagine you're taking your loved one out, it's
Valentine's Day, you're lookingforward to going to that
speakeasy because probation'sgoing on, and lo and behold, you
find out that earlier that daythe supplier for your little
speakeasy has been shot up by arival gang.
So this week being Valentine'sDay weekend, we wanted to do a
(01:02):
special episode, which we willbe covering the St Valentine's
Day Massacre.
I'm Richard.
Speaker 3 (01:09):
I'm Heather.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
And this is Deviant Criminology.
So in 1929 Chicago it was acity gripped by gang warfare.
So there were rival factionsvying for control of the
lucrative bootlegging trade.
So Chicago is kind of known atthis time period as almost one
of the biggest hubs in the worldor a prohibition era.
Alcohol at the this time movingin all across the Midwest and
(01:33):
the beginning of the interstatesystems kind of helped this.
So the two main players in thisviolent drama were Al Capone's
South side gang, known as theChicago outfit, and the North
side gang led by George BugsMoran, both very known names at
this time If you studiedanything about Chicago
Prohibition era gangs.
These are the two big players.
(01:53):
So these groups had been lockedin a bitter struggle for
dominance since the early 1920s,with the rivalry intensifying
as Prohibition fueled the riseof organized crime.
Speaker 3 (02:04):
The implementation of Pro prohibition in 1920 created
a perfect storm for the rise ofgangsters in Chicago.
With the manufacture, sale andtransportation of alcohol banned
, the massive black marketemerged and criminal
organizations stepped in to meetthe demand.
Chicago became a major centerof bootlegging, with speakeasies
(02:26):
and illegal bars proliferatingthroughout the city.
This illicit trade providedenormous profits for gangs,
allowing them to expand theiroperations and influence.
Speaker 2 (02:38):
And this was a lot of people that were making money
in this.
Politicians, we see theKennedys kind of rose out of
Prohibition era.
A lot of the episodes we seemto do came going back to the
1920s, 30s, 40s, because thiswas like a really kind of the
big era of popularization ofcriminals.
Al Capone probably mostfamously known for being at
(03:00):
Alcatraz and being so able toskirt the laws with corruption
and everything that the FBI andIRS had to work together.
The only way they could get himwas taxes.
So Al Capone is kind of a realknown figure here.
A lot of great movies that areabout this time period, and the
incident we're talking abouttoday is kind of one that really
impacted the development of lawenforcement's aggressiveness
(03:23):
towards ending these groups ofcriminals.
Speaker 3 (03:26):
I think it was also where the anti-establishment
feelings were greatlyexaggerated, because alcohol had
been something that was legal.
And then all of a sudden,somebody comes in and says, well
, that's not legal anymore.
And like, why do you get to saythat Again?
Who are you to decide where theline is for what's moral or
immoral, or legal or illegal?
Speaker 2 (03:47):
And I think it's actually kind of an era that
helped create the glorificationof crime in the United States,
because again it did make folkheroes and the media didn't help
that of you know.
You banned and you startprohibition at the same time
that you're having this greatdepression where you know maybe
(04:07):
a couple people want to have adrink and people are seeing
these criminals rise up with allthis money because of this and
it's like you know, I, why am Inot doing what these guys are
doing?
To have money.
I'm over here working my assoff and losing my farm or I can
just go rob a bank and take my50-50 chance.
So it was very even.
Law enforcement wasn't paidwell, if paid at all, and it was
(04:30):
very easy to turn a blind eyeto like, hey, give me a little
bit of money, which we see againin this case as we move forward
.
So in 1929, chicago was abustling metropolis with a
population of approximately 3.4million people already.
But that's insane.
I grew up in Indianapolis.
We didn't even have a millionpeople in the 90s and 2000s.
So I think that even by 1929,chicago was already over 3
(04:53):
million people.
The city had experienced rapidgrowth in the 20th century, with
its population increasing byover 500,000 people between 1910
and 1920.
However, by the late 1920s thisgrowth had begun to slow.
Part of that definitely had todo with the Great Depression,
and the cost of living inChicago even at that time would
have started to be a littlerough.
(05:13):
The city was very diverse, withlarge immigrant communities
including Italians, irish andEastern Europeans, many of whom
had arrived in the previousdecades.
Little shout out to about thistime period.
A little bit before here yousaw Hull House, which was Jane
(05:36):
Addams, who's kind of like themother of social work and the
mother of another area that Istudy sports social work where
she was very big on trying touse sport and community to bring
these immigrant groups together.
So you saw people at this timetrying to provide the resources
to these immigrant groups thatwere being repressed and weren't
as well off and people tryingto keep them out of crime
through these different programsand then social outreaches.
(05:58):
So this was a time that, yes,saw the rise of prohibition, saw
the rise of criminalorganizations, but also saw kind
of a rise of the outpouring ofsocial justice and advocates in
my field of social work.
Speaker 3 (06:11):
The road to the St Valentine's Day massacre was
paved with numerous violentconfrontations between rival
gangs.
One significant event occurredin 1924, when Dean O'Banion was
the previous leader of the NorthSide Gang was murdered in his
flower shop.
This killing, believed to havebeen orchestrated by Johnny
(06:32):
Torino Torrio, al Capone'smentor, sparked a series of
retaliatory attacks.
In June 1925, johnny himselfwas ambushed and seriously
wounded, leading him to handover control of his organization
to Capone.
Under Capone's leadership, theviolence escalated.
(06:52):
The period from 1925 to 1926was known as the Beer Wars, with
133 gangsters murdered in justtwo years.
Gangsters murdered in just twoyears.
Notable incidents included anattack on capone's headquarters
at the hawthorne hotel in ciceroin september 20th 1926 and the
(07:12):
murder of imy weiss, o'bannon'ssuccessor, on october 11th of
the same year.
These events furtherintensified the hatred between
the north and south side gangsthese guys are just murdering
the shit out of each other.
Speaker 2 (07:26):
Like this was an extremely violent time in
Chicago and you know it's kindof weird like studying criminal
justice and looking at likemurder statistics and right now,
like there's a lot of if youdidn't look at the media like
you would think violent crimewas on the rise in the United
States right now and actuallyit's down like almost 16% again
this year from the pandemic time.
But Chicago, like violence, isjust kind of part of their
(07:49):
history.
So even here this is just 133gang members from these two
gangs that were killed in thattime period.
This isn't even other homicidesthat are going on in Chicago at
that time.
So this is a very bloody time,a very violent time.
But the difference is, up untilthis point, 1926, going into
1927, a lot of these are smallattacks.
(08:10):
There are one or two peoplekilled here, a retaliatory
shooting here and as we see,this continues to escalate up
until Valentine's Day, 1929.
So the St Valentine's Daymassacre itself took place on
the morning of February 14th1929.
Obviously there wasn't a lot oflove in the air between these
two, so it's odd that they chosethis day.
(08:32):
But the setting was at a garageat 2122 North Clark Street
which served as a liquorwarehouse for the Moran Gang.
Capone's men, allegedlyincluding machine gun Jack
McGurn, had carefully plannedthe attack.
A lot of people in like the1920s, the 1940s, involved in
(08:52):
organized crime or bankrobberies and stuff, had machine
gun as their name oddly Like Iguess the Tommy gun had really
taken over at this point, butyou had machine gun Kelly.
Now you've got machine gun JackMcGurn.
The Italians especially, like Ihave Italian heritage on my
mother's side and stuff, andwe're just not really good at
nicknames Like Fat Tony isreally like the smallest guy in
the group and the smallest guyslike Slim Joe.
(09:14):
It's just really not good atthese nomenclatures or acronyms
that we give people.
So two of the hitmen weredressed as police officers,
likely to ease any suspicionfrom their targets.
Speaker 3 (09:27):
Around 1030 am, seven men associated with the
Northside gang were inside thegarage.
They included five of Moran'smen brothers Frank and Peter
Gusenberg, albert Eschlelik, akaJames Clark, and Adam Heyer and
Albert Weinschenk.
Also present were ReinhardSchwimmer, who was an
(09:50):
optometrist who frequented gangcircles not an association you
would necessarily think of andJohn May, a mechanic who was
working on one of the gang'svehicles.
Speaker 2 (10:01):
There seems to be a thing with, like gang members or
criminal elements havingassociates with really bad like
medical, because doc holiday wasa dentist, I believe.
I think so yeah, and then thisguy is an optometrist hanging
out like I really just want tofit in with some group because
the medical people don't take meseriously, the gangs don't take
(10:24):
me seriously, so I'm just goingto hang out at this corner
bootlegging place.
I just want to feel like I'mpart of something.
So this was a bad day for himthey might also had good pay.
I mean, if you need to getstitched up and you can't go to
the hospital well, but at thesame time again now that I'm
thinking about this this is justputting this together alcohol
was legal if it was used as amedical like, if it was
(10:47):
prescription, that's true so, asan automacist, I wonder if he
was able to prescribe so, if hewas actually maybe even funding
or a distributor for booze atthat time.
Now I want to look more intothat.
So, um, yeah, this guy could beinteresting, but that's not
today's topic.
So the attackers entered thegarage pretending to be
(11:08):
conducting a police raid, whichvery well orchestrated.
That's actually very geniusapproach, really hard to get
away with now.
But at the time it was easy tobuy police uniforms.
They probably just paid acouple officers off or went in
and took them.
This was a very bad time for lawenforcement in chic, as we've
talked about in other episodes.
Law enforcement at this timewasn't what we think of it now.
(11:29):
It wasn't until 1933 in theKansas City organized crime
shootings that killed a coupleof federal agents, that you see
this rise of organizing lawenforcement with stronger
trainings and stuff here.
It's just very easy to pay offa couple cops, give them some
uniforms.
So they ordered the seven mento line up against the wall.
Then, using two Thompsonmachine guns and two shotguns,
(11:52):
they opened fire, firing theirvictims with bullets.
The attack was brutal andthorough.
They continued to fire evenafter all seven men had fallen,
shooting to their corpses asthey laid on the ground, and
then two shotgun blasts wereused to obliterate the faces of
May and Clark.
So again, this is definitelypersonal.
I don't know what man Clark haddone specifically to piss them
(12:14):
off, but they were definitely umtwo main targets.
Speaker 3 (12:17):
Uh, just by the excessive damage it was it made
somebody mad enough to shootthem in the face.
Speaker 2 (12:23):
Yeah, that was definitely sending a message to
other people.
Um, because even at this time,like you usually didn't want to,
just because there was some aslike moral, of like respect for
the dead respect for the deadand respect like the families,
like let them have a funeral.
So shooting the face was justan extra like punch to the gut.
Speaker 3 (12:45):
In the immediate aftermath, the killers exited
the garage with the men who werein the civilian clothes,
pretending to be under thecustody of the men who were
dressed as officers.
The only survivor inside wasFrank Gusenberg, who, despite
having 14 bullet wounds, managedto survive for three hours but
refused to identify the killersbefore he died.
Speaker 2 (13:06):
Which kind of makes sense again this time, like if
he would have talked, they wouldhave gone after his family, and
he knew that.
So, and he probably did knowhis killers.
Speaker 3 (13:14):
If he was going to reveal it to anybody, it would
have been to his fellow gangmembers.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
Yes, definitely not to law enforcement, because,
again, the law enforcement thatshowed up may have been on the
payroll.
So you don't you're just givinginformation and then they just
go rat you out.
Um, it was just such a volatiletime in chicago.
Uh, this massacre sentshockwaves through chicago and
the entire nation.
Uh, it drama, dramatized theintense rivalry for the control
(13:40):
of the illegal liquor trade andbecame a symbol of violence of
prohibition eras.
The brutality of the illegalliquor trade and became a symbol
of violence of prohibition eras, the brutality of the killings
shocked the public and began toturn opinions against or
romanticize images of gangstersthat had prevailed in some
quarters.
So you're talking about goingfrom, like I said, like these
one or two hits, like, oh, we'llgo pop off one or two guys, to
(14:00):
this very well orchestratedbroad daylight gunning down way
overkill.
Like said uh, frank had 14bullet wounds, they're shooting
people in the face just so theycan't be identified like.
There's obviously suchbrutality and escalation that
this is when you start seeing,as I just said, the turn against
(14:21):
gangsters like they wereromanticized in these books.
We see this again time aftertime with bonnie and claude and
all these others that even intothe 1960s and 70s like they were
making movies, kind of makingthem these folk heroes, but it
was incidents like this thatwere starting to turn people
like no, they're not folk heroes, they're just killers and
murderers.
Speaker 3 (14:43):
And just like with Mad Dog, where that child was
hit by a stray bullet and killed, I think that this type of
escalation made people start toworry.
Well, how is this going toimpact the rest of us?
Are one of us going to getcaught in the crossfire?
Speaker 2 (14:57):
Yeah, and this kind of and we're going to talk about
it in a second as well butreally is what got the FBI
focusing on Al Caponespecifically?
The FBI focusing on Al Caponespecifically because this
incident A showed the power hehad and the connections he had
and the links he was willing togo to, but showed that he was
probably the most powerful inthe time in Chicago.
So they really focused on goingafter him.
Speaker 3 (15:20):
In the aftermath, police initially focused their
attention on Detroit's PurpleGang, based on eyewitness
accounts from landladies who hadrented rooms to suspicious men
just before the massacre.
However, this lead ultimatelywent nowhere.
The case remained unsolved forfour months until a breakthrough
came in December of 1929, whenFred Killer Burke was identified
(15:43):
as a suspect in the murder of apolice officer in Michigan.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
When police raided Burke's home, they found two
Thompson machine guns that werelater linked to the massacre and
I would really like to know howthey linked them to the
massacre, because I don't reallythink ballistics were at the
height of anything at that time,but I mean, maybe they were.
But to me that just seems likeoh, we have two Tommy guns, how
do you know those are the rightones?
(16:08):
But despite this evidence, noone was ever successfully
prosecuted for the StValentine's Day massacre.
Al Capone widely believed tohave ordered the hit and again,
this makes sense because thesetwo gangs have been going at it
for almost 10 years now.
He had the most to gang from it, but he was in Florida at the
time of the killings and had asolid alibi, which of course
(16:28):
he's the.
He's the head of the, the gang.
He's not going to do everythinghe can to not be associated
with such a massive massacre.
Uh, jack mcgurn, another primesuspect, was arrested but later
released due to lack of evidence.
And there's kind of depictionsof this in different gang movies
and stuff.
Um, I think probably theuntouchables is the most
(16:48):
well-known.
That depicts Al Capone and thebattle that Al Capone had with
the FBI as they were reallystarting to close in on him.
Speaker 3 (17:07):
States.
It marked a turning point inpublic attitudes towards
gangsters, where they once hadbeen seen as some exciting or
glamorous figures.
The brutality of the killingshocked the nation and began to
erode any remaining publicsympathy for the organization.
The event also spurred lawenforcement to take more
aggressive action againstorganized crime.
Federal authorities, includingthe Bureau of Prohibition and
the Bureau of Investigation,which was the predecessor to the
(17:30):
FBI, intensified their effortsto bring down major crime
figures.
The increased pressure wouldeventually contribute to
Capone's downfall, as he wasconvicted of tax evasion in 1931
.
Speaker 2 (17:43):
And this is kind of what the FBI originally was Like
.
The original head of the Bureauof Investigations was a tax
person Hoover I believe it wasHoover when he was brought over
actually came from like thelibraries section.
Like these weren't lawenforcement people, these were
actually people more trained todo taxes and investigate
(18:04):
financial issues.
So even at this time in 1931,when they talk about the Bureau
of Investigations like doingthese things, these were unarmed
, untrained law enforcementofficers.
They were really trying to usethe laws more civil side and
these financials and they werelike going after criminal
activity.
So it's very interesting toread it and look at this and
(18:27):
they're talking about like theBureau and the Bureau of
Prohibition was the ones thatbrought them down.
But the FBI and even thedepictions in some movies show
the FBI is like armed guystaking that.
That was not who they were atthis point.
They were just kind of likepencil pushers.
Speaker 3 (18:40):
Well, it kind of makes sense as far as the pencil
pusher aspect of it and goingafter the tax evasion side of it
.
You know, when you have thishuge crime and the guy's alive
with 14 bullet wounds andrefuses to identify who did it,
how are you going to make a caseon that?
You can't.
And on the flip side of it,well, al Capone has all this
money.
He never reported any of histaxes.
(19:01):
It obviously came fromsomewhere.
That's an easy case to make,because now, all of a sudden you
have all this money and youdidn't declare it on any tax
form anywhere.
You know as a pencil pusher.
Well, it's all numbers.
Numbers are easy to show, toshow improve.
Speaker 2 (19:14):
No, and I think another like takeaway for me
from this is you've, if I hadbeen shot 14 times, I would want
justice Like you've, got threehours to think about this.
He was conscious.
I would want justice Likeyou've got three hours to think
about this.
He was conscious.
He feared the gangs evenknowing he was going to die more
than he trusted law enforcementto get justice.
And I think that even there waskind of a turning point in
(19:37):
America and that was a smallexample of why At the time,
people just didn't trust thegovernment.
They were more fearful of thegangs than they were thinking
that law enforcement and thegovernment was going to do
anything to protect them.
And I think there's still a lotof cynicism like that that
exists today.
But that's just a small exampleof a much wider problem at the
time, which is why you wereseeing big figures like bank
(20:01):
robbers and gangsters beromanticized, because there was
a lot of this no trust that thegovernment, law enforcement,
everybody was going to be thereto protect you.
Speaker 3 (20:09):
And I think, like you said, it even goes to today.
And you see that, because ifyou have somebody who turns on a
gang or you know, as they say,turn states evidence and is
going to testify againstsomebody, how do you protect
that person?
Typically, long term, thatmeans something like witness
protection, which means you giveup everything.
Speaker 2 (20:26):
You give up your friends, your family, your life
and move someplace else andstart over, and it's not a fun
experience people that went intowitness protection in the 70s,
(20:48):
80s and 90s because they turnedstate evidence against these
organized crime organizationsthat are now just like leaving
witness protection, writingbooks and kind of like just
being left alone because overtime they kind of became folk
heroes in their own route aboutbeing willing to turn coat and
turn state's evidence and thensomehow come out and not be
targeted.
I can't there's so manyexamples but I'm so focused on
(21:09):
like this concept I can't thinkof their names right off the bat
, but it is kind of interestingif I can read those stories now
that those people have come out.
And, um, the guy from thegoodfellas is based on I can't
remember his name, but he's oneof them like went into witness
protection and then just whenthey came out and just started
telling the truth, uh, and gaveup witness protection because he
was like you know what, I'mgonna get killed.
(21:29):
I'm gonna get killed, but mightas well try to make some money
off of it if I can.
So yeah, but back at this timethis guy would rather die than
tell the police because he justdidn't see that it was going to
be beneficial to him.
That's.
That says a lot about the timeframe.
So the saint valentine's daymassacre remains one of the most
famous events in americancriminal history.
It has been the subjects ofnumerous books, films and
(21:51):
documentaries, cementing itsplace in popular culture.
The garage where the killingstook place became a macabre
tourist attraction until itsdemolition in 1967, which
surprises me that theydemolished it, because dark
tourism I guess maybe in the 60sand 70ies wasn't as popular as
it is now.
But I today that would becomelike a historical landmark.
(22:12):
Nobody would let that go.
Dark tourism is just such athing now where people like to
go to these old murder houses,old murder scenes and stuff A
little odd to me, but at thesame time just somebody that
investigates this stuff.
I enjoy going for theinvestigative side, like looking
at the scene trying to get abetter understanding of it, not
like, oh, I want to stand wherethis person stood, creeps me out
(22:34):
.
Speaker 3 (22:35):
And I think there's also a big difference between
when you're actually at anactive crime scene versus being
someplace where somethinghappened happened.
It's, at least in my opinion,not very fun when you're
actually at an active crimescene, seeing what has happened,
(22:56):
versus a historical context ofsomething happened here 50 years
ago that my grandparents talkedabout and now I actually get to
see what this place looked likewhen they were describing it.
Speaker 2 (23:03):
It's really interesting because I've have
been to both.
But when you go to like theones that like Lizzie Borden's
house and stuff and they stillare original, like with over 150
years ago, like the originalfurniture and stuff in years,
it's like there's so many thingsabout this that are creepy to
me, like to me there's not asense of like, oh ah, it's more
of like.
This is like sadness and justtrying to understand what
(23:24):
happened.
Yeah, being on a real crimescene, I think people, the
gawkers, think it's cool to comeand kind of see what's going on
.
A don't fucking do that, you'regetting in the way in law
enforcement, you're making itharder on them to do their jobs.
But on the flip side, whenyou're there, it's not like a
glamorous situation.
It's not like this fun,exciting.
It's usually a lot of standingaround waiting for crime techs
to do their job and everythingelse.
(23:46):
So even back then, like thiscrime scene would have been a
nightmare to try and process.
Try and process where thingsand they weren't doing nearly
the level we are today.
But this just became like atorch point for things and in
the decades since, the massacrescontinued to fascinate the
public and historians alike.
(24:18):
It serves as a stark reminder ofthe violence and corruption
that characterized theProhibition era and the dangers
of associating with organizedcrime and allowing them to gain
a foothold in society, kind oflike finding strongholds and
Chicago is notorious for this ofhaving these like pockets that
are so heavily gang affiliatedand held down that law
enforcement just can't get inthere.
But it's just a battle that wefought kind of since then.
Before that there were littlegangs, but not on this scale
(24:40):
with this much control.
The events also highlighted thechallenges by law enforcement
in combating well-organized andwell-funded criminal enterprises
.
We still see that Even when wetalk about 50, 60 years later.
When the federal government wastrying to go after organized
crime in New York and Chicago,they couldn't do it.
When you look at the peoplethat have been prosecuted,
(25:00):
besides Gotti, they never gotahead of any of these families.
They never really got high up,so it's always low-level people,
because these are sowell-funded, so well-connected,
so well-organized that you'renot even today, we're still not
able to infiltrate them like wewant.
Speaker 3 (25:16):
And you have to look at consequences too.
If I turn state's evidence,what happens to me?
What's going to happen to me ifI don't?
You're going to put me inprison and my family's just fine
, and I keep my mouth shut andmaybe I do my time.
Maybe I get out, maybe I don't,but if I do die in prison, it's
either going to be from naturalcauses or something that
happens pretty quickly you knowbefore the guards can show up
(25:39):
and stop something.
Speaker 2 (25:40):
Exactly, um, and I I think it's interesting because
I'm designing courses onorganized crime and stuff but
just the reach that theseorganizations had Like the
Chicago organizations wereconnected to the Philly ones, to
the New York ones andeventually out to the Vegas ones
(26:03):
.
These were national andinternational organizations that
had far reach.
As a local law enforcement,especially in the 1920s, 1930s,
you didn't have connections withthe department in the city next
to you, let alone how organized.
It was so easy to commit acrime in Chicago and quickly get
out of there and nobody wouldever be able to catch you.
(26:24):
So when they were talking aboutlinking those guns in Detroit,
part of me is like like even nowit would be hard, even with our
technology sometimes it's hardto land You're linking them a
hundred years ago.
It's just impossible.
And just to think the reachthat they had then and how easy
it was to get away with stufflike this.
And yet they we sit here andlike how did they not catch
(26:46):
people that did this?
Think about the connections andhow far that these gangs went.
Speaker 3 (26:51):
The resources.
Yeah, so that legacy of the StValentine's Day massacre extends
beyond its immediate impact onthe gang's warfare in Chicago.
It played a significant role inshaping public perception of
organized crime and contributedto the eventual repeal of
Prohibition in 1933.
Yay for all of us.
Speaker 2 (27:25):
The nature of the killings helped to galvanize
public opinion against thelawlessness that had flourished
under prohibition, ultimatelyleading to a reassessment of the
policy that you can't havesomething, especially something
that you had, and then you'vetaken it away.
It's like giving a small childan iPad, letting them play for a
while and then taking it fromthem and saying you can't have
it.
They've gotten so much pleasureand enjoyment from it.
(27:46):
It's become part of their lives.
They're going to throw a fit InProhibition.
We kind of saw that.
But you also gave rise tocriminal elements.
We saw even an example when Iwas in the military.
You would have chewing tobaccoNot illegal in the United States
.
You could buy it on base andeverything else, but you
couldn't have it on our ship.
So when we deployed, suddenly ablack market developed because
(28:09):
you couldn't buy it on the ship.
We're out to sea for months, sopeople would have their loved
ones send logs of chewingtobacco and people would sell
them for $25, for a 10.
The back of the states was liketwo, three dollars at the time
at the most.
You've created an enterprisewhen you tell people they can't
have something.
And one of the odd things to meis we didn't learn from
prohibition when it comes todrugs, but like even marijuana.
(28:32):
Now, for 100 years there's beenthis dark black market for
marijuana sales and a lot ofviolence has spawned from it
because you've outlawedsomething instead of regulating
it and we continue this cycleand, in a way, prohibition
created all these gangs.
They wouldn't have had thepower if it would all just been
(28:55):
legal.
And there were so manyjurisdictions across the U?
S and law enforcement that wereso small and embraced
speakeasies and bootleggersbecause it was safer for them.
We saw that in St PaulMinnesota.
It was easier for them toembrace it and almost became
safe havens than to try and bustit Cause you risk getting
(29:15):
killed.
So I think it says a lot abouthow, in a way, governments and
too much overreach andlegislation and regulation in
certain areas can cause moreharm than good.
Same thing you see with humansex trafficking now, like if you
allow sex workers to do theirjob openly and not have to fear
(29:38):
getting arrested or anythingelse, would you see almost a
decrease in human sextrafficking?
Because I can just, people canjust go do it.
It's not I have to seek it outand to try and get around laws
or get around getting busted bygoing to the streets.
Now I can use these sextraffickers to find somebody in
a more dark, secretive way.
Speaker 3 (30:00):
Less risk.
Speaker 2 (30:01):
Yes.
Speaker 3 (30:01):
If I have less risk and I can go buy it legally, why
would I not do that?
Yes, so then you take thatprofit margin out of the illegal
behavior.
Speaker 2 (30:12):
Exactly, and then what's the reason to put
yourself out there?
What's the reason to putyourself out there?
So, in the realm of criminaljustice, the massacre
underscored the need for moresophisticated and coordinated
law enforcement efforts tocombat organized crime.
It spurred the development ofnew investigative techniques and
led to increased cooperationbetween local, state and federal
law enforcement agencies.
That's something we see withwhen we we talked about bank
(30:34):
robbers at the time.
Like you committed a crime inIndianapolis and you just shot
right over to Cincinnati, therewas no conversation.
There was no talking.
And even later on, after the1930s, 40s, up until 2025, there
wasn't always good cooperationbetween local, state and federal
.
Like there was stepping on eachother's toes.
Who was in control?
So this is since the dawn ofmodern law enforcement has still
(30:58):
been an issue with thatjurisdiction.
But even then, the creation ofthe fbi's crime laboratories in
1932 was in part of response tothe challenges posed by
investigating complex,high-profile crimes like the
saint valentine's day massacre,like trying to find ways of
fingerprinting, like we've nowfingerprinting for a while.
But the creation of fbi crimelaboratory allowed for more
(31:19):
storing and large scale analysisof fingerprints.
So if you did have a crime inchicago, you could see those
fingerprints to um I think itwas quantico at the time.
I may be wrong.
You could send it to this fbilab and they had an index of all
these different fingerprintsand they could go through and
try and find it.
If you've ever seen pictures ofthat, it's insane.
This was a massive room withthousands, of hundreds of
(31:43):
cabinets of fingerprints on fileand they would go through and
have to look through each one totry.
It's amazing, but this wassomething that came right out of
that, because we've got tostart having better,
scientific-based ways of linkingpeople.
Speaker 3 (31:57):
And even sharing information, like we have NCIC
now, which they didn't have backthen.
Speaker 2 (32:02):
No, and God, we trust everybody else.
We run through NCIC.
Speaker 3 (32:06):
The event also had a lasting impact on Chicago's
reputation and identity.
While the city had already beenassociated with gangster
activity, the massacre cementedits image as the epicenter of
organized crime in America.
This reputation, while notalways welcome, had become an
indelible part of Chicago'shistory and continues to attract
interest from tourists andhistory buffs alike.
Speaker 2 (32:29):
And I think like one of the interesting things about
this is like we don't know thevictims here.
We obviously know the peoplethat gunned them down, but there
was also like it was two gangslike.
So I think it's interesting atthat time that so much attention
was given this when it was veryeasy to say, well, it was just
two gangs killing each other,why do we care it?
It really did have this impact.
So I think it also started toshow more humanized that even
(32:54):
though you're a criminal, you'restill a human being and you
didn't deserve to be murdered.
But as we celebrate thisValentine's Day weekend, I think
it's important to also kind ofremember the St Valentine's Day
massacre as a pivotal moment inthe history of organized crime
in America.
It marks the bloody climax ofChicago's gang wars and shock to
the nation's conscience andultimately contributed to
(33:16):
significant changes in lawenforcement and public policy
and would be what kind of ledthe steps to the formation of
the modern FBI, cemented againin that Kansas City shootout.
But nearly a century later itremains a powerful symbol of the
violence and excess of theprohibition era, serving as a
cautionary tale about theconsequences of allowing
(33:38):
organized crime to flourishunchecked.
And I do think it's odd that westill romanticize this era,
because even now, like there'sjoking like the roaring 2020s
now, where people are throwinglike prohibition era parties now
and you see a lot of places Igo to a couple every time I go
to different cities that are oldspeakeasies and that's kind of
(33:59):
their claim to fame like, andpeople like, oh, we've got to go
to that because we still havethis kind of romanticized view
of that time period when really,in the end, it was just a bunch
of criminals killing criminalsand a lot of innocent people
caught in the crossfire so happyvalentine's day happy
valentine's day.
we love you.
I want to thank you all so muchfor listening to our little
(34:21):
podcast.
This is created with.
So happy Valentine's Day.
Happy Valentine's Day, we loveyou.
I want to thank you all so muchfor listening to our little
podcast.
This is created with love andpassion for criminal justice and
true crime.
So if you're enjoying thepodcast, please follow us, like
or rate us on whatever systemyou're listening to us on,
subscribe to our podcast anddownload episodes.
(34:41):
Downloads are important for ourgrowth, as is growing our
listeners.
So if you wouldn't mind, takethe time to ask your friends,
family, coworkers, tell themabout us through word of mouth,
social media.
I don't care if you even screamat strangers on the streets to
help us kind of get out therewho we are.
If you're interested inlearning more, you could visit
our website atwwwdeviantcriminologycom.
(35:02):
There you'll find some stuffabout our backgrounds,
references, show notes for eachepisode.
You can also follow us on ourFacebook page at Deviant
Criminology.
We also have an Instagram page,which is deviant underscore
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(35:22):
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grow with us.
So again, thank you for takingthe time to listen and have a
good week.
Thank you.
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