The Violent Years (10 page)

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Authors: Paul R. Kavieff

BOOK: The Violent Years
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By 1929, O’Riordan had a Detroit police record of 14 arrests with no convictions. The charges included armed robbery and violations of the state prohibition laws. It is strange that O’Riordan was never arrested as a suspected kidnapper during this period when he was most active in the “Snatch Racket.” O’Riordan evidently gained valuable experience in the Burke, Newberry, Reid Mob. After Burke and Newberry left the gang, O’Riordan continued kidnapping Detroit area bootleggers, gamblers, and handbook operators with Stanley DeLong, Henry “Ray” Andrews, and an aggressive local thug named Joseph “Legs” Laman.

Although the kidnapping gang became well known as the “Legs” Laman Gang, its personnel was constantly changing throughout its period of organized activity. Leadership roles in the gang were assumed at various times by Harry Hallisey, Benny Rubenstein, Stanley DeLong, and Jimmy Walters—gangsters, blind pig operators, and gunmen all. The gang was also composed of a number of lesser-known Detroit underworld characters who were at least as vicious as the leaders.

The kidnapping racket was appealing to the Detroit underworld because it was much safer than rum-running, bootlegging, narcotics peddling, and armed robbery. Danger of arrest was minimal because the kidnapping victim almost always refused to talk.

The gang’s namesake, Joseph “Legs” Laman, was a career criminal. He was supposedly called Legs because of the length of his limbs, which appeared out of proportion to the rest of his body. Laman was born in Detroit in 1900. His mother and father separated when he was seven years old. There were four children in the Laman family at this time, and his mother, who had been left near destitute, sent Joseph and a sister to live in the St. Francis Orphan Asylum. He spent five years, from age 7 to age 12, at the orphanage. By the age of 12, Laman had become a disciplinary problem. He was sent to the Ford Republic Youth Home where he stayed until he was 15 years old. At 15, he was released and returned home to find that his mother had since remarried. His new stepfather had no use for the boy, and from age 15 Laman was out on his own. As a teenager, Laman worked as a Teamster and for a short time as a structural steel worker. At the advent of Prohibition, he drifted into crime.

By his own account, Laman became a bootlegger and rumrunner around 1920. He was also suspected of hijacking blind pigs. “Legs” Laman went by the aliases of Joseph Laman and Joseph Kable. His Detroit police record included charges for armed robbery, disorderly conduct, and violating the state prohibition laws. Although the Legs Laman Gang would grow to number more than 20 associates, its members often worked in groups of five or six and frequently pulled kidnapping jobs independently of the larger organization.

The underworld in general created its own terminology related to the kidnapping racket. The kidnap victim was referred to as the “package.” The “fingerman” was the person who would identify a potential victim for the gang. The “pickup men” would abduct the person. The “prison” or “castle” was where the kidnap victim would be taken to and held prisoner until the ransom was paid to the gang. The “keeper” was the person or persons who guarded the victim and sometimes beat or tortured the prisoner. The “voice” was the person who would negotiate with the blindfolded victim and help with the ransom payment arrangements. The kidnap Mob’s “castles” were often located in different cities. At one time or another, the Laman Gang used houses and apartments in Ferndale, Detroit, and Dearborn, Michigan. The gang also used a location in Monroe, Michigan, and an apartment in Toledo, Ohio.

Torture was sometimes resorted to in order to get an uncooperative victim to negotiate for a ransom. One of the Laman Gang’s favorite techniques was applying lit cigarettes to the hands and feet of the victim. Sometimes burning matches were used. Eyelashes were pulled out one at a time or knives thrust into the flesh. Another form of diversion often used by the gang was to tie the package—as the victim was referred to—against a wall and shoot at him with pistols. The object of this exercise was to see how close they could come to the victim without actually wounding him. Obviously, it took very little of this type of persuasion to get the victim to do anything that the kidnappers wanted. The kidnapping Mobs developed their own names for these tortures. Burning a victim with cigarettes or cigars was called “toasting”; shooting at a victim, “fancy shooting”; pulling out eyelashes, “plucking”; or threatening a victim with a red-hot poker, “playing poker.”

The kidnap gangs would typically be well organized and follow similar modes of operation. Ransoms paid were most often between $5,000 and $25,000, the amount depending on the financial status of the victim or on how sharp a bargain he could drive. The most important member of the kidnap Mob was the fingerman, the name being derived from the fact that he pointed out the Mob’s potential victim or put the “finger” on him. The fingerman named the potential victim, found out his financial status, what racket he was in, and his whereabouts at any particular time of the day or night. Sometimes the Mob would try to extort money from a potential victim by threat of abduction. If the threats failed to produce the desired results, the man would be kidnapped.

The kidnappers’ methods were simple. The pickup men would either abduct the man from his place of business or pick him up at gunpoint near his home. If the victim were in his car, the gangsters would pull up alongside of him and cut him off, forcing his vehicle to a stop. Then men wearing masks or handkerchiefs to cover their faces would pull guns and force their way into the victim’s car. The prey would be forced to drive a short distance. At a prearranged spot, the kidnappers would abandon the prisoner’s car and get into their own vehicle, often forcing the victim to lie down on the floor of the car. The masks would remain on the gangsters only long enough to blindfold the kidnap victim. Once the kidnappers returned to their own car, another “tail car” would pull in behind and follow them. The purpose of the tail car was to protect the kidnappers in case of trouble, for example blocking the path of a pursuing police car or providing back up fire support in the event of a gun battle. The victim was taken to one of the gang’s castles or hideouts, where typically he would be locked up. For two days, no one spoke to the victim or answered any of his questions. Food was placed near the spot where he was chained. On the third day, a carefully masked member of the gang would approach the victim and ask him to write down a list of his friends who might serve as intermediaries in the ransom negotiations. If the man was a racketeer, as were most of the kidnap victims during the early days of the gang’s kidnapping activities, the Mob would make contact with the racketeer’s business associates or family through a name on the victim’s list. Often the person chosen was another racketeer or even someone associated with the kidnappers whose connection was unknown to the victim.

The person that was used as the go-between in the ransom negotiations was called the “Right O Guy.” He was often in a racket himself, but a different racket than the kidnap victim. Once the Right O Guy was chosen, the victim was forced to write a ransom note to his business associates or family. The letter would typically state that his life was in peril and that he would be killed or tortured if the ransom money was not forthcoming. After the ransom letter was delivered, one of the gang would contact the victim’s family and tell them how much the ransom would be. The original ransom request would always be for some ridiculous amount of money, which the gang knew that the kidnapped man’s family could never meet. This often ranged anywhere from $25,000 to $100,000. The high amount demanded for the ransom gave the kidnappers a lot of bargaining power in the negotiations. They would usually end up settling for between $5,000 and $10,000. The kidnap Mob usually knew how much money the victim was worth and often asked for what they considered to be a fair portion of it. The ransom was paid to the Right O Guy who would conduct the actual ransom negotiations with the victim’s family. The family or the man’s business associates would never see the actual kidnappers in most cases. The money would be paid to the apparent friend of the family who would take it to his confederates. The Right O Guy would be paid off, the gang would get their money, and the kidnapped wise guy would be released.

This system worked fine for the first couple of years, and these types of kidnappings were almost never reported to the police. Surprisingly, when a racketeer or gambler was kidnapped and paid off the gang once, he was usually never bothered again.

When Laman turned against his Mob and became a state’s witness in 1930, he described to a Wayne County Grand Jury the structure of his original kidnapping gang. According to Laman, in late 1926 he, Luke Hartman, Henry “Ray” Andrews, Stanley DeLong and his wife, Dude Manual, and a thug named Joe Mariano established a base of operations for their particular group. The original house was located in Dearborn, Michigan. Later, when things began to get hot for the gang, DeLong’s home in Ferndale, Michigan, was often used, along with a place in Detroit. Henry Andrews, his wife, and Mrs. DeLong were put in charge of operating the houses and preparing the meals for the victims. Hartman was used as the fingerman, identifying potential victims for the Mob. Laman was one of the pickup men. Mariano was used as the keeper and torturer and Dude Manual as a sort of handyman.

As long as the kidnapping gangs only “snatched” other underworld types, there seemed to be little interference from the police. The kidnapping of underworld characters was so successful that it wasn’t long before the Laman Gang got greedy and started abducting wealthy legitimate businessmen.

The gangsters who Detroit Police Department officials believed were responsible for changing the direction of the Laman Gang’s kidnapping activities from the “snatching” of local racketeers to wealthy businessmen were Harry Hallisey and Louis Ross. Hallisey operated a popular Detroit blind pig known as the Camel Club. Louis Ross was a Detroit handbook operator. Both men had many respectable, wealthy patrons among their clientele. As a blind pig operator, Hallisey befriended many wealthy legitimate people. When their inhibitions were loosened by Hallisey’s bootleg liquor and beer, they would often confide in Hallisey about their financial situations and personal problems. Ross, as a handbook operator taking bets, was also in a unique position to determine potential kidnap victims who were financially secure. Both men were in ideal situations to become fingermen for the Laman Gang. While Hallisey avoided being directly involved in the actual kidnappings, he was alleged to have fingered some of the jobs pulled by the Laman Gang.

Stanley DeLong, who posed as a Ferndale, Michigan, barber, was also one of the men who operated behind the scenes in the Laman Gang, making telephone calls and other arrangements for the paying of ransoms. DeLong had a Detroit Police Department record of 15 arrests, which included charges for armed robbery, violation of state prohibition laws, and carrying a concealed weapon. DeLong would later be identified by Joseph “Legs” Laman as the voice of the gang. DeLong had solid connections in the Detroit underworld and later admitted in court testimony that he was close friends and business associates with Purple Gangster George Cordell alias Cordelli. He had also been involved in the bootlegging business with Benny Rubenstein, another member of the Laman Gang. Rubenstein would be later accused of being a combination fingerman and muscleman for the gang.

Another Detroit gangster who played an important role in the fingering and kidnapping of local businessmen for the Laman Gang was a man named Jimmy Walters. Walters, a well-known Irish mobster, operated a Detroit blind pig named the Clover Club. His cabaret was reported to be one of the hangouts of the Laman Gang. Walters was both a colorful and vicious Detroit underworld character. Born in Detroit in 1897, Walters grew up in the predominately Irish community on Detroit’s lower southwest side known as “Corktown.” His Detroit Police Department record did not begin until January 21, 1921, when he was arrested for disturbing the peace. He would be arrested 12 times between 1921 and 1930 with no convictions. Charges included possession of burglar tools, violations of the U.S. drug laws, and armed robbery. Walters had served with distinction in the U.S. Army during World War I, as a sergeant in the 116th Field Artillery of the U.S. Expeditionary Force. He was known in the Detroit underworld as a fearless and aggressive thug and reputed to be as good with a pistol as he was with his fists. Walters was also known in the underworld as a powerful independent operator, and he was greatly feared by his competitors.

In 1930, he was identified by Detroit police as being one of the largest drug dealers in the Detroit underworld during the later ‘20s. His other business dealings, including his cabaret and other interests, were supposedly small compared to his drug operation. He had first been linked to the Detroit narcotics trade when he was indicted as a member of the Bill Morton Gang, which controlled the city’s narcotics traffic during the early ‘20s. Walters was known to be a close friend of Joseph “Legs” Laman. Among his many racket interests, Walters was reported to have had control of the barrel beer trade in certain sections of the city. His involvement with the Legs Laman Gang was strictly one of his sideline activities.

Supposedly, Walters liked his combat experience during the war but disliked authority. He came back to Detroit with a general contempt for the law. These feelings may have been further aggravated when his younger brother, Edward Walters, was shot and killed by a Detroit detective. Walters’s brother and another man were caught breaking into a Duffield Street saloon one night in June of 1926.

For some reason, Walters was known to have a particular hatred of the Italian Mob. His fearlessness was demonstrated many times in various underworld encounters. According to one account, one night two tough local strong-arm men known for “shaking down” independent blind pig operators sauntered into Walters’s club. They pulled automatic pistols out of their coats and laid them on the table where they were sitting. They then called Walters over to their table and told him, “We’re in for a cut of your club.” Walters pulled a gun out of his pocket and laid it on the table with the other two pistols. “So you’re in and I’m out? All right, let’s see you take the place, just go ahead!” The two men reportedly got up and quickly walked out. At one point, Walters’s name was so feared that allowing another blind pig operator to use it in reference was enough to scare off most would-be hijackers and shakedown artists.

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