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Al Capone — Part 8

70 pages · May 08, 2026 · Broad topic: Organized Crime · Topic: Al Capone · 69 pages OCR'd
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Criminal court, the federal district ai torney has no patience with the reck- leg optimiass of the slack thinkers who welcome every oturder of a gang: ater by gangsters with the remark y and a 00d riddance, too.” —~ ’ Problem Is More Complex, _ - : ~The problem,” said Mr. Johnson, "16 not so simple as that. The short- sighted view of it which the comment ‘wand sidttttonne* feoniteas bee arre hla goes TES spa se Sats Shese desperate Men to convey a sense wecurity te thoee who take human if# at thelr behest. It gives their anrderers greater courage. Theowe @ngage their services can point the ghastly list of two hundred guedived and wipuinished aasasaina- Hons and (way, ‘ See how small thé risk in. . : “~The point that they wow make is { there are honest eccupations In the haxsards of injury and death tire greater. It is an awful thing for 2 “community when such a point can be made against ft, for the point ¢is- loess the appalling ramifications sf érime that is fostered by privilege and ret to last we are with. “Like Chiet Justice ae oo ~ “4 ee at 1°: an a you mame of fh mass S Une #, aynonym tor vielency throughout hieed work), think haves made the violations of ether laws, 1 am sgt the Ddottormd of lawieaguess today.” “Werk Done without Fasfare. & perponality the federal district ia the bast ‘known of the ding crime fighters ef Chicago. is partly because he bas never ] eleciive office and partly because work has never been accompanied Tenfares. Nor has be ¢ver been ex- ited by the ‘That does pot arked in the courm of thie i sie "bert, lew viotation of ane = Ts of his district attorneyship haé 3 6 and of his forthright manner of think- ing you have to give heed to a few bttehet ede Jenn Jonnen’e kitchen gardem, + ‘ John Jobneon’s on ~ * het gvain .| George Johnson and not, for quaint reasons which you shall learn jater, to become George B Q@ Jobnwn for many & year—went to work In that warden at the age of seven. =~ That was forty-nine years ago. He's of Sturdy Merk, of Webster county, Tewa, which 7: Johnson took up in iséi, emigrated the year before ancient province of Bmaland den, that province which bred forbears of two of the most sffecti and his friend and near nelghbor, John A. dwanson, state's attorney, tor Cook county. * ae When -little ‘George Johnson went to work in the xXitchen garden of the Towa homestead he was teugit How This, m his own words, was ths wubstance of the lesson: - “I was taught very early that to keep the garden clean it was act enough to cut off ee a a. Me Pyle Taare a at them up.by the reots and shake out in the bright glare of the morning aun every bit of woil that eling=s ta the tendrils of the roota. “7 was taught thet I could not clean the gerden by a method of sélection. “I was taught that ] must not sey, ‘I will take that weed out and leave this weed‘in,’ but that the only way to clean the garden was to pull up all the weeds by the rocta and shake them out to the aun.” Applies Lemson te deb, That was the lessen of forty-nine yeérs ago. In accordance with word ,| DF word of M George Johnaon did his work weed by wetd in the one acre kitchen garden for seven years, Then he was considéred olq enough—for the Smajand stock does not pamper its yount—to go inte the Selds and fol- low the plow, =~ Today he applies the eid lesson, word by word and weed by weed, to every new day of his work as tha United States, government's premier fighter ot orginteed rime fn the Cht caro area. He hammers ep the theme thet the erime gituation in Chicago ts pot, as he puts ft, “ going to be cleaned up as] or long as public officials piuck op one kind of crime weed and ignore sa- other.” . And he sdded: sot “tf you are going to rié the elty ef crime you must take crime without any processes of selection. “Yeu wil] hare te root it up Wherever pou And tt and hes pedi. ee leas pubdlicity.” - . : OBrien Cote Beveled. . were droken on the sighth floor of the of incomes sequentiy he faced the a@ pentence of cighteon years and a fine of . tractor and a pel! able influence, But ne | EBAuence made him look any different *)trom any other noxious weed wher Mr. Johnsof’s comment en the O’Brien verdict was intensely charac- teristic of kim. When President Coél- idge appointed Aim federa) distrigt at- toroey in February, 1927, he was. asked to tafk on plans and policies. “TI wilt tlk,” he said, as be peered benigoly at the reporters through his sfiver bowed apectacitea, “only with indictmenta and vetdicts* Dropping his glance he aided in Bis quiet, reflective way: -- “If wordg could drive the official and criminal gangsters cut of Chicago Johnson Searneéd his Bglish, aftival in America—had a they would have been gone long ago.’ [miration fer the writings | oh Then be set himeelf to thinking. |watae Emerson sad that o studying end planning how to combat his young son shared wit#uis- organized crime in Chicago, and by |they decided on “ Emeraommith i * organized crime “ be meant primarily | Hngulshing middie name the doose and beer running wanes, andi George and Johneon. naod the racketeers. fut when George study His thinking, studying and plennug| arrived in Chicago $i sore constituted a stow process. For George }iaw he found that the @irec- E. Q Johnson ts slow. That, probably,/af George &. Johnso w his ia why he te inexorably sure when be/tory, So he, offhand, an finally ewings inte action fimee Bene fie . ere rrrenpe Sesw Sweeerer Sresw Bene uaa, al ator Deneen said of him, * ¥ea, George “and what,” T in E. Q@ ts slower than the Second Com- ae edaral ing, but he grinds end grinds ead] “tor no “ saving oO | grinds all the dime.” Stodies Problem 30 \wonthe, On hie problem of how to fight er triet attorney ground for twenty sold months, studying H from every angie, accumulating facts on gang: dom’s far flung operations, finding eut where i was most vuilnerable arid where it bad been most lax én cover teacher of ing ite tral. The result of his studies and his planning was that aazsiing tospira- tion, the prosecution of gangsteré for evasion of federal income tax,” But be credits tne success of his beitie to no inspirations of his ewn of others He credits ¢ to what . he calls “ the absolute ‘Horeachabilty trict attormey, “ase ti, B. questions as ta whic fy aout for. som in Chicage of the federal courts.” “They,” he slid, “are the founda: tion of whatever success we have bad. I cahnot foe emphatically praise thd high celibér of the federal judges Some Some people talk of the harshneat of talk of thé harshness of *
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