The Big Con (18 page)

Jews are difficult, but there is a con man’s proverb which says, “It takes ten Jews to trim one Greek.” And all con men agree that it is next to impossible to trim a Chinese. “I don’t know any grifter who would be dumb enough to try to trim a Chink,” said Little Chappie Lohr. “I’ve often seen them watching flat-joints down in China-
town [San Francisco] that were playing for tourist suckers. They would look on for about five minutes, then walk on with a kindly grin. They’re a fly lot, those Chinks. They can smell a crooked joint.” Nevertheless, Chinese do occasionally fall victim to confidence men.

“Once a mark, always a mark,” and “You can’t knock a good mark” are not meaningless sayings; they have been born of long experience, and express a good deal more of the grifter’s philosophy about marks than appears on the surface.

It is easy for the layman to understand why some marks “blow up” when they realize that they have been trimmed. If these marks are not properly cooled out, they may get the mob into serious trouble, or, more rarely, kill or injure the roper. The average reader can readily sympathize with the mark whom Christ Tracy once trimmed for a large chunk in New York. “I’ve been calling you Mr. Bennett for the past week,” said the mark, “but now I’m going to call you the biggest s—– of a b—– in New York.” Some years later Christ encountered the mark on the street in Boston. “What are you calling me now, my friend?” he kidded. “I haven’t changed my mind since I saw you last in New York,” snapped the mark and walked away.

But it is difficult for the legitimate citizen (and sometimes for the mark himself) to understand why a man, once trimmed on a con game, will go back for another dose of the same medicine. Yet it happens all the time. Grifters have an endless fund of stories which illustrate this fact.

“I roped a mark for the last turn at faro-bank in Chicago,” said a fine short-con man named Scotty. “Old Hugh Brady played for him. The mark went for about ten
grand—all he had at the time. About two years later Old Hughey was strolling down Clark Street and he met Mr. Mark, who was tickled to see him again. He said, ‘I’ve been looking for you for a long time. I’ve raised some more money and I’d like to play that faro game again.’ Brady told the mark that he had moved to another hotel. He rented another room and framed the gaff and took the mark all over again.”

The Big Alabama Kid tells of a mark they had beaten in Miami for $50,000. “We figured he was good for a second play,” said the Kid, “so we sent him from Miami to Vancouver, B. C., for $30,000 more. He was gone for nearly three months. The store had given him up for lost, strayed or stolen. But one day who should come in smiling but Mr. Bates with a lot of apologies for keeping me waiting so long. He said that his banker had tried to tell him that this deal was a swindle, and wouldn’t let him have his money. So he waited until things had cooled off at home and the banker had forgotten all about it. Then he went to the bank, drew out his money, and caught the first train for the South.”

The Big Alabama’s mark is typical of the man who leaves the big store beaten, only to return as soon as possible with a fresh bank roll, determined to correct the mistake which was made the first time and recoup his losses. It is also quite indicative of the strength of the “con” which has been put into the mark. Some marks would return even years later if they could raise the money and locate the insideman. This is well illustrated by a mark whom the High Ass Kid roped in Texas. He was put on the send and came through with about $45,000. The Kid figured that he would not be good for another play and “blew him off.” Some time later, another roper picked up the mark on a train. He steered him to the hotel, when the mark recognized the approach and confided
to the roper that he had been through this once before, and that he was looking for the insideman. The roper convinced the mark that he worked for the High Ass Kid with another branch of the same syndicate. The mark said that he already had the money in his home bank, so that he could go ahead with the deal as soon as he found the High Ass Kid. Then the roper, finding his work all done for him, steered his man to another store and took him for $20,000 more. The mark said he would have been back much sooner, but for the fact that it had taken him some time to borrow the $20,000 here and there from friends.

A mark, once hooked, is often most difficult to “unhook.” If the operators once get his confidence completely, he is so sure of the deal in which he is involved that he will not listen to reasonable advice even if it is given to him. Many a banker has dissuaded one of his clients from withdrawing his money only with difficulty; some marks proceed with the deal in the face of sound advice to do otherwise. Con men report many instances of this phenomenon. And District Attorney Van Cise
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of Denver, in prosecuting the Denver confidence ring, cites the case of one C. H. Hubbell of McPherson, Kansas, who was tied up with the Christ Kid when the officers arrested the Kid. He was being played for $50,000 and was most indignant at the interruption. Even when he learned that he was being played on the rag, he refused to believe it and insisted on posting bond for both the Christ Kid and his insideman.

Once the “con” takes effect on the mark, its strength is surprising. The mark may believe in the validity of the con deal even after the con men have told him it is a swindle; part of this is doubtless wishful thinking, and part the comforting fact to which he always returns when
he doubts the scheme—hasn’t he already made money by this method? And so he often does ludicrous things because he is unwilling or unable to shake off the “con” which has been put into him. Claude King tells an experience to illustrate this point.

“I had a store in Florida,” said he, “and played for a savage who lost ten grand. That was all the jack he could get his mitts on at that time, so I sent him on his way and eased him up. I thought I’d knock him good, so I wrote him that he’d been trimmed and that it was no use looking for us as we were going to Europe. About a year later I bumped into him on the street. He shook my hand and said, ‘Mr. MacAllister, you can’t get away with it. You can’t let me down now. You know, I didn’t make that mistake. It was that crazy fellow who introduced me to you. Now I have dug up ten thousand more. You can’t keep me out of the deal this time. Just you and I alone will get the money from that poolroom, and we won’t let anyone else in on it.’

“I said, ‘You’ve got something there, my boy. We’ll do it.’ I took him again and he said, ‘Well, I guess that is just the breaks of gambling. I’ll see if I can’t make some more money.’ Off he went and I felt sorry for him because he was such an understanding winchell.”

Of course, not all marks come back. Many of them, realizing or suspecting that they have been swindled, immediately cause trouble and all the ingenuity and persuasiveness of the insideman is required to prevent serious repercussions; sometimes all that fails and the con men are indicted. But not very often, considering the large number of marks who are beaten.

It is a rather common experience among con men to encounter a mark who knows about con games, or who has known someone who has been fleeced, and to find that the mark is good for a play himself. An old-timer tells a story which shows this type of mark in action. “Jerry
Daley and I had an 8 die store [a short-con game much used by old-timers] in Charleston, South Carolina. We had a famous jockey in our boost. One day he said to Daley, ‘Jerry, if I had the money I once had, I’d break that game of yours. I’ve watched you beat a lot of marks and I notice that you freeze out the players who can’t put up the money. Your game is on the level, but you know you have to have money to beat it.’”

Two other old-timers cap this anecdote with a similar one. They tell how they had rented space from a saloonkeeper in Mattoon, Illinois, for an 8 die cloth. All week the saloon-keeper watched the con men trim the suckers who came into the saloon. When Saturday night’s business was over, the con men “mitted him in” and took him for $800—his week’s receipts.

There are simply no statistics available on the number of marks who are swindled on the big-con games. However, it is estimated by experienced con men that only from five to ten per cent of those swindled ever go to the police. District Attorney Van Cise has very kindly permitted me to use the names of the marks who were known to have been swindled by the Blonger mob of Denver from 1919-1922.
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Before attempting to draw any conclusions from these figures, perhaps it should be suggested that the Denver situation appears somewhat unusual. Because of the airtight protection enjoyed under Lou Blonger, the con men felt free to “rip and tear”—that is, to grift without restraint as long as they avoided Denver residents. This may account for the fact that small scores occur with greater frequency than they might in the big stores in, say, Miami. I have information regarding several large scores, one of $200,000 taken from a nationally prominent figure, which were made by the Denver mob during the time, but which cannot be printed here because the victims do not wish any publicity. Perhaps it is only chance that more big touches do not appear in this list; perhaps the fact that the large touches usually come from prominent
people who cannot afford to admit participation in a con game helps to account for the absence of testimony regarding more large touches. It is also possible that the marks have not always stated their losses exactly. Furthermore, we do not know that this list is representative of the number of touches which were known to the police, for no one knows exactly how many marks complained to the Denver police, were cooled out, and sent on their various ways by the officers who were in league with the swindlers; these names were compiled—and not without difficulty—by District Attorney Van Cise and used as a basis for his prosecution; so powerful was the fix that, at times, this list threatened to dwindle away to almost nothing.

I make these suggestions only by way of cautioning the reader that these figures are probably not representative and that they would not apply to all mobs alike. They are simply the only ones available which apply to the operations of one mob over a significant period of time. And, in the absence of something better, they will have to serve as a basis for calculating the number of marks played and the volume of business handled by a big-con mob working steadily (during the summer season) under full police protection.

If we summarize these figures (including two touches, one for $13,000 and one for $50,000, which were not completed but nevertheless were reported to the authorities) we see that they reach a total of $437,900 taken from nineteen men. If we can assume that this, at a conservative estimate, represents ten per cent of the total, we can estimate that, roughly, the sum of $4,379,000 passed into the hands of the Denver mob during this time, taken from a probable total of 190 victims. District Attorney Van Cise arrived at an independent estimate that the Denver mob took from $1,000,000 to $3,000,000 each season from 1919 to 1922.

The volume of play given different stores at different times varies greatly. When the fix is sure, times are good, and a smoothly working mob has a store, the number of marks increases until the play assumes the appearance of a rush. When the fix fails or when the “heat is on,” the number of marks decreases noticeably. It has been my experience that the police departments in those cities where stores are or were located are usually unwilling to permit examination of records with a view to collection of statistics—and even if they were co-operative, there would be no record of those marks who were successfully fixed. Hence, it is practically impossible to give anything like accurate estimates of the number of marks who have been swindled on the big con. Truly, their name is legion.

A con mob is a functioning unit of the big store. It consists of a minimum of two—the roper and the insideman. When the mark is played against the store (as he usually is in the big-con games) the mob also includes the personnel of the big store—the manager or bookmaker who has charge of the impressive-looking shills, and the minor employees such as board-markers, clerks and the “tailers” who keep tab on the mark while he is not with one of the con men.