September 23, 2025 • 55 mins
You’ve probably never heard of Fredericka "Marm" Mendelbaum aka Mother Mandelbaum - a modest german immigrant who eventually became one of then most notorious crime bosses in New York.
She backed two of the largest heists in history, but for decades law enforcement couldn't touch her.
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Sources
Margalit Fox, The Talented Mrs. Mandelbaum: The Rise and Fall of an American Organized-Crime Boss (Random House, 2024)
“The Life and Crimes of ‘Old Mother’ Mandelbaum,” Smithsonian Magazine
“The Extraordinary ‘Mother’ Mandelbaum,” Museum of the City of New York (MCNY)
https://thehustle.co/the-architect-who-became-the-king-of-bank-robberies
https://forward.com/culture/630243/fredericka-mandelbaum-organized-crime-jewish-mother-margalit-fox/?utm_source=chatgpt.com
https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/community/articles/marm-mandelbaum-queen-fences
Find-A-Grave entry for Fredericka Mandelbaum (death/burial details and transcriptions). Find A Grave
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/like-mother-like-murder--6210055/support.
She backed two of the largest heists in history, but for decades law enforcement couldn't touch her.
Get ad free episodes, bonus content, and support our show!
Join our Patreon!
Become an Apple subscriber!
(all options are less than $5)
Sources
Margalit Fox, The Talented Mrs. Mandelbaum: The Rise and Fall of an American Organized-Crime Boss (Random House, 2024)
“The Life and Crimes of ‘Old Mother’ Mandelbaum,” Smithsonian Magazine
“The Extraordinary ‘Mother’ Mandelbaum,” Museum of the City of New York (MCNY)
https://thehustle.co/the-architect-who-became-the-king-of-bank-robberies
https://forward.com/culture/630243/fredericka-mandelbaum-organized-crime-jewish-mother-margalit-fox/?utm_source=chatgpt.com
https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/community/articles/marm-mandelbaum-queen-fences
Find-A-Grave entry for Fredericka Mandelbaum (death/burial details and transcriptions). Find A Grave
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/like-mother-like-murder--6210055/support.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
Welcome to Like Mother Like Murder. I am Rachel and
I'm Heather. We bring you the good, the badass, and
the crime.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
This is Like Mother Like Murder.
Speaker 1 (00:33):
Hello everyone, and welcome to Like Mother Like Murder, your
favorite true crime mom Cast. I am Rachel and I
am Heather. And each week we bring you mom related
true crime from missing moms to murdered mom's, moms who murder, survivors,
and much much more yues we do. This is your
(00:55):
mom Cast mom Cast coming at you, And today Heather
has our He gave me a little bit of a
spoiler that we are gonna kind of kick it back
a little bit, to kick it back. Oh, kick it
back to the old school days. And one of the
things that we used to do was we would talk
about what we were drinking. And I know, Heather, you
(01:15):
came here with something in that cup, so I want
to hear all about it.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
So it's so funny because we used to do this
all the time.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
But I have in front of me a like Murder
like mr a Like Mother Like Murder mug which you
can get if you so please, and on the backside
it says okay, love you by Yeah, that's it. And
for those of you who have listened to all like
(01:42):
three hundred or something, yeah, so's you know that I
got an espresso machine very much near almost the beginning
of our like mother like Murder journey back like wine
time journey, and it in this cup is a latte,
(02:03):
and I'm feeling it and it's really bringing me back
because not only am I drinking a latte, y'all, but
I also have a case today that is a very
Heather old school.
Speaker 2 (02:17):
Oh, this is a Heather case.
Speaker 1 (02:18):
This is something Heather would go into a deep dive
about and decide to just tell Rachel like something all
about it. Yeah, that's awesome. So I don't have a
like mother like Murder mug because do I even support us? Like?
Why do I not have a like mother like her rock?
But I do you know who? I do support Kevin
(02:41):
from what the weird ones are. I do have that mug.
And because you had your coffee, I ran off camera
very quickly. I do not do lattes. This is actually
iced coffee in this cup, because everyone knows I only
drink iced coffees. And it has a splash of oat milk.
So that's about as groovy as I get. Mine is
(03:03):
an oat milk latte. Yeah, so my newest thing. Because
Starbucks was doing their oat milk or chata.
Speaker 2 (03:14):
Like I was all about it.
Speaker 1 (03:18):
So what I decided was, I'm not going to be
spending five dollars on that every day.
Speaker 2 (03:24):
No, So I went to Trader Joe's.
Speaker 1 (03:27):
I'm sorry, I was about to say Trader's Joe And
if you have any Filipinos in your life, you'll know why.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
But this podcast, I don't know why. My mom in my.
Speaker 1 (03:42):
Head going, yo, let's go to Trader's Joe.
Speaker 2 (03:44):
Okay, So I'll tell you my recipe really quickly, really quickly.
You get the they have.
Speaker 1 (03:52):
A cinnamon bun oat creamer and then you get just
oat milk. You all you need is just like a
literal slash of that cinnamon bun oat milk creamer and
then oat milk and that, I swear it's the orchata.
Speaker 2 (04:12):
I mean, it's better van the awesome.
Speaker 1 (04:15):
Good to know, so good because it has the cinnamon,
it has like cinnamon bun. So it's got like that
vanilla ish flavor. It Lah'll kiss. That is the that
is it Barista's kiss. I do just have to say
because this happened yesterday that I you know, we have
followed the.
Speaker 2 (04:35):
Crystal Rogers case.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
We have brought you all of those updates, and yesterday
was sentencing and you know, they got life in prison.
So I am ecstatic about that. The family members got
to read their statements to him, and they were very powerful,
very emotional. But I'm glad that they were given that
opportunity and able to you know, sit down. I listened
(05:00):
to them all. That family is absolutely incredible, and now
you know, things that were brought up as well, is
the fact that Tommy Ballard. Everyone thinks that there is
this connection. He's alleged right now, so we're gonna be following.
Like even though so many things have happened and there
(05:21):
has been so many closures in one way or another,
there's still so much that needs to happen. We still
don't know where Crystal Rogers is. But finally the people
are that were responsible are held accountable, at least most
of them, and now we wait to see what else happened.
So that was huge for me yesterday. Wanted to share
(05:42):
that yes, yes, yes, about damn time. That is that's
exactly what I was about Damn time. So glad, like
you said that, there is at least a piece of
and then so hard because I know a lot of
families feel like it's never gonna be closure closures, right,
and especially in a case like Crystal Rogers. I mean
we saw it in the Jennifer Doulo's case as well.
(06:05):
We don't have Crystal.
Speaker 2 (06:07):
It's so hard to really get you can't get.
Speaker 1 (06:10):
Closure, but when you don't know where she is too,
that's just so hard not having those answers, right, Yeah, Yeah,
So at least one step in the right direction though, right,
and and a little bit of justice finally served where
it needed to be. So yeah, I just wanted to
add that before we got into time.
Speaker 2 (06:30):
I'm so glad, you so big.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
I know it's something we've talked about all the time
all but I am, I think, besides Adelson, only because
we did so many updates on them right month, Crystal
Rogers has also been our biggest updates constantly making sure
we're covering that case. Yeah, we've been able to do
some you know, and and we we used to do
the episodes where we would bring the updates and it's
(06:54):
not something that I don't I don't want to stop
doing those. Those are important and we absolutely want to
bring those, but you're right, like certain cases that we
have followed, there has been so much Jenniferkulow's Crystal Rogers,
you know, Dan Markel's case, also Suzanne Morpheu, there were
some that we.
Speaker 2 (07:12):
Just followed that had breaks in the case.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
So once that happens, we will absolutely be bringing those updates.
For sure.
Speaker 2 (07:18):
We are trying to keep up to date.
Speaker 1 (07:20):
But if there's a case that you guys see that
you know, something we covered and you're like, ooh, they
should cover, please let us know.
Speaker 2 (07:27):
We would love to. Or if there are theories.
Speaker 1 (07:31):
That you feel when we covered a case that maybe
is insulved that we didn't dive into or you want
us to dive into, let us know. We love listener suggestions.
We've covered cases based on listener suggestions before and we
love that kind of interaction. So definitely definitely hit us up.
Speaker 2 (07:51):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (07:51):
I am ready for today, though, So let's.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
Let's get into it.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
Let me let me set the scene a little bit,
just to give you an idea, because I know, like
I I titled this marm okay, and I know that
doesn't really give a lot of hints, but I know
you know who this is, Jimma Teller Sons of Anarchy, Okay, matriarch,
crime matriarch.
Speaker 2 (08:15):
Do you did you ever watch Weeds?
Speaker 1 (08:17):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (08:18):
Okay, so Nancy, Nancy Botwin Weeds?
Speaker 1 (08:22):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (08:23):
Did you ever watch Peaky Blinders?
Speaker 1 (08:25):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (08:26):
So Pollie Pollie the aunt, right, she was his aunt? Yes,
Peaky Blinders. And then there's that new that new show.
Speaker 1 (08:35):
I haven't actually watched it, but I want to because
it's got uh Retta and I'm big friend of hers.
But her name is I think Beth Beth from Good Girls. No, okay,
that's okay, it's a newer show. We don't watch new shows.
I'm surprised I said yes to everything you just said.
Those are all shows fifteen years ago when we actually
(08:55):
watched shows. Now you have an idea of kind of
where I'm going with marm okay, okay, So let's start
with a quote from the subject of today's episode.
Speaker 2 (09:09):
This is from marm. I am ma, because I give.
Speaker 1 (09:14):
Them what a mother cannot sometimes give money and horses
and diamonds. Wow, money and horses and diamonds. That's all right.
Who are you?
Speaker 2 (09:30):
Who are you?
Speaker 1 (09:31):
Mar? So? How did a modest immigrant from Germany become
one of the most notorious crime bosses in New York,
being dubbed old Mother Mandelbaumb, eventually having to flee to Canada,
but not before backing two of the most successful.
Speaker 2 (09:52):
Bank robberies in history.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
Wow, damn right, you've probably never heard of her, but
we're gonna.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
Fix that today.
Speaker 1 (10:05):
This is the true life story of crime boss Frederica
marm Mandelbomb aka Mother Mandelbomb. When I first wrote that,
I was going flashbacks to like old MTV like two
Life Story.
Speaker 2 (10:25):
Yeah, did you ever watch that?
Speaker 1 (10:27):
I can tell you yes, yes, yeah, I can totally
see that. But also that is that's quite the that's
quite the name right there. I know, Frederica Mandelbomb. Yeah,
oh why that just instantly makes me think, like she's
gotta be a matriarch.
Speaker 3 (10:47):
Type right, like that so much her name is yeah,
it screams that right, Like it's just like automatically, like
she was born to be the person one hundred percent.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
And the more I tell you about her, her name
fits like she definitely was born to be this person. Okay,
so born Frederic So she's German, which is why, like
she was born Frederic, but people say Frederica okay. So.
Born Frederic Weisner aka Frederica on March twenty fifth, eighteen
(11:27):
twenty five, in Castle, Germany to a Jewish family. She
ended up marrying Wolf Mandelbaum around eighteen forty eight, and
then a few years later they immigrated to New York City.
Speaker 2 (11:40):
There was a masts immigration to New York City.
Speaker 1 (11:44):
They ended up settling in a place in New York
City named Little Germany. And she was still in her
early twenties at the time, so very young. And in
those early years in New York City, her and her
husband Wolf were pretty much peddlers.
Speaker 2 (12:00):
So they were literally hawking.
Speaker 1 (12:02):
Everything from broken watches, scraps of like silk cloth, whatever
they could find, literally carrying this stuff on their backs,
setting it up in the streets like vendors, and using
any tricks that they could to just get people to
come over to their makeshift shop.
Speaker 2 (12:23):
Yeah why what they were selling exactly.
Speaker 1 (12:27):
And they were doing everything they could to make ends
meet for their At this point they had had They
ended up having four children, two sons and two daughters,
and times were tough and only getting tougher. But Frederica,
she was not going to settle. Not long after they
arrived in America, financial crisis hit the US, so it
(12:51):
was called the Panic of eighteen fifty seven. Businesses were
failing left and right, Unemployment was high, and many already downtrodden,
down on their luck. Poor resorted to pickpocketing and looting
to get by, and this included children, teenagers and adults alike.
(13:14):
Frederica saw opportunity and what she did was she began
teaching others, and a lot of times this was young
children and teenagers how to pickpocket and shoplift, and then
she would fence the product, meaning she would take what
they stole, and then she would sell the stolen good
(13:35):
for profit. And sorry, this makes me think of the
woman that we covered a while back who was having
the people steal from like the shops and she was
reselling it out of her grin. Yeah, yeah, I forgot
her exactly, but yeah, that's crazy. This is and as
you hear more about this, yeah, exact same.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
This was her idol. This is who she looked up to.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
This is she read about Fredrika and was like, I
can't do this one under press because one thing that
made Frederica really good about this is she was an immigrant,
but she's and they were in learned Little Germany.
Speaker 2 (14:10):
She spoke German right, but she was also really good
at English.
Speaker 1 (14:15):
So she was really good at forming those relationships with
the other immigrants, so teaching them this is how you pickpocket,
this is how you shoplift, this is how you loot.
Speaker 2 (14:26):
But then she was also.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
Really good with her English and being able to sell
these stolen goods out a profit.
Speaker 2 (14:37):
To Americans.
Speaker 1 (14:39):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (14:40):
So she continued to cultivate the relationship she had and
she was offering this motherly advice in this support to
a lot of these folks, and she never forgot where
she came from. So eventually Frederica would graduate from selling
these goods on the street and she actually opened a shop.
(15:01):
In eighteen sixty five, she was able to rent a
space down on the Lower East Side and her and
her husband opened this dry goods and habitashery store where
they were basically it was a front for selling all
these stolen products. But now they're.
Speaker 1 (15:20):
Doing it out of a store, so it's a more
reputable establishment. Yeah, storefront makes you think like absolutely everything's
fine and dandy, and it's not just like this lady
was like, I'm not selling these out of my trunk,
I'm selling these on Amazon.
Speaker 2 (15:37):
Yeah, reputable, Okay, crazy.
Speaker 1 (15:40):
So within a few short years, by eighteen seventy three,
not only did she own the shop, now she no
longer had to rent.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
She owned the shop on the first floor, but.
Speaker 1 (15:50):
Then her family also occupied the apartments that were above
and now they had extra warehouse room for the not
so legally obtain and goods. So it's so funny you
said that, because remember how that lady had like the
garage shock full of all the stuff. Oh yeah, so
did Frederica. Fredrika had a bunch of warehouse.
Speaker 2 (16:10):
Room for all of her stolen products. Yeah, becomes a system.
There's a method to the madness exactly. So her business
continued to grow.
Speaker 1 (16:22):
Eventually, her husband did die in eighteen seventy five, and
at this point, at this point, marm Mandelbaum, she had
four kids, raging from eight to fifteen years old. But
she expanded her circle. She was like, I don't need
my husband. This was all me, baby, and she just
continued to network. She networked at her synagogue and neighborhood
(16:44):
beer and oyster halls alike. She made herself known in
criminal circles and in high society, making all the right
connections cricket, cops, judges, even politicians. She knew what she
was doing, and she wasn't known as mother Mandelbomb for nothing. Okay,
(17:04):
she used that maternal instinct and she wanted to make
way for the next generation. So she allegedly opened a
school for children, supposedly allegedly right down the street from
the local police department, where children could learn to be
successful in the business. We're talking. They could learn to pickpocket, shoplift, burglary,
(17:31):
and they could graduate all the way up to full
blown cons That's it's insane. Like here, let me take
you guys under my wing, my criminal wing, yes exactly,
and bring you up in this way under my criminal
(17:56):
wing into my criminal ring. Nine. It's crazy.
Speaker 2 (18:02):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (18:03):
So not only did she provide this education for future criminals,
but she also had a special fund that was specifically
meant to provide bail money and legal fees for a
chosen few who she favored. This specifically included some very
(18:25):
famous female criminals like Sophie Lyons, who was a very
notorious female thief and con woman from also the same period,
the late eighteen eighties, and if they ever got into
you know, like if they ever got caught, or they
ever needed you know, bail money or they needed a lawyer,
(18:46):
she was like, Okay, you're on my special list. I'm
going to front you cash for whatever you need. So
she had a special fund just for this. And Frederica's
own children also later role in her criminal enterprise. Okay,
her son Julius played a very large part in her business.
(19:09):
And it's also said that one of her daughters was
actually married to either it was either a detective or
a politician. A politician and was potentially providing her mom
with like some insider information. So one report that I
read also said that her children, and from what I'm
(19:32):
understanding was most likely Julius, would come with her when
she would go to evaluate stolen goods to determine Okay,
this is good enough, and I'll go ahead and get
what's worth it and what's not exactly that they would
come with her and they would be the lookout for
detectives who would want to catch the infamous mother Mandelbaum
(19:53):
and what she was doing. But Frederica was smart, and
she was careful, and she knew how to be criminally successful,
but to remain out of reach from the law, well,
especially if she has a whole system and people who
are within and able to you know, look out or
(20:15):
know what's going on and update. So it's a whole
family scheme at.
Speaker 2 (20:20):
This since it is a family scheme.
Speaker 1 (20:22):
And the biggest thing, one thing I read throughout all
of this was that she was incredibly like loyal to
the people she worked with in that she never forgot
where she came from. So like, she opened that shop
on the Lower East Side, and after a few years
(20:42):
she was making enough money she easily could have moved
and lived in like the ritzy part of New York,
but she didn't.
Speaker 2 (20:50):
She stayed where she was. She never forgot where she
came from, and she never forgot who she worked with.
Speaker 1 (20:58):
And she she brought the same people up with her,
right she had, like this right hand man who she
worked with for decades. You know, she brought her children
along with her, the same people she surrounded herself with.
So she's a moral criminal, like cracked is that can
those you don't see those go inside very often? Well,
(21:23):
what do they say, there's honor amongst thieves or something
like that. So so her enterprise continued to growl. But
like I said, she was smart. She was never once
the one actually cracking a safe or running from the
robbery herself. But she did finance a lot of criminal
(21:44):
endeavors and she would take her cut. She was behind
some of the largest heists in history. So one was
the eighteen sixty nine Ocean National Bank robbery.
Speaker 2 (21:59):
So enter George Leslie.
Speaker 1 (22:02):
He was an architect who decided that bank robbing was
a more lucrative career. Okay, I mean he's probably not wrong.
If you're good, we don't support doing the wrong thing
around here, Like, yeah, you can make money by stealing
from a by robbing a bank.
Speaker 2 (22:23):
Okay, it's not the right bank, it's not the right thing.
Speaker 1 (22:28):
So he actually moved to the East Coast, and he
was an architect, so he did not have an end
to the criminal world. So he was actually seeking out
someone like Mandelbaum to figure out how he could do this.
And so he had a meeting with Mandelbaum and he
(22:48):
intrigued her with his less violent way of breaking into
a bank.
Speaker 2 (22:54):
He wasn't there to just.
Speaker 1 (22:56):
Like blow up a safe with dynamite, No, he had this.
He was an architect, he had this very intricate way
basically of picking the lock.
Speaker 2 (23:06):
I won't go into all the details.
Speaker 1 (23:09):
But he had this very intricate way of stealing the cash,
and mother Mandelbaum took to the young man and decided, Okay,
I'm gonna fund you, I'm gonna make this happen for you,
and i'm gonna staff your plan. So, like I said,
I'm not gonna go into all the details. But in
the show notes, there's this really good article about George
(23:31):
Leslie and his bank heists in his whole career as
a architect.
Speaker 2 (23:38):
Turned bank robber.
Speaker 1 (23:40):
Okay, but this successful robbery of the Ocean National Bank
ended up being the largest bank robbery in the then
history of New York City City, with the thieves getting
almost a million dollars. And this is back in eighteen
sixty nine. So they got away with seven hundred and
sixty eight thousand, eight hundred and seventy nine dollars and
(24:00):
ninety four cents worth of stolen cash, jewelry, and securities.
So when you adjust that or say that I'm sorry,
say that number, yeah, and then you're gonna say exactly
what I want to hear, But say that number seven
hundred and sixty eight thousand dollars, seven hundred and sixty
eight thousand. M hm. So when you adjust that to
today's money, eighteen million dollars mm hmm. And because mother
(24:29):
Mandelbomb knew how to fence stuff, so that wasn't just cash,
that was also jewelry and securities and this kind of stuff.
She knew how to fence things, so it's believed that
she also had the means to launder all those non
cash items. Her cut eight hundred thousand dollars, which would
have been twenty three million in today's money. Wait, how
(24:54):
was I missed? I missed something?
Speaker 2 (24:56):
How was her way? Hold on than?
Speaker 1 (24:58):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (24:58):
Yeah, yeah, hold on back up? Okay, I was like, wait,
what are you talking about?
Speaker 1 (25:02):
Her cut was more than that's even more Badass's crazy.
She's not a badass, by the way, I want to
point out.
Speaker 2 (25:10):
She is a badass. She's a bass. I think I
mixed those up. Okay, I don't know why her cut was,
but uh.
Speaker 1 (25:18):
Didn't you say that he only made like seven hundred
and eighty six thousand, so how would he get more
than what he made?
Speaker 2 (25:23):
I don't know, Rachel, that's crazy.
Speaker 1 (25:25):
That's okay, you don't need to know, because I think
there's a lot that we don't know about this lady
that probably happened. Oh, she was charging interests for sure.
She said, yeah, you're gonna make some money. Not that's nuts.
It was funny because I was actually I told Zach
about this lady because he's super into like all these.
Speaker 2 (25:48):
Random historical things. Then I was like, had you ever
heard of her before?
Speaker 1 (25:51):
And he's like no, So of course I read him
my entire script, and so of course he starts looking
into Mandelbaumb and then I said, you need to read
about George Leslie too, and this whole, this whole bank robbery,
and so he's reading about it. So basically, George Leslie
was like, I need a funder, I need a backer,
and he knew that Mandelbaum was a great way to
(26:13):
get in. She had a lot of contacts. She was like, Okay,
i'll fund you, but this is gonna be like a tryout.
You're a brand new guy. Before this happens. She basically said,
I need to get revenge on this woman because uh,
she joined a rival prime family. And it turns out
(26:34):
that George Leslie was actually having an affair with her.
Oh wow.
Speaker 2 (26:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:40):
So it turns out George Leslie is a bit of
a hoe because I'll and I'll tell you during the
next one.
Speaker 2 (26:46):
Yeah, he's a hoe.
Speaker 1 (26:47):
So basically, Fredrika got someone to still a ring from
somebody and then gave it to George Leslie's girlfriend affair
lady who Mandelbaumb doesn't like for joining the rival gang.
And then this woman where's it actually thinking it's from George,
and she wears it to this fancy dinner party. Turns
(27:10):
out who it was stolen from was actually the wife
of a district court judge, and she is.
Speaker 2 (27:17):
At the dinner party.
Speaker 1 (27:19):
Oh my god. The woman who it got stolen from
was like, bitch, that's my ring. She calls up her
husband and she goes this lady's stole my ring. And
so the court judge sends in the Pinkertons, which is
like you know, private, yes, back then, And the Pinkerton
agents raid this woman's home and find all this stolen stuff,
(27:41):
and then that lady goes to jail and then Mandelbaum's like, okay,
you're allowed in now, you're allowed to continue working on
this bank robbery. And you've proven that A you're loyal
to me and B you won't be so distracted. Yeah,
that's crazy. You know what's crazy too, is like I'm positive.
(28:05):
I mean, it's there's so much back then and today
that happens like this, right, but we're just so normal
we don't see it. Like I'm telling you absolutely something
that is probably happening right now all the time. Yeah,
constantly the drama. And that's what's so crazy is like
this this story, that exact thing that I explained is
(28:29):
happening I'm sure all the time, and we are we
just live such normal lives.
Speaker 2 (28:36):
Yeah, so we have no idea reading.
Speaker 1 (28:38):
About this stuff, about this this woman who's just like
this crime boss of this is happening all the time.
Speaker 2 (28:45):
We covered a case of.
Speaker 1 (28:46):
A woman who was basically doing this exact thing, right,
I mean, it's insane, it is. That is crazy. Okay,
tell me more. Okay. So, like I said, that heist
was basically like tryout for George. He was not in
any way like a known criminal, and so Mandelbomb's like,
(29:07):
I'm gonna take a chance on you.
Speaker 2 (29:08):
Believe in your idea, but we got to try you out.
So he pulled it off.
Speaker 1 (29:13):
And this basically skyrocketed his reputation. And with a backer
like Fredrika Mandelbaum, he was in it. And so he
got a crew. He became a criminal in good standing,
so to speak, and him and his crew started bank
robbing up and down the East Coast, had very successful careers.
(29:34):
And then in eighteen seventy eight they had been planning
this bank robbery for like three years. His crew went
on to rob the Manhattan Savings Institution.
Speaker 2 (29:45):
Now I say his.
Speaker 1 (29:46):
Crew, yeah, and I'll get to that. But again this
was financed by Frederica and she also later helped launder
the securities in the Manhattan Savings Institution.
Speaker 2 (29:58):
Robbery ended up.
Speaker 1 (29:59):
Netting two point seven million dollars, which is over eighty
million in today's money, and that is the largest heist
in history two to till today. That is still the
largest heist in history. And our Frederica marm Mandelbaumb.
Speaker 2 (30:17):
Was the backer.
Speaker 1 (30:18):
No, like I said, Crewe was the one who did it. Unfortunately,
George Leslie never saw his payday because he was found murdered.
Now it is unsolved, but there are a couple theories.
I've already got a couple theories. Tell me So one
(30:43):
theory is there's this one guy that was on his
crew that basically didn't like him a because George used
to take the pretty significant cut. I think George used
to take like fifty percent because he was the one
that basically invented you'll have to read whole little article,
but he invented a little thing that could pick the
(31:04):
lock of a safe without having exploded. Okay, Okay, so
he used to take a bigger cut, which his partner
didn't think was fair. B George was also having an
affair with multiple of his cruise partner's wives.
Speaker 2 (31:18):
Okay, hoh see.
Speaker 1 (31:22):
See there were rumors that he was actually going to
jump ship from Frederica Mandelbombs backing and start kind of
working with another criminal enterprise. Yeah, yeah, you don't do that,
(31:43):
Georgie Warg who gave you your start in the criminal world. Okay,
we love how you're trying to be like, hey, don't
do that. Don't go from one wrong to a different wrong.
You know, like you're already this deep inside of like
the crazy you know, scheme and person who does this
(32:04):
and criminal matriarchs plan. Why would you leave to someone else?
So it's currently unsolved but there is a lot of
theories as to why this man did not ever see
his payday from the largest heist in history. That's crazy. Two. Now,
(32:27):
we've talked about two of the literal largest robberies, and
Fredrika marm Mandelbaumb got her cut from both of them,
but she continued to remain untouched by the long arm
of the law. So in addition to her payouts from
heightst like this, Fredrika she was still fencing. She was
(32:49):
known as the Queen of fenses, right. She was still
receiving souling goods and turning them for a profit. And
it is said that she had as much just ten
million dollars worth of stolen luxury goods.
Speaker 2 (33:04):
So we're talking.
Speaker 1 (33:05):
Gold, diamonds, silk apparently she really liked silk, lace, cash,
Miller jewels, all fenced.
Speaker 2 (33:15):
Through that modest little habitashery shop on the Lower East Side.
Speaker 1 (33:22):
Yeah. So in today's money, do you know how much
ten million is? You're saying ten million from how ten million?
Speaker 4 (33:33):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (33:33):
Yeah? I think did I remember you saying something like
two point seven was like eighty million, So I don't
know three billion. I've already like messed up all my numbers,
so I don't know. Oh, okay, what is that? So no,
I have no idea. So it's like something like three
(33:53):
hundred and eighty million dollars.
Speaker 2 (33:57):
Yeah, so this.
Speaker 1 (34:01):
Like at this point, she's like, you know, fifty six
year old woman who started out as an immigrant literally
selling on the streets scraps of silk and broken watches,
is now pushing out.
Speaker 2 (34:21):
Four hundred million.
Speaker 1 (34:23):
Wow. Okay, but eventually it all comes crumbling down. Yes, ma'am,
it tell me about her downfall and evil. Let's hear
about her downfall. I don't know if you're gonna be
happy or sad about her downfall.
Speaker 2 (34:40):
Quite almost I.
Speaker 1 (34:41):
Feel like I'm gonna be happy. I don't want her
scheming all these other people. So in eighteen eighty four,
a new district attorney, Peter b Onney, went after marm.
He deployed the Pinkertons, which you know we know is
a private detective force, which was probably smart because the
(35:04):
NYPD we know had probably been on her.
Speaker 2 (35:07):
Payroll for decades. Right.
Speaker 1 (35:08):
Absolutely, they were not they weren't gonna, They're not gonna.
They're not gonna not pad their own pockets. So the Pinkertons,
they launched like kind of like a sting undercover investigation.
And this guy, Goustaf Frank, he actually pretended to be
(35:29):
a man named Stein, and he took advantage of the
fact that Fredrika Mandelbaum she had First of all, she
she was very generous towards other thieves.
Speaker 2 (35:41):
That's where she had.
Speaker 1 (35:42):
Her you know, humble beginnings, and particularly those who had
a German Jewish background.
Speaker 2 (35:50):
So that's what he did.
Speaker 1 (35:53):
And basically he wiggled his way into her inner circle, okay.
And what he did is he eventually purchased marked silk
from her, so he was able. They were able to
mark silk like n you know, to the naked eye,
no one could see it, and then they you know,
(36:14):
stole it, and then he purchased the stolen goods from her. Okay. So,
after over like two decades of successfully evading the authorities, Fredrika,
along with her son Julius, and one of like her
(36:34):
right hand man who she had been with her for years,
were arrested in July of eighteen eighty four. Her bail
was set at ten k, which is for her.
Speaker 2 (36:48):
Chump change, right, Like, yeah, that's crazy, there's nothing to her.
Speaker 1 (36:53):
She made that in the morning, like that's what she
probably literally had that in her pocket.
Speaker 2 (37:00):
Serious And but I mean, she's getting charged.
Speaker 1 (37:03):
She's not getting charged with murder, she's not getting charged
with like kidnappings, She's not getting charged with anything violent.
Speaker 2 (37:08):
She's getting charged with, you know, like selling a stolen good.
Here be very quickly.
Speaker 1 (37:14):
Posted her bail and she had some very good lawyers
and they were able to work their lawyer magic and
they got you know, her hearings postponed. And at this point,
she's like pushing sixty. You know, she never really issued
public statements in the past, but she's like.
Speaker 2 (37:30):
I would never wear innocent.
Speaker 1 (37:35):
Rachel. Yeah, my faces, I would never, but you did,
Like that is the clip. That is the clip we used.
I would never. But she's out on bail. She's at
home the Pinkerton's. They set up twenty four to seven
(37:55):
surveillance at her you know, she's got she's still at
the same place she's been since eighteen sixty five. She's
got her habit ashery shop on the bottom and then
her apartments on the upper level. They set up twenty
four seven surveillance at her place, and they want to
make sure like she's not gonna flee and when her.
Speaker 2 (38:16):
Trial they starts. It's so funny.
Speaker 1 (38:18):
There's this one there's this one article where they talk
about there in the courtroom and her they announced like
Fredrika Mandelbaum, like you know, show up and her lawyer
looks around, like where is she?
Speaker 2 (38:32):
I don't know where was mother.
Speaker 1 (38:34):
Mandelbaumb Well back in Germany.
Speaker 2 (38:39):
No, the fifty nine year old was in Canada.
Speaker 1 (38:42):
Oh, sources say that she had outsmarted the Pinkertons using
a body double. Oh okay, yeah, so she was in
Canada and at the time, there was no extradition between
Canada and the US for the crimes that she had
committed because, like I said, like this was like stolen
(39:04):
goods crimes, Like if it had been murdered or something
violent or more serious, they probably.
Speaker 2 (39:09):
Could have extradited. But this was not.
Speaker 1 (39:12):
And that's crazy because it's not like she It's crazier
to me because it's not like she just robbed like
the mall or a wal Mart or something like that.
This is millions and millions and millions of dollars, right,
But they're not getting her on the on the heist, right, Okay.
All they got her on was a few yards of silk, right, right, right,
(39:35):
But I know, well everyone knows, right, you can't prove.
It doesn't matter what you know, it matters what you've
been proved.
Speaker 2 (39:45):
Okay's true.
Speaker 1 (39:46):
True.
Speaker 2 (39:48):
That was in eighteen eighty four. In eighteen eighty.
Speaker 1 (39:51):
Five, her daughter Annie, who was still back in New York,
actually ended up dying of pneumonia. Yeah, and mother Mandelbaumb
actually risked getting caught, and she snuck, it said. She
snuck back into the US and attended the wake, which
(40:14):
was at her old shop slashed home using a disguise
and a hidden entrance that the thieves used to use
to get in and out, but was not going to
miss saying goodbye to her daughter, so she attended the
wake and then snuck back to Canada.
Speaker 2 (40:34):
And Frederica ended.
Speaker 1 (40:35):
Up living out the remaining years, which happened to be
only about like nine ten more years in Canada, and
then she ended up passing away in Canada and her
body was then eventually returned back to New York where
she was buried with her family. And she was sixty
eight years old.
Speaker 2 (40:56):
Oh yeah, yep, that is.
Speaker 1 (41:04):
Insane. Like there's portions of this story where I think
the word incredible come to mind. And I don't like
to glorify or you know, be like, that's awesome what
you did, because it's wrong, But it's also incredible in
a way that you can get away with all of
(41:26):
this over so long, still to this day, and this
is something that happened in the eighteen hundred still be
the largest heist of all time type of stuff, you know, and.
Speaker 2 (41:40):
Live your life right free, freely on the run at
the end of it. Holy hell, what's crazy to me?
Speaker 4 (41:50):
We have heard about the Bugsy guy or like Babyface
Gotty the mob, or like the Gambinos or all of
these more mob mafia crime family crime syndicates.
Speaker 1 (42:09):
Now, granted, you know, their criminal enterprises were a lot
more than just fencing and robbing. A lot of these
crime syndicates included sex.
Speaker 2 (42:21):
Work and murder, murder.
Speaker 1 (42:25):
For hire and you know, gambling and definitely more more
violent stuff. Now do I think that mother mandel Bomb
probably like dabbled in some more violent shits.
Speaker 2 (42:39):
She probably probably had to get something to beat up
every once in a while.
Speaker 1 (42:46):
You know, you do this for however many decades, and yeah,
that's definitely a possibility, But I think it's kind of
crazy to me, right, why do we not know her
name like this?
Speaker 2 (42:57):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (42:57):
That is that is an insane part. I feel like
this would be a bigger, bigger no name and in
conversations you know all the time, like other people that
you named right, right, and so it's just it is,
it's absolutely.
Speaker 2 (43:15):
Mind boggling to me.
Speaker 1 (43:16):
So I don't even remember how I ran across it.
I think I was just like googling lesser known because
I didn't want to do a murder or anything violent
this week. I think we've been working really hard on
our projects that we've been working on.
Speaker 2 (43:32):
And I felt I needed to take from a page
from our old book.
Speaker 1 (43:37):
Yeah, and I just needed I don't I hate saying
lighthearted because this is definitely crime, but you know, yeah,
but it's definitely way more light hearted than we've been
working on some heavier stuff. So I was like, let me,
let me and whenever we do stuff from like eighteen
hundred seventeen hundreds, I think it's just a little, you know,
(43:58):
it's a little less heavy.
Speaker 2 (44:00):
And so I, you know, I was googling stuff.
Speaker 1 (44:03):
And this this lady popped up. I'm like, why have
I never heard of this? Like this would have stuck
out in my head. And so the more I start
reading about her, and then I get to like these
heists that she funded, and I'm like, because I've heard
of George Leslie, but yeah, what he wouldn't even exist
if it wasn't for this lady. She put him on
the map, that is christ I was like, I need
(44:25):
to bring this to Rachel, like I need Rachel that
you didn't hear and to everyone else that is now
I want to look into her more. Did you, like,
during your research, did you find like books or documentaries
or movies or like anything that are.
Speaker 2 (44:41):
There is someone does someone did write a book about her?
Speaker 1 (44:45):
In my sources, how was this not like a film
that everyone knows who she is because of a film,
Because this is exactly interestingly, back in the nineteen hundreds,
I read a one of the articles that said, after
her death, back in the nineteen hundreds, they made a movie.
(45:05):
I say, nineteen hundreds. It's still funny, early nineteen hundreds,
I should say, oh my god, we were born one hundreds, Rachel.
Speaker 5 (45:13):
Yeah, Bill, I just had like a moment, Holy crap,
they made a movie and it was.
Speaker 1 (45:27):
New York City, you know, early eighteen hundred or early
nineteen hundreds kind of time, and they said, like, oh,
enter this character. She's a marm Mandelbomb type. So I
think back then it was definitely more of a person.
But so there is a book by Margalite Fox called
(45:48):
The Talented Missus Mandelbaumb The Rise and Fall of an
American Organized Crime Boss. Wow.
Speaker 2 (45:55):
Mm hmm.
Speaker 1 (45:57):
But I've actually found a lot of really cool smith
Smithsonian Magazine and Museum of the City of New York.
So I think on the East coast there's a lot
more about her, just like in the history.
Speaker 2 (46:11):
Because what I also did.
Speaker 1 (46:12):
At one point was I went on Google and I
googled where her shop was because the location, you know,
I don't know if it's still the same building, but
the location is still there on the Lower East Side,
you know, and I'm like, that's so interesting.
Speaker 2 (46:27):
So like, you know, literally.
Speaker 1 (46:28):
Buildings and be like, this is where mother mantel Bomb was.
There should be a plaque.
Speaker 2 (46:37):
This is a historical, like historical figure. If we ever
go to New York when going to New York, when
we go to New York to sell out Times.
Speaker 1 (46:47):
Square, some day we will go and you know how
when we went to uh, Nashville. We did that ghost
tour that actually we we we had him kind of
turn into a crime ghost, right right, we will do that.
We'll say, bring us to Marmandelbaum's place. That's crazy. What
if they're like, we don't know who that is, you
(47:08):
don't belong here. I will literally bring up our podcast
and say, listen to episode.
Speaker 2 (47:15):
Whatever episode this is.
Speaker 1 (47:18):
We will never know.
Speaker 2 (47:19):
You guys, you guys thought us.
Speaker 1 (47:24):
I'm not counting counting. Yeah, this is episode.
Speaker 2 (47:30):
Season four. We know that as good as we get.
Speaker 1 (47:35):
Are we in season four?
Speaker 2 (47:36):
Yes?
Speaker 1 (47:37):
It's crazy. Who do we think we are? Heather? That's crazy?
Speaker 2 (47:42):
What an insane, insane story?
Speaker 1 (47:45):
It is it? You know, to kind of like bring
it back to what you were doing in the beginning
and you were naming all these people. I feel like
we find this character not just speaking of her, but
this character type so fascinating because there's it's it just
blows your mind on like how someone can do this
and and and orchestrate it all and get away with
(48:08):
it for so long. And the names that you you
bring up in these shows, Gemma Teller, you know, it's they're.
Speaker 2 (48:20):
Beloved in a way of like.
Speaker 1 (48:25):
They're the heart and soul of this family and of
y crime mob whatever they created, and they are the
matriarch of the whole thing. Yes, and without them everything
would fall apart. And so it is crazy because I
do know those those characters, and I find myself watching
(48:45):
them thinking.
Speaker 2 (48:46):
Like, damn, that's nuts, you know, yeah, and then knowing.
Speaker 1 (48:50):
That you know it happens in real life, is like.
Speaker 5 (48:54):
It is.
Speaker 1 (48:55):
It is crazy because you and I think the biggest
thing is you think about like where she started.
Speaker 2 (49:02):
Literally, I'm here, I'm on the streets.
Speaker 1 (49:05):
I am doing whatever I can to provide for my
four young children. Yeah, you know what, I I can't
get a job. No one around me can get a job.
The country is in a financial crisis. We do what
we do to put food on the table to survive.
Speaker 2 (49:21):
You know what, I know I'm good at.
Speaker 1 (49:23):
I can I can get these little these kids to
go pickpocket because they're better at it. And then what
am I good at? I can take what they have
and I can sell it at a better price. No
one's gonna want to buy something from the six year old,
but I can speak good English and I can get
them to buy it from me.
Speaker 2 (49:42):
So we're gonna band.
Speaker 1 (49:43):
Together and we're both gonna it's gonna be a win
win situation. And you know, you start like that and
then before you know it. I mean, I don't think
she ever thought like, one day, I'm gonna be worth
you know, in her in her time, you know, ten
million dollars and I'm gonna be running this you know,
super crazy criminal enterprise and I'm going to back the
(50:04):
largest heist in history.
Speaker 2 (50:05):
No, I don't think.
Speaker 1 (50:06):
When she first starts out pickpocketing she thinks this is
you know, that's what's gonna be my life one day.
You build to that over the years, right, I think
when she you would think that when she first rented
that that storefront, she was like, Okay, this is great.
Now I can really put food on the table for
my kids. And then it just builds over the years
(50:29):
and before you know what, you're looking back going holy crap.
But that's what's so scary, right, right, That's how you
just got to be careful and because before you know it,
you're sucked in and there's no going back. You can
just stop, right, And that's what's I think we've covered
(50:52):
people before, you know, moms on the other side where
you got sucked in to this, to this, and there
was plenty points where you could have stopped.
Speaker 2 (51:08):
And you didn't. Yeah, and you know now.
Speaker 1 (51:11):
It's it's too far, too little, too late, and there's
no going back, too far gone. Yeah, exactly. Damn well,
she marm shesh marm, marm. Wow, hadther a great job.
I I do appreciate when you bring these cases. They're interesting.
(51:35):
They kind of captivate you and take you on a
whole different ride, which is nice, you know, so mom,
related love that, Mother Marm, but not not gonna bring
you down, you know, it's not. It's not. And also,
I mean, I mean, we talk about these cases because
we want to see resolution, we want to raise awareness,
(51:58):
we want to do those things. And in this one
that's not in any way, shape or form, you know
the backing of this right, And so when I say
bring you down, it's just you know, it is heavy.
It is hard to hear certain things, but important and
that's why we do them. So it's nice to sprinkle
a little bit of this in And I love it.
(52:19):
I love it, crazy crazy, crazy, all right. I loved that.
Thank you very much for that. Anything else before we
go No, I just want to give a shout out
to all of our our wonderful listeners that hope you
guys enjoyed this little fun history lesson. Yeah, and we'll
(52:41):
be back next week with some more fun stuff or
or not or not not if it's my week. You
don't get fun for me, you guys, unless it's an
ABC of crime or something.
Speaker 2 (52:54):
But not all.
Speaker 1 (52:56):
Thinking of doing something like that this week, I was like, Oh,
I should be cool like Rachel and just come up
with an ABC.
Speaker 2 (53:02):
It's been a while, it has been a while.
Speaker 1 (53:06):
Maybe I'll I'll bring something sooner or later in that realm.
Do itlorright, you guys, We.
Speaker 2 (53:15):
Unfortunately, I do love these but that's the raptors.
Speaker 1 (53:18):
I love that you added that in there, and I
was amazing. We're great, all right, Love you guys, Thank
you for listening. If you're still here, you are the
greatest human that has ever existed on this planet. And
we hope that you guys have an amazing week.
Speaker 6 (53:39):
Execute your don't stolen goods, yes, and don't drop banks no,
don't and don't have affairs absolutely not.
Speaker 1 (53:51):
And you know what.
Speaker 2 (53:55):
We understand. In times of financial hardship, it can be hard.
Speaker 1 (54:01):
Yeah, but try not to pick it pocket people or
shoplift or loot. Please, please, The resources out there got
to you gotta feed your babies to figure it out,
you know, try to just find the right resources. But
(54:21):
at the end of the day, you got to feed
your babies. So I get it.
Speaker 2 (54:24):
But like, try to go the right route.
Speaker 1 (54:28):
Yeah. Try. Let's all be tryers. Yeah, you's all want
to be triers.
Speaker 2 (54:33):
I think try your best.
Speaker 1 (54:34):
All right, that's always say I'm gonna be tryed around
here a whole bunch of triers.
Speaker 2 (54:39):
All right, we are not here. We will talk to
you next week.
Speaker 1 (54:42):
K love you, bye, CA, love you bye. Are your.
Speaker 2 (54:49):
Field?
Speaker 1 (54:51):
Tryer? Yeah, try. Don't if you happen to take your
children under your wings, do not.
Speaker 2 (54:58):
Creative criminal rates. Please, you're gonna do the pickpocketing, you
do it, don't you Do.
Speaker 1 (55:05):
Not teach your children to pickpocket.
Speaker 2 (55:08):
They're they're least likely to be looked at though, So
it's like, you know, like a really smart strategy.
Speaker 1 (55:14):
It's not.
Speaker 2 (55:15):
But don't do it. I hate it. But also.
Speaker 1 (55:22):
No, I'm just kidding. It is crazy.
Speaker 2 (55:28):
That is crazy.
Speaker 1 (55:30):
Ship I'm still recording. Okay, that's
Welcome to Like Mother Like Murder. I am Rachel and
I'm Heather. We bring you the good, the badass, and
the crime.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
This is Like Mother Like Murder.
Speaker 1 (00:33):
Hello everyone, and welcome to Like Mother Like Murder, your
favorite true crime mom Cast. I am Rachel and I
am Heather. And each week we bring you mom related
true crime from missing moms to murdered mom's, moms who murder, survivors,
and much much more yues we do. This is your
(00:55):
mom Cast mom Cast coming at you, And today Heather
has our He gave me a little bit of a
spoiler that we are gonna kind of kick it back
a little bit, to kick it back. Oh, kick it
back to the old school days. And one of the
things that we used to do was we would talk
about what we were drinking. And I know, Heather, you
(01:15):
came here with something in that cup, so I want
to hear all about it.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
So it's so funny because we used to do this
all the time.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
But I have in front of me a like Murder
like mr a Like Mother Like Murder mug which you
can get if you so please, and on the backside
it says okay, love you by Yeah, that's it. And
for those of you who have listened to all like
(01:42):
three hundred or something, yeah, so's you know that I
got an espresso machine very much near almost the beginning
of our like mother like Murder journey back like wine
time journey, and it in this cup is a latte,
(02:03):
and I'm feeling it and it's really bringing me back
because not only am I drinking a latte, y'all, but
I also have a case today that is a very
Heather old school.
Speaker 2 (02:17):
Oh, this is a Heather case.
Speaker 1 (02:18):
This is something Heather would go into a deep dive
about and decide to just tell Rachel like something all
about it. Yeah, that's awesome. So I don't have a
like mother like Murder mug because do I even support us? Like?
Why do I not have a like mother like her rock?
But I do you know who? I do support Kevin
(02:41):
from what the weird ones are. I do have that mug.
And because you had your coffee, I ran off camera
very quickly. I do not do lattes. This is actually
iced coffee in this cup, because everyone knows I only
drink iced coffees. And it has a splash of oat milk.
So that's about as groovy as I get. Mine is
(03:03):
an oat milk latte. Yeah, so my newest thing. Because
Starbucks was doing their oat milk or chata.
Speaker 2 (03:14):
Like I was all about it.
Speaker 1 (03:18):
So what I decided was, I'm not going to be
spending five dollars on that every day.
Speaker 2 (03:24):
No, So I went to Trader Joe's.
Speaker 1 (03:27):
I'm sorry, I was about to say Trader's Joe And
if you have any Filipinos in your life, you'll know why.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
But this podcast, I don't know why. My mom in my.
Speaker 1 (03:42):
Head going, yo, let's go to Trader's Joe.
Speaker 2 (03:44):
Okay, So I'll tell you my recipe really quickly, really quickly.
You get the they have.
Speaker 1 (03:52):
A cinnamon bun oat creamer and then you get just
oat milk. You all you need is just like a
literal slash of that cinnamon bun oat milk creamer and
then oat milk and that, I swear it's the orchata.
Speaker 2 (04:12):
I mean, it's better van the awesome.
Speaker 1 (04:15):
Good to know, so good because it has the cinnamon,
it has like cinnamon bun. So it's got like that
vanilla ish flavor. It Lah'll kiss. That is the that
is it Barista's kiss. I do just have to say
because this happened yesterday that I you know, we have
followed the.
Speaker 2 (04:35):
Crystal Rogers case.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
We have brought you all of those updates, and yesterday
was sentencing and you know, they got life in prison.
So I am ecstatic about that. The family members got
to read their statements to him, and they were very powerful,
very emotional. But I'm glad that they were given that
opportunity and able to you know, sit down. I listened
(05:00):
to them all. That family is absolutely incredible, and now
you know, things that were brought up as well, is
the fact that Tommy Ballard. Everyone thinks that there is
this connection. He's alleged right now, so we're gonna be following.
Like even though so many things have happened and there
(05:21):
has been so many closures in one way or another,
there's still so much that needs to happen. We still
don't know where Crystal Rogers is. But finally the people
are that were responsible are held accountable, at least most
of them, and now we wait to see what else happened.
So that was huge for me yesterday. Wanted to share
(05:42):
that yes, yes, yes, about damn time. That is that's
exactly what I was about Damn time. So glad, like
you said that, there is at least a piece of
and then so hard because I know a lot of
families feel like it's never gonna be closure closures, right,
and especially in a case like Crystal Rogers. I mean
we saw it in the Jennifer Doulo's case as well.
(06:05):
We don't have Crystal.
Speaker 2 (06:07):
It's so hard to really get you can't get.
Speaker 1 (06:10):
Closure, but when you don't know where she is too,
that's just so hard not having those answers, right, Yeah, Yeah,
So at least one step in the right direction though, right,
and and a little bit of justice finally served where
it needed to be. So yeah, I just wanted to
add that before we got into time.
Speaker 2 (06:30):
I'm so glad, you so big.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
I know it's something we've talked about all the time
all but I am, I think, besides Adelson, only because
we did so many updates on them right month, Crystal
Rogers has also been our biggest updates constantly making sure
we're covering that case. Yeah, we've been able to do
some you know, and and we we used to do
the episodes where we would bring the updates and it's
(06:54):
not something that I don't I don't want to stop
doing those. Those are important and we absolutely want to
bring those, but you're right, like certain cases that we
have followed, there has been so much Jenniferkulow's Crystal Rogers,
you know, Dan Markel's case, also Suzanne Morpheu, there were
some that we.
Speaker 2 (07:12):
Just followed that had breaks in the case.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
So once that happens, we will absolutely be bringing those updates.
For sure.
Speaker 2 (07:18):
We are trying to keep up to date.
Speaker 1 (07:20):
But if there's a case that you guys see that
you know, something we covered and you're like, ooh, they
should cover, please let us know.
Speaker 2 (07:27):
We would love to. Or if there are theories.
Speaker 1 (07:31):
That you feel when we covered a case that maybe
is insulved that we didn't dive into or you want
us to dive into, let us know. We love listener suggestions.
We've covered cases based on listener suggestions before and we
love that kind of interaction. So definitely definitely hit us up.
Speaker 2 (07:51):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (07:51):
I am ready for today, though, So let's.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
Let's get into it.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
Let me let me set the scene a little bit,
just to give you an idea, because I know, like
I I titled this marm okay, and I know that
doesn't really give a lot of hints, but I know
you know who this is, Jimma Teller Sons of Anarchy, Okay, matriarch,
crime matriarch.
Speaker 2 (08:15):
Do you did you ever watch Weeds?
Speaker 1 (08:17):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (08:18):
Okay, so Nancy, Nancy Botwin Weeds?
Speaker 1 (08:22):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (08:23):
Did you ever watch Peaky Blinders?
Speaker 1 (08:25):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (08:26):
So Pollie Pollie the aunt, right, she was his aunt? Yes,
Peaky Blinders. And then there's that new that new show.
Speaker 1 (08:35):
I haven't actually watched it, but I want to because
it's got uh Retta and I'm big friend of hers.
But her name is I think Beth Beth from Good Girls. No, okay,
that's okay, it's a newer show. We don't watch new shows.
I'm surprised I said yes to everything you just said.
Those are all shows fifteen years ago when we actually
(08:55):
watched shows. Now you have an idea of kind of
where I'm going with marm okay, okay, So let's start
with a quote from the subject of today's episode.
Speaker 2 (09:09):
This is from marm. I am ma, because I give.
Speaker 1 (09:14):
Them what a mother cannot sometimes give money and horses
and diamonds. Wow, money and horses and diamonds. That's all right.
Who are you?
Speaker 2 (09:30):
Who are you?
Speaker 1 (09:31):
Mar? So? How did a modest immigrant from Germany become
one of the most notorious crime bosses in New York,
being dubbed old Mother Mandelbaumb, eventually having to flee to Canada,
but not before backing two of the most successful.
Speaker 2 (09:52):
Bank robberies in history.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
Wow, damn right, you've probably never heard of her, but
we're gonna.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
Fix that today.
Speaker 1 (10:05):
This is the true life story of crime boss Frederica
marm Mandelbomb aka Mother Mandelbomb. When I first wrote that,
I was going flashbacks to like old MTV like two
Life Story.
Speaker 2 (10:25):
Yeah, did you ever watch that?
Speaker 1 (10:27):
I can tell you yes, yes, yeah, I can totally
see that. But also that is that's quite the that's
quite the name right there. I know, Frederica Mandelbomb. Yeah,
oh why that just instantly makes me think, like she's
gotta be a matriarch.
Speaker 3 (10:47):
Type right, like that so much her name is yeah,
it screams that right, Like it's just like automatically, like
she was born to be the person one hundred percent.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
And the more I tell you about her, her name
fits like she definitely was born to be this person. Okay,
so born Frederic So she's German, which is why, like
she was born Frederic, but people say Frederica okay. So.
Born Frederic Weisner aka Frederica on March twenty fifth, eighteen
(11:27):
twenty five, in Castle, Germany to a Jewish family. She
ended up marrying Wolf Mandelbaum around eighteen forty eight, and
then a few years later they immigrated to New York City.
Speaker 2 (11:40):
There was a masts immigration to New York City.
Speaker 1 (11:44):
They ended up settling in a place in New York
City named Little Germany. And she was still in her
early twenties at the time, so very young. And in
those early years in New York City, her and her
husband Wolf were pretty much peddlers.
Speaker 2 (12:00):
So they were literally hawking.
Speaker 1 (12:02):
Everything from broken watches, scraps of like silk cloth, whatever
they could find, literally carrying this stuff on their backs,
setting it up in the streets like vendors, and using
any tricks that they could to just get people to
come over to their makeshift shop.
Speaker 2 (12:23):
Yeah why what they were selling exactly.
Speaker 1 (12:27):
And they were doing everything they could to make ends
meet for their At this point they had had They
ended up having four children, two sons and two daughters,
and times were tough and only getting tougher. But Frederica,
she was not going to settle. Not long after they
arrived in America, financial crisis hit the US, so it
(12:51):
was called the Panic of eighteen fifty seven. Businesses were
failing left and right, Unemployment was high, and many already downtrodden,
down on their luck. Poor resorted to pickpocketing and looting
to get by, and this included children, teenagers and adults alike.
(13:14):
Frederica saw opportunity and what she did was she began
teaching others, and a lot of times this was young
children and teenagers how to pickpocket and shoplift, and then
she would fence the product, meaning she would take what
they stole, and then she would sell the stolen good
(13:35):
for profit. And sorry, this makes me think of the
woman that we covered a while back who was having
the people steal from like the shops and she was
reselling it out of her grin. Yeah, yeah, I forgot
her exactly, but yeah, that's crazy. This is and as
you hear more about this, yeah, exact same.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
This was her idol. This is who she looked up to.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
This is she read about Fredrika and was like, I
can't do this one under press because one thing that
made Frederica really good about this is she was an immigrant,
but she's and they were in learned Little Germany.
Speaker 2 (14:10):
She spoke German right, but she was also really good
at English.
Speaker 1 (14:15):
So she was really good at forming those relationships with
the other immigrants, so teaching them this is how you pickpocket,
this is how you shoplift, this is how you loot.
Speaker 2 (14:26):
But then she was also.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
Really good with her English and being able to sell
these stolen goods out a profit.
Speaker 2 (14:37):
To Americans.
Speaker 1 (14:39):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (14:40):
So she continued to cultivate the relationship she had and
she was offering this motherly advice in this support to
a lot of these folks, and she never forgot where
she came from. So eventually Frederica would graduate from selling
these goods on the street and she actually opened a shop.
(15:01):
In eighteen sixty five, she was able to rent a
space down on the Lower East Side and her and
her husband opened this dry goods and habitashery store where
they were basically it was a front for selling all
these stolen products. But now they're.
Speaker 1 (15:20):
Doing it out of a store, so it's a more
reputable establishment. Yeah, storefront makes you think like absolutely everything's
fine and dandy, and it's not just like this lady
was like, I'm not selling these out of my trunk,
I'm selling these on Amazon.
Speaker 2 (15:37):
Yeah, reputable, Okay, crazy.
Speaker 1 (15:40):
So within a few short years, by eighteen seventy three,
not only did she own the shop, now she no
longer had to rent.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
She owned the shop on the first floor, but.
Speaker 1 (15:50):
Then her family also occupied the apartments that were above
and now they had extra warehouse room for the not
so legally obtain and goods. So it's so funny you
said that, because remember how that lady had like the
garage shock full of all the stuff. Oh yeah, so
did Frederica. Fredrika had a bunch of warehouse.
Speaker 2 (16:10):
Room for all of her stolen products. Yeah, becomes a system.
There's a method to the madness exactly. So her business
continued to grow.
Speaker 1 (16:22):
Eventually, her husband did die in eighteen seventy five, and
at this point, at this point, marm Mandelbaum, she had
four kids, raging from eight to fifteen years old. But
she expanded her circle. She was like, I don't need
my husband. This was all me, baby, and she just
continued to network. She networked at her synagogue and neighborhood
(16:44):
beer and oyster halls alike. She made herself known in
criminal circles and in high society, making all the right
connections cricket, cops, judges, even politicians. She knew what she
was doing, and she wasn't known as mother Mandelbomb for nothing. Okay,
(17:04):
she used that maternal instinct and she wanted to make
way for the next generation. So she allegedly opened a
school for children, supposedly allegedly right down the street from
the local police department, where children could learn to be
successful in the business. We're talking. They could learn to pickpocket, shoplift, burglary,
(17:31):
and they could graduate all the way up to full
blown cons That's it's insane. Like here, let me take
you guys under my wing, my criminal wing, yes exactly,
and bring you up in this way under my criminal
(17:56):
wing into my criminal ring. Nine. It's crazy.
Speaker 2 (18:02):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (18:03):
So not only did she provide this education for future criminals,
but she also had a special fund that was specifically
meant to provide bail money and legal fees for a
chosen few who she favored. This specifically included some very
(18:25):
famous female criminals like Sophie Lyons, who was a very
notorious female thief and con woman from also the same period,
the late eighteen eighties, and if they ever got into
you know, like if they ever got caught, or they
ever needed you know, bail money or they needed a lawyer,
(18:46):
she was like, Okay, you're on my special list. I'm
going to front you cash for whatever you need. So
she had a special fund just for this. And Frederica's
own children also later role in her criminal enterprise. Okay,
her son Julius played a very large part in her business.
(19:09):
And it's also said that one of her daughters was
actually married to either it was either a detective or
a politician. A politician and was potentially providing her mom
with like some insider information. So one report that I
read also said that her children, and from what I'm
(19:32):
understanding was most likely Julius, would come with her when
she would go to evaluate stolen goods to determine Okay,
this is good enough, and I'll go ahead and get
what's worth it and what's not exactly that they would
come with her and they would be the lookout for
detectives who would want to catch the infamous mother Mandelbaum
(19:53):
and what she was doing. But Frederica was smart, and
she was careful, and she knew how to be criminally successful,
but to remain out of reach from the law, well,
especially if she has a whole system and people who
are within and able to you know, look out or
(20:15):
know what's going on and update. So it's a whole
family scheme at.
Speaker 2 (20:20):
This since it is a family scheme.
Speaker 1 (20:22):
And the biggest thing, one thing I read throughout all
of this was that she was incredibly like loyal to
the people she worked with in that she never forgot
where she came from. So like, she opened that shop
on the Lower East Side, and after a few years
(20:42):
she was making enough money she easily could have moved
and lived in like the ritzy part of New York,
but she didn't.
Speaker 2 (20:50):
She stayed where she was. She never forgot where she
came from, and she never forgot who she worked with.
Speaker 1 (20:58):
And she she brought the same people up with her,
right she had, like this right hand man who she
worked with for decades. You know, she brought her children
along with her, the same people she surrounded herself with.
So she's a moral criminal, like cracked is that can
those you don't see those go inside very often? Well,
(21:23):
what do they say, there's honor amongst thieves or something
like that. So so her enterprise continued to growl. But
like I said, she was smart. She was never once
the one actually cracking a safe or running from the
robbery herself. But she did finance a lot of criminal
(21:44):
endeavors and she would take her cut. She was behind
some of the largest heists in history. So one was
the eighteen sixty nine Ocean National Bank robbery.
Speaker 2 (21:59):
So enter George Leslie.
Speaker 1 (22:02):
He was an architect who decided that bank robbing was
a more lucrative career. Okay, I mean he's probably not wrong.
If you're good, we don't support doing the wrong thing
around here, Like, yeah, you can make money by stealing
from a by robbing a bank.
Speaker 2 (22:23):
Okay, it's not the right bank, it's not the right thing.
Speaker 1 (22:28):
So he actually moved to the East Coast, and he
was an architect, so he did not have an end
to the criminal world. So he was actually seeking out
someone like Mandelbaum to figure out how he could do this.
And so he had a meeting with Mandelbaum and he
(22:48):
intrigued her with his less violent way of breaking into
a bank.
Speaker 2 (22:54):
He wasn't there to just.
Speaker 1 (22:56):
Like blow up a safe with dynamite, No, he had this.
He was an architect, he had this very intricate way
basically of picking the lock.
Speaker 2 (23:06):
I won't go into all the details.
Speaker 1 (23:09):
But he had this very intricate way of stealing the cash,
and mother Mandelbaum took to the young man and decided, Okay,
I'm gonna fund you, I'm gonna make this happen for you,
and i'm gonna staff your plan. So, like I said,
I'm not gonna go into all the details. But in
the show notes, there's this really good article about George
(23:31):
Leslie and his bank heists in his whole career as
a architect.
Speaker 2 (23:38):
Turned bank robber.
Speaker 1 (23:40):
Okay, but this successful robbery of the Ocean National Bank
ended up being the largest bank robbery in the then
history of New York City City, with the thieves getting
almost a million dollars. And this is back in eighteen
sixty nine. So they got away with seven hundred and
sixty eight thousand, eight hundred and seventy nine dollars and
(24:00):
ninety four cents worth of stolen cash, jewelry, and securities.
So when you adjust that or say that I'm sorry,
say that number, yeah, and then you're gonna say exactly
what I want to hear, But say that number seven
hundred and sixty eight thousand dollars, seven hundred and sixty
eight thousand. M hm. So when you adjust that to
today's money, eighteen million dollars mm hmm. And because mother
(24:29):
Mandelbomb knew how to fence stuff, so that wasn't just cash,
that was also jewelry and securities and this kind of stuff.
She knew how to fence things, so it's believed that
she also had the means to launder all those non
cash items. Her cut eight hundred thousand dollars, which would
have been twenty three million in today's money. Wait, how
(24:54):
was I missed? I missed something?
Speaker 2 (24:56):
How was her way? Hold on than?
Speaker 1 (24:58):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (24:58):
Yeah, yeah, hold on back up? Okay, I was like, wait,
what are you talking about?
Speaker 1 (25:02):
Her cut was more than that's even more Badass's crazy.
She's not a badass, by the way, I want to
point out.
Speaker 2 (25:10):
She is a badass. She's a bass. I think I
mixed those up. Okay, I don't know why her cut was,
but uh.
Speaker 1 (25:18):
Didn't you say that he only made like seven hundred
and eighty six thousand, so how would he get more
than what he made?
Speaker 2 (25:23):
I don't know, Rachel, that's crazy.
Speaker 1 (25:25):
That's okay, you don't need to know, because I think
there's a lot that we don't know about this lady
that probably happened. Oh, she was charging interests for sure.
She said, yeah, you're gonna make some money. Not that's nuts.
It was funny because I was actually I told Zach
about this lady because he's super into like all these.
Speaker 2 (25:48):
Random historical things. Then I was like, had you ever
heard of her before?
Speaker 1 (25:51):
And he's like no, So of course I read him
my entire script, and so of course he starts looking
into Mandelbaumb and then I said, you need to read
about George Leslie too, and this whole, this whole bank robbery,
and so he's reading about it. So basically, George Leslie
was like, I need a funder, I need a backer,
and he knew that Mandelbaum was a great way to
(26:13):
get in. She had a lot of contacts. She was like, Okay,
i'll fund you, but this is gonna be like a tryout.
You're a brand new guy. Before this happens. She basically said,
I need to get revenge on this woman because uh,
she joined a rival prime family. And it turns out
(26:34):
that George Leslie was actually having an affair with her.
Oh wow.
Speaker 2 (26:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:40):
So it turns out George Leslie is a bit of
a hoe because I'll and I'll tell you during the
next one.
Speaker 2 (26:46):
Yeah, he's a hoe.
Speaker 1 (26:47):
So basically, Fredrika got someone to still a ring from
somebody and then gave it to George Leslie's girlfriend affair
lady who Mandelbaumb doesn't like for joining the rival gang.
And then this woman where's it actually thinking it's from George,
and she wears it to this fancy dinner party. Turns
(27:10):
out who it was stolen from was actually the wife
of a district court judge, and she is.
Speaker 2 (27:17):
At the dinner party.
Speaker 1 (27:19):
Oh my god. The woman who it got stolen from
was like, bitch, that's my ring. She calls up her
husband and she goes this lady's stole my ring. And
so the court judge sends in the Pinkertons, which is
like you know, private, yes, back then, And the Pinkerton
agents raid this woman's home and find all this stolen stuff,
(27:41):
and then that lady goes to jail and then Mandelbaum's like, okay,
you're allowed in now, you're allowed to continue working on
this bank robbery. And you've proven that A you're loyal
to me and B you won't be so distracted. Yeah,
that's crazy. You know what's crazy too, is like I'm positive.
(28:05):
I mean, it's there's so much back then and today
that happens like this, right, but we're just so normal
we don't see it. Like I'm telling you absolutely something
that is probably happening right now all the time. Yeah,
constantly the drama. And that's what's so crazy is like
this this story, that exact thing that I explained is
(28:29):
happening I'm sure all the time, and we are we
just live such normal lives.
Speaker 2 (28:36):
Yeah, so we have no idea reading.
Speaker 1 (28:38):
About this stuff, about this this woman who's just like
this crime boss of this is happening all the time.
Speaker 2 (28:45):
We covered a case of.
Speaker 1 (28:46):
A woman who was basically doing this exact thing, right,
I mean, it's insane, it is. That is crazy. Okay,
tell me more. Okay. So, like I said, that heist
was basically like tryout for George. He was not in
any way like a known criminal, and so Mandelbomb's like,
(29:07):
I'm gonna take a chance on you.
Speaker 2 (29:08):
Believe in your idea, but we got to try you out.
So he pulled it off.
Speaker 1 (29:13):
And this basically skyrocketed his reputation. And with a backer
like Fredrika Mandelbaum, he was in it. And so he
got a crew. He became a criminal in good standing,
so to speak, and him and his crew started bank
robbing up and down the East Coast, had very successful careers.
(29:34):
And then in eighteen seventy eight they had been planning
this bank robbery for like three years. His crew went
on to rob the Manhattan Savings Institution.
Speaker 2 (29:45):
Now I say his.
Speaker 1 (29:46):
Crew, yeah, and I'll get to that. But again this
was financed by Frederica and she also later helped launder
the securities in the Manhattan Savings Institution.
Speaker 2 (29:58):
Robbery ended up.
Speaker 1 (29:59):
Netting two point seven million dollars, which is over eighty
million in today's money, and that is the largest heist
in history two to till today. That is still the
largest heist in history. And our Frederica marm Mandelbaumb.
Speaker 2 (30:17):
Was the backer.
Speaker 1 (30:18):
No, like I said, Crewe was the one who did it. Unfortunately,
George Leslie never saw his payday because he was found murdered.
Now it is unsolved, but there are a couple theories.
I've already got a couple theories. Tell me So one
(30:43):
theory is there's this one guy that was on his
crew that basically didn't like him a because George used
to take the pretty significant cut. I think George used
to take like fifty percent because he was the one
that basically invented you'll have to read whole little article,
but he invented a little thing that could pick the
(31:04):
lock of a safe without having exploded. Okay, Okay, so
he used to take a bigger cut, which his partner
didn't think was fair. B George was also having an
affair with multiple of his cruise partner's wives.
Speaker 2 (31:18):
Okay, hoh see.
Speaker 1 (31:22):
See there were rumors that he was actually going to
jump ship from Frederica Mandelbombs backing and start kind of
working with another criminal enterprise. Yeah, yeah, you don't do that,
(31:43):
Georgie Warg who gave you your start in the criminal world. Okay,
we love how you're trying to be like, hey, don't
do that. Don't go from one wrong to a different wrong.
You know, like you're already this deep inside of like
the crazy you know, scheme and person who does this
(32:04):
and criminal matriarchs plan. Why would you leave to someone else?
So it's currently unsolved but there is a lot of
theories as to why this man did not ever see
his payday from the largest heist in history. That's crazy. Two. Now,
(32:27):
we've talked about two of the literal largest robberies, and
Fredrika marm Mandelbaumb got her cut from both of them,
but she continued to remain untouched by the long arm
of the law. So in addition to her payouts from
heightst like this, Fredrika she was still fencing. She was
(32:49):
known as the Queen of fenses, right. She was still
receiving souling goods and turning them for a profit. And
it is said that she had as much just ten
million dollars worth of stolen luxury goods.
Speaker 2 (33:04):
So we're talking.
Speaker 1 (33:05):
Gold, diamonds, silk apparently she really liked silk, lace, cash,
Miller jewels, all fenced.
Speaker 2 (33:15):
Through that modest little habitashery shop on the Lower East Side.
Speaker 1 (33:22):
Yeah. So in today's money, do you know how much
ten million is? You're saying ten million from how ten million?
Speaker 4 (33:33):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (33:33):
Yeah? I think did I remember you saying something like
two point seven was like eighty million, So I don't
know three billion. I've already like messed up all my numbers,
so I don't know. Oh, okay, what is that? So no,
I have no idea. So it's like something like three
(33:53):
hundred and eighty million dollars.
Speaker 2 (33:57):
Yeah, so this.
Speaker 1 (34:01):
Like at this point, she's like, you know, fifty six
year old woman who started out as an immigrant literally
selling on the streets scraps of silk and broken watches,
is now pushing out.
Speaker 2 (34:21):
Four hundred million.
Speaker 1 (34:23):
Wow. Okay, but eventually it all comes crumbling down. Yes, ma'am,
it tell me about her downfall and evil. Let's hear
about her downfall. I don't know if you're gonna be
happy or sad about her downfall.
Speaker 2 (34:40):
Quite almost I.
Speaker 1 (34:41):
Feel like I'm gonna be happy. I don't want her
scheming all these other people. So in eighteen eighty four,
a new district attorney, Peter b Onney, went after marm.
He deployed the Pinkertons, which you know we know is
a private detective force, which was probably smart because the
(35:04):
NYPD we know had probably been on her.
Speaker 2 (35:07):
Payroll for decades. Right.
Speaker 1 (35:08):
Absolutely, they were not they weren't gonna, They're not gonna.
They're not gonna not pad their own pockets. So the Pinkertons,
they launched like kind of like a sting undercover investigation.
And this guy, Goustaf Frank, he actually pretended to be
(35:29):
a man named Stein, and he took advantage of the
fact that Fredrika Mandelbaum she had First of all, she
she was very generous towards other thieves.
Speaker 2 (35:41):
That's where she had.
Speaker 1 (35:42):
Her you know, humble beginnings, and particularly those who had
a German Jewish background.
Speaker 2 (35:50):
So that's what he did.
Speaker 1 (35:53):
And basically he wiggled his way into her inner circle, okay.
And what he did is he eventually purchased marked silk
from her, so he was able. They were able to
mark silk like n you know, to the naked eye,
no one could see it, and then they you know,
(36:14):
stole it, and then he purchased the stolen goods from her. Okay. So,
after over like two decades of successfully evading the authorities, Fredrika,
along with her son Julius, and one of like her
(36:34):
right hand man who she had been with her for years,
were arrested in July of eighteen eighty four. Her bail
was set at ten k, which is for her.
Speaker 2 (36:48):
Chump change, right, Like, yeah, that's crazy, there's nothing to her.
Speaker 1 (36:53):
She made that in the morning, like that's what she
probably literally had that in her pocket.
Speaker 2 (37:00):
Serious And but I mean, she's getting charged.
Speaker 1 (37:03):
She's not getting charged with murder, she's not getting charged
with like kidnappings, She's not getting charged with anything violent.
Speaker 2 (37:08):
She's getting charged with, you know, like selling a stolen good.
Here be very quickly.
Speaker 1 (37:14):
Posted her bail and she had some very good lawyers
and they were able to work their lawyer magic and
they got you know, her hearings postponed. And at this point,
she's like pushing sixty. You know, she never really issued
public statements in the past, but she's like.
Speaker 2 (37:30):
I would never wear innocent.
Speaker 1 (37:35):
Rachel. Yeah, my faces, I would never, but you did,
Like that is the clip. That is the clip we used.
I would never. But she's out on bail. She's at
home the Pinkerton's. They set up twenty four to seven
(37:55):
surveillance at her you know, she's got she's still at
the same place she's been since eighteen sixty five. She's
got her habit ashery shop on the bottom and then
her apartments on the upper level. They set up twenty
four seven surveillance at her place, and they want to
make sure like she's not gonna flee and when her.
Speaker 2 (38:16):
Trial they starts. It's so funny.
Speaker 1 (38:18):
There's this one there's this one article where they talk
about there in the courtroom and her they announced like
Fredrika Mandelbaum, like you know, show up and her lawyer
looks around, like where is she?
Speaker 2 (38:32):
I don't know where was mother.
Speaker 1 (38:34):
Mandelbaumb Well back in Germany.
Speaker 2 (38:39):
No, the fifty nine year old was in Canada.
Speaker 1 (38:42):
Oh, sources say that she had outsmarted the Pinkertons using
a body double. Oh okay, yeah, so she was in
Canada and at the time, there was no extradition between
Canada and the US for the crimes that she had
committed because, like I said, like this was like stolen
(39:04):
goods crimes, Like if it had been murdered or something
violent or more serious, they probably.
Speaker 2 (39:09):
Could have extradited. But this was not.
Speaker 1 (39:12):
And that's crazy because it's not like she It's crazier
to me because it's not like she just robbed like
the mall or a wal Mart or something like that.
This is millions and millions and millions of dollars, right,
But they're not getting her on the on the heist, right, Okay.
All they got her on was a few yards of silk, right, right, right,
(39:35):
But I know, well everyone knows, right, you can't prove.
It doesn't matter what you know, it matters what you've
been proved.
Speaker 2 (39:45):
Okay's true.
Speaker 1 (39:46):
True.
Speaker 2 (39:48):
That was in eighteen eighty four. In eighteen eighty.
Speaker 1 (39:51):
Five, her daughter Annie, who was still back in New York,
actually ended up dying of pneumonia. Yeah, and mother Mandelbaumb
actually risked getting caught, and she snuck, it said. She
snuck back into the US and attended the wake, which
(40:14):
was at her old shop slashed home using a disguise
and a hidden entrance that the thieves used to use
to get in and out, but was not going to
miss saying goodbye to her daughter, so she attended the
wake and then snuck back to Canada.
Speaker 2 (40:34):
And Frederica ended.
Speaker 1 (40:35):
Up living out the remaining years, which happened to be
only about like nine ten more years in Canada, and
then she ended up passing away in Canada and her
body was then eventually returned back to New York where
she was buried with her family. And she was sixty
eight years old.
Speaker 2 (40:56):
Oh yeah, yep, that is.
Speaker 1 (41:04):
Insane. Like there's portions of this story where I think
the word incredible come to mind. And I don't like
to glorify or you know, be like, that's awesome what
you did, because it's wrong, But it's also incredible in
a way that you can get away with all of
(41:26):
this over so long, still to this day, and this
is something that happened in the eighteen hundred still be
the largest heist of all time type of stuff, you know, and.
Speaker 2 (41:40):
Live your life right free, freely on the run at
the end of it. Holy hell, what's crazy to me?
Speaker 4 (41:50):
We have heard about the Bugsy guy or like Babyface
Gotty the mob, or like the Gambinos or all of
these more mob mafia crime family crime syndicates.
Speaker 1 (42:09):
Now, granted, you know, their criminal enterprises were a lot
more than just fencing and robbing. A lot of these
crime syndicates included sex.
Speaker 2 (42:21):
Work and murder, murder.
Speaker 1 (42:25):
For hire and you know, gambling and definitely more more
violent stuff. Now do I think that mother mandel Bomb
probably like dabbled in some more violent shits.
Speaker 2 (42:39):
She probably probably had to get something to beat up
every once in a while.
Speaker 1 (42:46):
You know, you do this for however many decades, and yeah,
that's definitely a possibility, But I think it's kind of
crazy to me, right, why do we not know her
name like this?
Speaker 2 (42:57):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (42:57):
That is that is an insane part. I feel like
this would be a bigger, bigger no name and in
conversations you know all the time, like other people that
you named right, right, and so it's just it is,
it's absolutely.
Speaker 2 (43:15):
Mind boggling to me.
Speaker 1 (43:16):
So I don't even remember how I ran across it.
I think I was just like googling lesser known because
I didn't want to do a murder or anything violent
this week. I think we've been working really hard on
our projects that we've been working on.
Speaker 2 (43:32):
And I felt I needed to take from a page
from our old book.
Speaker 1 (43:37):
Yeah, and I just needed I don't I hate saying
lighthearted because this is definitely crime, but you know, yeah,
but it's definitely way more light hearted than we've been
working on some heavier stuff. So I was like, let me,
let me and whenever we do stuff from like eighteen
hundred seventeen hundreds, I think it's just a little, you know,
(43:58):
it's a little less heavy.
Speaker 2 (44:00):
And so I, you know, I was googling stuff.
Speaker 1 (44:03):
And this this lady popped up. I'm like, why have
I never heard of this? Like this would have stuck
out in my head. And so the more I start
reading about her, and then I get to like these
heists that she funded, and I'm like, because I've heard
of George Leslie, but yeah, what he wouldn't even exist
if it wasn't for this lady. She put him on
the map, that is christ I was like, I need
(44:25):
to bring this to Rachel, like I need Rachel that
you didn't hear and to everyone else that is now
I want to look into her more. Did you, like,
during your research, did you find like books or documentaries
or movies or like anything that are.
Speaker 2 (44:41):
There is someone does someone did write a book about her?
Speaker 1 (44:45):
In my sources, how was this not like a film
that everyone knows who she is because of a film,
Because this is exactly interestingly, back in the nineteen hundreds,
I read a one of the articles that said, after
her death, back in the nineteen hundreds, they made a movie.
(45:05):
I say, nineteen hundreds. It's still funny, early nineteen hundreds,
I should say, oh my god, we were born one hundreds, Rachel.
Speaker 5 (45:13):
Yeah, Bill, I just had like a moment, Holy crap,
they made a movie and it was.
Speaker 1 (45:27):
New York City, you know, early eighteen hundred or early
nineteen hundreds kind of time, and they said, like, oh,
enter this character. She's a marm Mandelbomb type. So I
think back then it was definitely more of a person.
But so there is a book by Margalite Fox called
(45:48):
The Talented Missus Mandelbaumb The Rise and Fall of an
American Organized Crime Boss. Wow.
Speaker 2 (45:55):
Mm hmm.
Speaker 1 (45:57):
But I've actually found a lot of really cool smith
Smithsonian Magazine and Museum of the City of New York.
So I think on the East coast there's a lot
more about her, just like in the history.
Speaker 2 (46:11):
Because what I also did.
Speaker 1 (46:12):
At one point was I went on Google and I
googled where her shop was because the location, you know,
I don't know if it's still the same building, but
the location is still there on the Lower East Side,
you know, and I'm like, that's so interesting.
Speaker 2 (46:27):
So like, you know, literally.
Speaker 1 (46:28):
Buildings and be like, this is where mother mantel Bomb was.
There should be a plaque.
Speaker 2 (46:37):
This is a historical, like historical figure. If we ever
go to New York when going to New York, when
we go to New York to sell out Times.
Speaker 1 (46:47):
Square, some day we will go and you know how
when we went to uh, Nashville. We did that ghost
tour that actually we we we had him kind of
turn into a crime ghost, right right, we will do that.
We'll say, bring us to Marmandelbaum's place. That's crazy. What
if they're like, we don't know who that is, you
(47:08):
don't belong here. I will literally bring up our podcast
and say, listen to episode.
Speaker 2 (47:15):
Whatever episode this is.
Speaker 1 (47:18):
We will never know.
Speaker 2 (47:19):
You guys, you guys thought us.
Speaker 1 (47:24):
I'm not counting counting. Yeah, this is episode.
Speaker 2 (47:30):
Season four. We know that as good as we get.
Speaker 1 (47:35):
Are we in season four?
Speaker 2 (47:36):
Yes?
Speaker 1 (47:37):
It's crazy. Who do we think we are? Heather? That's crazy?
Speaker 2 (47:42):
What an insane, insane story?
Speaker 1 (47:45):
It is it? You know, to kind of like bring
it back to what you were doing in the beginning
and you were naming all these people. I feel like
we find this character not just speaking of her, but
this character type so fascinating because there's it's it just
blows your mind on like how someone can do this
and and and orchestrate it all and get away with
(48:08):
it for so long. And the names that you you
bring up in these shows, Gemma Teller, you know, it's they're.
Speaker 2 (48:20):
Beloved in a way of like.
Speaker 1 (48:25):
They're the heart and soul of this family and of
y crime mob whatever they created, and they are the
matriarch of the whole thing. Yes, and without them everything
would fall apart. And so it is crazy because I
do know those those characters, and I find myself watching
(48:45):
them thinking.
Speaker 2 (48:46):
Like, damn, that's nuts, you know, yeah, and then knowing.
Speaker 1 (48:50):
That you know it happens in real life, is like.
Speaker 5 (48:54):
It is.
Speaker 1 (48:55):
It is crazy because you and I think the biggest
thing is you think about like where she started.
Speaker 2 (49:02):
Literally, I'm here, I'm on the streets.
Speaker 1 (49:05):
I am doing whatever I can to provide for my
four young children. Yeah, you know what, I I can't
get a job. No one around me can get a job.
The country is in a financial crisis. We do what
we do to put food on the table to survive.
Speaker 2 (49:21):
You know what, I know I'm good at.
Speaker 1 (49:23):
I can I can get these little these kids to
go pickpocket because they're better at it. And then what
am I good at? I can take what they have
and I can sell it at a better price. No
one's gonna want to buy something from the six year old,
but I can speak good English and I can get
them to buy it from me.
Speaker 2 (49:42):
So we're gonna band.
Speaker 1 (49:43):
Together and we're both gonna it's gonna be a win
win situation. And you know, you start like that and
then before you know it. I mean, I don't think
she ever thought like, one day, I'm gonna be worth
you know, in her in her time, you know, ten
million dollars and I'm gonna be running this you know,
super crazy criminal enterprise and I'm going to back the
(50:04):
largest heist in history.
Speaker 2 (50:05):
No, I don't think.
Speaker 1 (50:06):
When she first starts out pickpocketing she thinks this is
you know, that's what's gonna be my life one day.
You build to that over the years, right, I think
when she you would think that when she first rented
that that storefront, she was like, Okay, this is great.
Now I can really put food on the table for
my kids. And then it just builds over the years
(50:29):
and before you know what, you're looking back going holy crap.
But that's what's so scary, right, right, That's how you
just got to be careful and because before you know it,
you're sucked in and there's no going back. You can
just stop, right, And that's what's I think we've covered
(50:52):
people before, you know, moms on the other side where
you got sucked in to this, to this, and there
was plenty points where you could have stopped.
Speaker 2 (51:08):
And you didn't. Yeah, and you know now.
Speaker 1 (51:11):
It's it's too far, too little, too late, and there's
no going back, too far gone. Yeah, exactly. Damn well,
she marm shesh marm, marm. Wow, hadther a great job.
I I do appreciate when you bring these cases. They're interesting.
(51:35):
They kind of captivate you and take you on a
whole different ride, which is nice, you know, so mom,
related love that, Mother Marm, but not not gonna bring
you down, you know, it's not. It's not. And also,
I mean, I mean, we talk about these cases because
we want to see resolution, we want to raise awareness,
(51:58):
we want to do those things. And in this one
that's not in any way, shape or form, you know
the backing of this right, And so when I say
bring you down, it's just you know, it is heavy.
It is hard to hear certain things, but important and
that's why we do them. So it's nice to sprinkle
a little bit of this in And I love it.
(52:19):
I love it, crazy crazy, crazy, all right. I loved that.
Thank you very much for that. Anything else before we
go No, I just want to give a shout out
to all of our our wonderful listeners that hope you
guys enjoyed this little fun history lesson. Yeah, and we'll
(52:41):
be back next week with some more fun stuff or
or not or not not if it's my week. You
don't get fun for me, you guys, unless it's an
ABC of crime or something.
Speaker 2 (52:54):
But not all.
Speaker 1 (52:56):
Thinking of doing something like that this week, I was like, Oh,
I should be cool like Rachel and just come up
with an ABC.
Speaker 2 (53:02):
It's been a while, it has been a while.
Speaker 1 (53:06):
Maybe I'll I'll bring something sooner or later in that realm.
Do itlorright, you guys, We.
Speaker 2 (53:15):
Unfortunately, I do love these but that's the raptors.
Speaker 1 (53:18):
I love that you added that in there, and I
was amazing. We're great, all right, Love you guys, Thank
you for listening. If you're still here, you are the
greatest human that has ever existed on this planet. And
we hope that you guys have an amazing week.
Speaker 6 (53:39):
Execute your don't stolen goods, yes, and don't drop banks no,
don't and don't have affairs absolutely not.
Speaker 1 (53:51):
And you know what.
Speaker 2 (53:55):
We understand. In times of financial hardship, it can be hard.
Speaker 1 (54:01):
Yeah, but try not to pick it pocket people or
shoplift or loot. Please, please, The resources out there got
to you gotta feed your babies to figure it out,
you know, try to just find the right resources. But
(54:21):
at the end of the day, you got to feed
your babies. So I get it.
Speaker 2 (54:24):
But like, try to go the right route.
Speaker 1 (54:28):
Yeah. Try. Let's all be tryers. Yeah, you's all want
to be triers.
Speaker 2 (54:33):
I think try your best.
Speaker 1 (54:34):
All right, that's always say I'm gonna be tryed around
here a whole bunch of triers.
Speaker 2 (54:39):
All right, we are not here. We will talk to
you next week.
Speaker 1 (54:42):
K love you, bye, CA, love you bye. Are your.
Speaker 2 (54:49):
Field?
Speaker 1 (54:51):
Tryer? Yeah, try. Don't if you happen to take your
children under your wings, do not.
Speaker 2 (54:58):
Creative criminal rates. Please, you're gonna do the pickpocketing, you
do it, don't you Do.
Speaker 1 (55:05):
Not teach your children to pickpocket.
Speaker 2 (55:08):
They're they're least likely to be looked at though, So
it's like, you know, like a really smart strategy.
Speaker 1 (55:14):
It's not.
Speaker 2 (55:15):
But don't do it. I hate it. But also.
Speaker 1 (55:22):
No, I'm just kidding. It is crazy.
Speaker 2 (55:28):
That is crazy.
Speaker 1 (55:30):
Ship I'm still recording. Okay, that's
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