The Violent Years (25 page)

On January 17, 1940, the Robinson case was given to the jury. It was up to the people to decide if Dr. Robinson had been the victim of a holdup on July 8, 1939, or merely paying off a gambling debt. Defense attorney Sidney Sherman made the argument in his closing statement before the jury that if this had been a real holdup, Holtzman would have never stopped the car for Inspector Myers. “If they were the desperate men they are depicted and were fleeing a holdup, they would have knocked Myers aside with the fender of their car or blown the top of his head off with the pistols,” Sherman contended. The jury was out two hours and 40 minutes and brought in a verdict of acquittal for the Purple Gang defendants. The four men were immediately taken into police custody after the verdict was read. A warrant had been issued on orders from Judge Ferguson. The new charge was carrying concealed weapons.

Detectives Farrish and Brouillet were taken before the grand jury. In testimony, the former officers described how Joe Holtzman told them that $1,000 was paid to Inspector Boettcher to let Dr. Robinson get back some of the confiscated holdup money that was to be used as evidence. Farrish and Brouillet also admitted that Robinson gave them $75 each in gratitude for giving him back $1,000 of the holdup money. The detectives told Judge Ferguson that several days after the holdup, they ran into Sammy Millman and Scotty Silverstein. Millman and Silverstein offered the detectives $1,000 to try and fix the case by getting the armed-robbery charges dropped. Farrish and Brouillet stated that they took $300 and were promised the other $700 if they could get the case dismissed. During this same period, both men admitted attending a conference at an attorney’s house. Present at this meeting were Sam Millman, Scotty Silverstein, and an official from the Wayne County Prosecutor’s Office. The purpose of the gathering was to discuss how they might get the case thrown out or if necessary get the charges reduced to carrying concealed weapons.

At their examination, all four Purple Gangsters acquitted in the Robinson holdup trial pleaded not guilty to the new charge of carrying concealed weapons. They were promptly ordered to appear before Judge Ferguson on charges growing out of Farrish and Brouillet’s confessions. All four defendants were charged with conspiracy to obstruct justice.

On January 19, 1940, acting on warrants issued by Judge Ferguson, police arrested Purple Gang defense attorney Sidney Sherman and former Purple Sam Millman. Both men were officially charged with conspiracy to obstruct justice in the Robinson case. Four more men were also being sought on the same charges. The list included former Purple Gangsters Izzy Bernstein and Jacob “Scotty” Silverstein, Dr. Martin Robinson, and Assistant Wayne County Prosecutor Robert Perretto. Judge Ferguson had received information that Perretto was involved in the conspiracy and was given the responsibility of trying to fix the case in the prosecutor’s office. Perretto had been suspended from his position in the prosecutor’s office several days earlier.

Detailed in the grand jury warrant against the six suspects for conspiracy to obstruct justice were the specifics of the case. On July 10, 1939, Holtzman, Cooper, Jacobs, and Feldman had been jailed on charges of armed robbery. That same day Farrish, Brouillet, and the other defendants had met at the home of attorney Sidney Sherman. According to the grand jury testimony of Farrish and Brouillet, plans were made at this meeting to get the armed-robbery case quashed or reduced to a charge of carrying concealed weapons. If the case was reduced to the weapons charge. Holtzman was to take the responsibility for the guns. The reason for this was that Holtzman was the only one of the holdup suspects that did not have a police record. At that time, it was agreed that Dr. Robinson would fail to identify the four men as the bandits who had robbed him. Later, the conspirators offered Detectives Farrish and Brouillet $1,000 to fix the case. Robert Perretto, the Assistant Wayne County Prosecutor in charge of the holdup case, agreed to try to get the charges reduced, and he made suggestions at the meeting of how this could be accomplished.

As a result of these revelations before the Ferguson Grand Jury, all six of these men and the four Robinson case defendants were officially charged with conspiracy to obstruct justice. Sherman and Millman were arrested on January 19, 1940. The attorney was arrested in his downtown Detroit law office, located in the Barium Tower. When Sherman was registered and fingerprinted at Detroit police headquarters, he appeared to be on the verge of a breakdown. With tears streaming down his face, he said, “There is nothing to this! I have never been arrested before, not even for a traffic ticket. This is all wrong!”

By January 21, 1940, Superintendent of Police Fred Frahm had been fired, Chief of Detectives John Hoffman had resigned. Raymond Boettcher, Uniform Division Inspector at Bethune Station, was suspended and appeared before the Ferguson Grand Jury. The district police inspector system was abolished by Commissioner Eaman, and four of five district inspectors had resigned. These men included self-proclaimed Purple Gang nemesis Henry J. Garvin. The Detroit Police Department was in turmoil.

On March 15, 1940, Feldman, Holtzman, Jacobs, and Cooper were convicted of carrying concealed weapons in Detroit Recorders Court. Feldman, Jacobs, and Cooper were sentenced to serve 2½ to 5 years in state prison. Holtzman was given 5 years’ probation. On May 21, 1940, the warrant against Sidney Sherman was officially dropped on a motion from his attorney. Assistant Prosecutor Robert Perretto was eventually reinstated, and the conspiracy charge against him was dropped on May 24, 1940. Charges against both Perretto and Sherman were unsubstantiated and vague. Sherman continued to practice criminal law for many years afterwards, but close friends maintain that he was never the same after having been accused of the Ferguson charges. On May 27, 1940, Dr. Martin Robinson and Sam Millman were found guilty of conspiracy to obstruct justice. On November 13, 1940, Robinson was sentenced to 3 to 5 years in state prison. Millman received a sentence of 2 to 5 years.

The grand jury testimony of Detectives Farrish and Brouillet implicated Inspector Raymond Boettcher in the Robinson case. It was Boettcher’s testimony that really blew the lid off the police department graft investigation. Shortly after Inspector Boettcher was called before the Ferguson Grand Jury in the middle of January 1940, he decided to become a state’s witness and was granted immunity in the case. Boettcher’s testimony created a sensation in Detroit. The inspector told the grand jury that he had been the “bag man” (payoff man) for the $50 million a year numbers rackets in Detroit. Boettcher described himself as the payoff man at Detroit police headquarters and City Hall. He received money every month from Elmer “Buff Ryan. Ryan, a former gambler, was the gambling syndicate’s contact man with Detroit police headquarters. The monthly payments were for protection from the Detroit Police Department and City Hall. Boettcher told the grand jury an amazing story. He described in detail how he personally paid former Mayor Richard Reading and his son, Richard Jr., more than $4,000 a month in graft. Boettcher stated that he served in the capacity of payoff man between the gamblers and city officials for 33 months. “Thanksgiving came every month in the City Hall and police department,” Boettcher told the grand jury. Inspectors’jobs in the police department could be purchased for $1,500 each. Other positions could also be secured for the right cash payments. Boettcher testified that he paid monthly graft allowances to Superintendent of Police Fred Frahm and many other high-ranking police officials. The former inspector explained how he paid Frahm between $1,000 and $1,800 every month. Boettcher would often hand Frahm the money in a men’s room at Detroit police headquarters. “Slip it to me, kid,” the superintendent would say to Boettcher, as he handed Frahm the graft payment. The inspector called the Robinson case a jinx. Boettcher told the grand jury that when the $1,000 in recovered robbery loot was returned to Robinson the day of the holdup, Robinson had paid him and another officer $200 apiece in appreciation. Boettcher had been present at the Bethune Station the day Inspector Myers walked in with the four reputed bandits and the holdup money. The inspector had made the mistake of being photographed counting the holdup money by a press photographer. Boettcher believed that this photograph was what tied him to the Robinson case. When questioned by Special Prosecutor O’Hara, Boettcher replied, “I never counted any of the money, at no time did I handle the money. The only thing I got was a $200 gift from Robinson.” “I should have thrown Robinson out the window when he offered me $200. I sincerely wish I had,” Boettcher lamented.

It seemed as though the majority of officials in the police department and City Hall were on Buff Ryan’s payroll. It was later discovered that Wayne County Prosecutor Duncan C. McCrea was one of the worst “grifters” (police slang for anyone who takes graft). At first, McCrea demanded $1,500 a month from the handbook operators. Later, the price for protection from the prosecutor’s office was raised to $3,000 a month. Still not satisfied with this figure, McCrea sent a messenger around to every handbook in the city with address forms. The forms were returned to McCrea, who then levied a $5 a week tax on every handbook in Detroit through Consolidated News Service. With more than 700 handbooks in the city, this amounted to a princely sum.

Boettcher was shocked when he learned that even the Wayne County Prosecutor was on “Buff Ryan’s payroll. The former Inspector had never known anything about that angle of the gambling syndicate’s graft payments. Both Wayne County Prosecutor Duncan C. McCrea and Wayne County Sheriff Thomas Wilcox were removed from office and later convicted of taking graft for offering protection. Both men were sentenced to serve 4V2 to 5 years in state prison.

Aside from city officials and police department brass, hundreds of bookmakers, numbers operators, and organized crime figures associated with the Detroit gambling industry were brought before Judge Ferguson. In August of 1940, both Abe and Joe Bernstein were called before the grand jury to explain their interests in the Consolidated News Service. Consolidated provided horse-race information to all of the Detroit area handbooks. According to testimony from various gamblers, the Purple Gang had muscled their way into the Consolidated News Service in 1929. This was accomplished by kidnapping one of the principal owners and holding him for ransom. Some gamblers thought the Purples had been given 25 percent of Consolidated. Others thought it was much more. Testimony also showed that the Consolidated News Service paid William C. Rick, Commander of Central Station, $100 a month. The news service also paid the Wayne County Prosecutor’s Office $1,500 a month in 1934 and 1935. In 1935, Consolidated was taken over by the Nationwide News Service of Chicago. At that time the Purples were no longer the dominant power in the Detroit underworld. Abe and Joe Bernstein were out.

In November of 1943, Isadore Bernstein was finally arrested in Los Angeles. He was later extradited back to Detroit to stand trial on the conspiracy to obstruct justice charges growing out of the Robinson case. Bernstein described himself as a retired Detroit businessman, now residing in Beverly Hills, California. On December 17, 1943, he walked into Detroit police headquarters with Lt. Marvin Lane, the officer that had taken him back to Michigan. “Hello, Izzy,” said Inspector Edward Graff. “My name is Irving,” said Bernstein with dignity, “and this is another bum rap.” Bernstein was arraigned and released on bail. Almost three years later, Bernstein appeared with his lawyer in Detroit Recorders Court shortly before his case was to go to trial. Bernstein pleaded guilty. The judge accepted the plea, fined him $2,500 plus $250 court costs, and he was released.

On October 15, 1946, the last defendant untried on charges growing out of the Robinson case stood before Judge Arthur E. Gordon in Recorders Court. Found guilty of conspiracy to obstruct justice, Jacob “Scotty” Silverstein was fined $1,000 plus $250 court costs. Silverstein’s previous court dates had been waived because he was serving with the U.S. Army in Italy. Silverstein was seriously wounded overseas and returned to the U.S. eight months earlier. No doubt his military record figured into his light sentence. Elmer “Buff Ryan was later convicted in a policy and numbers case and sentenced to 1-5 years. Judge Homer Ferguson went on to become a U.S. senator, and Chester O’Hara a Wayne County circuit judge.

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In the final analysis, most of the officials who professed shock by the original charges were hit with indictments. In the end, Mayor Richard Reading, his son Richard Jr., many top police officers and lesser policemen, Wayne County Sheriff Thomas Wilcox, and Prosecutor Duncan McCrea were all convicted, removed from their posts, and served prison time. In all, the Ferguson Grand Jury indicted 360 persons, including 75 public officials and 81 racketeers. More than 150 went to prison over a four-year period. Chances are that all of it would have been overlooked had it not been for the dramatic suicide/murder of Janet MacDonald, which made the corruption impossible for even corrupt officials to overlook.

After a short time, the handbook and numbers rackets once again appeared in Detroit. The Ferguson Grand Jury investigation, however, practically ended the old-time roadhouse and casino-style gambling that had run wide open in Wayne and Macomb Counties for years. The investigation did not stop official corruption, but was a wake-up call to the community and to public and law-enforcement officials.

“You’d better pick up Eddie Sarkesian if you don’t want to find him full of lead. He’s on the spot. He’s been shaking down bookies. The boys are after him. He’s got a gun!”

—Anonymous phone call tip to
Detroit police, August 16, 1944

“I’ve got heavy business, someone important to meet. I don’t think I’ll ever be back. If I don’t show up, the station is yours.”

—Last known words of Detroit
mobster Chris Scroy, April 8, 1959