Rothstein: The Life, Times, and Murder of the Criminal Genius Who Fixed the 1919 World Series

by David Pietrusza

  Recently Fallon had represented John McGraw, at the behest of Giants owner Charles Stoneham. After drinking and brawling one night at the Lambs Club with actor William Boyd, McGraw boarded a taxi to his West 109th Street apartment with two other men-one of whom, actor John Slavin, mysteriously fractured his skull. McGraw admitted purchasing four pints of whiskey at the Lambs Club-"I never fight unless I am drunk." A grand jury indicted him for illegal possession of alcohol. By the time Fallon took the case to court, McGraw had changed his story, denying purchasing any liquor that evening, and claiming he couldn't have, as he had generously given away all his cash to a needy Lambs Club cleaning woman. It was the sort of preposterous story Fallon's clients told with regularity, and which regularly won them acquittal. The jury freed McGraw in five minutes.

  As the Black Sox case broke, Rothstein engaged Fallon to represent Attell and Sullivan. Attell had implicated Rothstein by name on September 29. Fallon publicly advised The Little Champ to keep a discreet silence. He didn't. A day after Fallon's warning-Attell vowed to reveal the "master mind" behind the "whole scheme." Broadway had only one "master mind": Arnold Rothstein.

  Fallon tried changing the subject, advancing a curious theory of his new client's innocence:

  The men [the Black Sox and the gamblers] undoubtedly are morally reprehensible, but it is my opinion that no crime has been committed. I consider the conspiracy indictment invalid as `conspiracy to commit an illegal act' means nothing unless you can prove that throwing a ball game is an illegal act. This I am prepared to doubt. If the gamblers who are said to have fixed this series are not profiting by an illegal act, they cannot be prosecuted as such. Profiting as such is not an indictable offense.

  On October 1 A. R. issued his own statement: he was selling his gambling houses and quitting all gambling for good. The slurs, the calumny he had been forced to endure, had finally proven too much. He told the World:

  My friends know that I have never been connected with a crooked deal in my life, but I am heartily sick and tired of having my name dragged in on the slightest provocation or without provocation whenever a scandal comes up.

  I have been victimized more than once and have been forced to bear the burden as best I could, simply because of the business that I was in and the peculiar moral code which governs it. But that is all past.

  The unwarranted use of my name in this unfortunate scandal was the last straw. I made up my mind to retire from the gambling business as long ago as last June, as plenty of witnesses will testify, but this has led me to make the announcement publicly, instead of dropping out quietly as was my original plan.

  From now on, I will devote most of my time and attention to the real estate business and to my racing stable. It is not pleasant to be what some may call a "social outcast," and for the sake of my family and my friends I am glad that the chapter is closed.

  A. R. went too far. Normally content to ignore his activities, the Times could not tolerate this drivel and unleashed a vitriolic editorial in his direction:

  He Goes, but Is Not Driven

  With patience at last exhausted, one Arnold Rothstein, who seems to be a man of commanding eminence in the circles in which he moves, has decided to give no more excuse to the censorious. It seems that in the past, whenever by any possibility his name could be linked with a current scandal, somebody has done it. Naturally this has worn upon the nerves of a man with a nature as sensitive as his. As he puts it in a printed interview of a length proportional to the importance of his determination, "it is not pleasant to be what some may call a `social outcast.' " And so. "I am going to devote most of my time to the real estate business and to my racing stables. "

  It is interesting to note-and especially our police and the District Attorney's office should be regardful-that Mr. Rothstein's decision to retire from what he calls "the gambling business" is entirely an outcome of his own present preferences and desires. For years and years he has lived and prospered on the profits of what "some may call" criminal activities, and the only penalty has been the linking of his name with all the current scandals!

  One easily can imagine how annoying that would be to him, but more serious inconveniences not infrequently have been endured by persons who did not confess, even after conviction, their law-breaking as frankly as does Mr. Rothstein. Evidently he has no fear that his revelation now will have effects any more troublesome than did his continual conduct of a business which the law professes to hold criminal.

  There is a mystery here, but presumably the police will regard it with "that baffled look" which has come to be their usual, if not habitual, expression.

  And while Fallon defended Sullivan and Attell (what a remarkable coincidence if Attell actually had operated independently of A. R.), he nonetheless acted suspiciously like Rothstein's counsel. On October 4, he announced: "Rothstein turned the proposition [the fix] down hard, calling the man who made it all sorts of names."

  "I am making this statement," he explained piously, if improbably, "in justice to Mr. Rothstein, and I am not his attorney."

  Meanwhile A. R. was caught in a pincer move. Despite his claims of leaving the gambling trade, A. R. maintained his Long Beach casino. Nassau County's District Attorney subpoenaed Attell, Nat Evans, and the real Curley Bennett to obtain information on Rothstein's Long Island operations. Enough was enough. A. R. would do whatever necessary to silence the Little Champ.

  Fallon summoned Attell and Sullivan to A. R.'s home. Sullivan was in no position financially to disagree with Arnold, but Attell might have been. That September Abe had won $100,000 at dice. He put $20,000 to $25,000 of his winnings in a film-and not just any film. With amazing chutzpah, he invested in a baseball film called Headin' Home starring the game's greatest star: Babe Ruth.

  Attell was solvent, but also practical. No need to antagonize so powerful and ruthless a figure as his old friend Arnold. No use taking chances serving time. Fallon ordered everyone to vanish: Attell to Montreal, Sullivan to Mexico, and Rothstein and his wife on a liner bound for Europe. A. R. would foot the bill. Attell and Sport Sullivan departed as planned. On October 9, Rothstein tested the idea of flying the coop, issuing this statement to the Morning Telegraph:

  I am in a position to prove conclusively that instead of profiting I lost heavily upon the outcomes of the games.

  I am most reluctant to make any statement to the public press concerning the conditions affecting the playing of the world's baseball series of 1919, but circumstances have arisen which prompt me to speak.

  My physical condition is such that the imperative orders of my physician are to leave town for a short time in an endeavour to regain my health. In order that there may be no unfair nor unjust inference from my departure, I take this occasion to explain my position in this entire matter.

  It is of course hardly necessary for me to explain how deeply grieved I am at the suggestion that I participated in some way in the outrageous happenings that are alleged to have taken place in the playing of that series.

  Notwithstanding that these insinuations have absolutely no basis or foundation, I am unable to do more than proclaim my innocence of any part in these occurrences.

  The Telegraph wanted to know more: Had A. R. known in 1919 that the series was crooked? "I not only had no part in the transaction but possessed no knowledge whatsoever of such events," he said, ignoring his very public run-in with Burns and Maharg.

  "Did you bet on the series?"

  "Yes," A. R. answered, "and I am in a position to prove conclusively that instead of profiting I lost heavily upon the outcome of the games.

  "Now I have to go away and my purpose in speaking at this time is to make manifest my desire to exonerate myself from these totally unjust suggestions, and to have it known that I will return at once if afforded an opportunity to meet and disprove these slanderous accusations."

  No one believed A. R. was leaving town for his health. The questions and accusations grew louder. "I want you to stop this noise," A. R
. ordered Fallon. Fallon was a proponent of dragging a case out, letting public outrage die down before a case got to jury. But he also believed in spectacularly brazen courtroom stunts. He advised an adversarial approach: "I want you to get on a train and walk right into the lion's den."

  "You mean go to Chicago?"

  "Right."

  "Are you crazy?"

  "Only in the earlier stages of insanity. Go to Chicago. You can stop an indictment with your Svengali pan."

  "Of all the dopey advice I ever had! And I'm paying you for it, too."

  "Listen. Go to Chicago and begin brow-beating everyone. Find fault with everything. Be temperamental.... I've got a great scheme."

  "You'd better have."

  "It's about photographers. Listen ..."

  Fallon outlined his plan. He'd notify the Chicago papers of Rothstein's appearance. They'd assign photographers to cover his arrival, crowding and jostling him, yelling for a pose. Rothstein could then scream to the grand jury about his reception, claiming he was being treated like a criminal.

  Rothstein wasn't buying it. "I don't want any photographs," he said.

  "Hold your hat over your face, then. It's the best bet I can think of."

  "You'd better take a night off and do some more thinking."

  A. R. boarded a train for Chicago, ready to testify but still not convinced of Fallon's plan, but trusting his attorney's skills. Far more important, however, than Fallon's public strategy, was his backroom strategy and his talents as America's most accomplished jury fixer.

  Arriving in Chicago, A. R. first stopped at the law offices of Alfred Austrian, one of the biggest lawyers in Chicago, counsel to both the White Sox and Cubs. Some said Rothstein asked Austrian to also represent him, observing that his interests and the interests of Austrian client Charles Comiskey coincided. If Rothstein went down, everyone went down-including half the talent on Comiskey's team.

  That may have been, but if Rothstein and Fallon wanted Austrian or the grand jury on their side, they would have acted well before leaving New York. With whom had Rothstein conferred before departing for Chicago? Ban Johnson-who exerted far more influence over grand-jury proceedings than either Austrian or Comiskey. Ban Johnson-who was dangling the plum of chairmanship of a planned new baseball commissionership in front of the grand jury's presiding officer, Chief Judge Charles McDonald.

  Johnson desired two items. The first was Charles Comiskey's head on a platter. A. R. couldn't help him there. The second was job protection. Johnson had ruled baseball's ruling body, the National Commission, since 1903, but his power was fading fast. Virtually every National League club and three of eight American League teams wanted Johnson ousted. He needed all the help he could get.

  Arnold could offer him the New York Giants.

  Bill Fallon was already extricating John McGraw from his Lambs Club difficulties, but of more significance to Comiskey than McGraw was Giants owner Charles Stoneham, A. R.'s secret partner in a series of shady brokerage operations. Stoneham provided knowledge of Wall Street; Rothstein provided protection from Tammany. Johnson sorely wanted Stoneham's support. A few weeks after A. R. visited Chicago, White Sox secretary Harry Grabiner recorded this in his diary:

  [Cubs minority stockholder Albert] Lasker was told by Stoneham that Johnson came to see him to secure the lease on the Polo Grounds in the name of the American League [the Yankees were tenants of the Giants at the Polo Grounds] and would place new owners in the American League in New York that were satisfactory to Stoneham and Johnson would even let Stoneham to name the 3rd member of the National Commission.

  Ban Johnson fulfilled his part of the bargain. Arnold Rothstein didn't.

  After meeting Austrian, A. R. headed for the grand jury. Austrian accompanied him. The standard histories tell us that when Rothstein arrived, news photographers virtually attacked him. Actually, press coverage was minimal and unenthusiastic. Only two Chicago dailies, the journal and the Tribune, printed A. R.'s photo-and the journal ran it in a tiny grouping with three other witnesses.

  Nonetheless, Arnold had enough to portray himself as a victim, assuming his best air of outraged rectitude. "Gentlemen," he implored the grand jury, "what kind of country is this? I came here voluntarily and what happens? A gang of thugs bars my path with cameras as though I was a notorious person-a criminal even! I'm intended to an apology. I demand one! Such a thing couldn't happen in New York. I'm surprised at you."

  We'll never fully know what A. R. said in his half hour before the grand jury, beyond strenuously maintaining innocence and placing all blame elsewhere. The Chicago Daily journal reported he claimed to have thrown "Attell and Burns out of his office [sic-they never met at his office], told John J. McGraw ... what had happened and asked him to notify `Kid' Gleason, manager of the White Sox, that a group of crooked players ... were about to `throw' the championship games to Cincinnati."

  For good measure, he told conflicting tales of his betting during the Series. Entering the grand jury, he advised reporters that he hadn't bet at all. Exiting, he claimed to the same reports that he lost $6,000.

  His ordeal over, A. R. released a written statement, brazenly denying all guilt. It read:

  Attell did the fixing.

  I've come here to vindicate myself. If I wasn't sure I was going to be vindicated, I would have stayed home. As far as my story is concerned, I've already told most of it, but I guess you [the Grand jury] want it on the official record.

  The whole thing started when Attell and some other cheap gamblers decided to frame the Series and make a killing. The world knows I was asked in on the deal and my friends know how I turned it down flat. I don't doubt that Attell used my name to put it over. That's been done by smarter men than Abe. But I wasn't in on it, wouldn't have gone into it under any circumstances and didn't bet a cent on the Series after I found out what was under way. My idea was that whatever way things turned out, it would be a crooked Series anyway and that only a sucker would bet on it.

  I'm not going to hold anything back from you [the jury]. I'm here to clear myself and I expect to get out of here with a clean bill of health.

  But reporters wanted more. A Tribune reporter demanded details of The Big Bankroll's gambling career. Gambling was the last thing A. R. would discuss. "Pardon me," he said as he walked away. "I believe the phone is ringing."

  When A. R. returned to his impromptu press conference, the Tribune's man resumed, "Now, regarding your career as a gambler-?"

  Rothstein interrupted: "I am now in the real estate business."

  "Yes, yes, of course. But.... What was the largest pot you ever won?"

  Rothstein thought for an instant, but remained on message: "I believed I vindicated myself before the grand jury."

  The reporter asked about A. R.'s race track gambling, but Rothstein cut him off with the comment. "Abolishing of horse racing was largely responsible for baseball gambling."

  Rothstein's obtuse responses and his chilling manner disconcerted his inquisitor, but he bore on, nonetheless: "How much money, in the aggregate, have you won in your career?"

  "A frightfully dark and dismal day, isn't it?" And that was all The Big Bankroll had to say to the Tribune.

  To another reporter, he put all the blame on Attell:

  Attell approached me shortly before the world series of 1919. He told me that it would be possible to fix the series. I was both interested and amused at the proposition for I didn't think it possible to fix a team.

  Attell asked me to put up a fund of $100,000 for the purpose, but finally I turned him down cold for the reason stated. I had no further conversation with him, heard nothing further about the matter, thought it was abandoned and went out and bet $6,500 on the Sox.

  Now for goodness sake let me out of this matter hereafter. Chicagoans proved easily impressed. "Rothstein in his testimony today proved himself to be guiltless," pronounced Alfred Austrian, who had his reasons for being impressed. Illinois State Attorney Maclay Hoyne was so satisfied he tol
d reporters. "I don't think Rothstein was involved in it [the Series fix]." The grand jury agreed. Two jurors became so smitten with their star witness that in years to come they would visit him regularly in New York. Their courtesy so touched A. R., that he would graciously provide them with theater and baseball tickets and fine dinners.

  Ban Johnson also expressed confidence in A. R.'s innocence. "I found the man Arnold Rothstein and after a long talk with him, I felt convinced he wasn't in any plot to fix the Series," Johnson told the press. "He did admit to me that he'd heard of the fixing, but in spite of that, declared he had wagered on the White Sox. . . ."

  Rothstein escaped indictment, helped, no doubt by Illinois State Attorney Hoyne's chief investigator: Rothstein pal Val O'Farrell. But A. R.'s associates weren't so lucky. The eight Black Sox, plus Attell, Sullivan, Chase, "Brown," Zelser, Zork, Ben Franklin, and the Levi brothers all found themselves indicted. No Illinois statute prohibited fixing sporting events, so authorities changed them with conspiracy to defraud bettors (in the form of a Chicagoan, Charles Nims, who lost $250 on the Sox) and players (in the form of catcher Ray Schalk), and to injure the business of Comiskey and the American League. If found guilty, they faced up to $2,000 in fines and five years in jail.

  To Abe Attell $2,000 seemed a reasonable expense for winning tens of thousands, but five years loss of liberty was a little steep. The Little Champ remained in Montreal. Neither was Bill Fallon eager for him to return. "I'll not produce my client," Fallon proclaimed just before the grand jury finished its work, "unless there is a specific charge made, or my client is indicted. This is merely a dodge to reach someone else [Rothstein] through Attell."

  Fallon didn't want Attell back until it was safe-safe for Attell; but more importantly, safe for Rothstein. In late October he advised Abe to return to New York. But before Attell left Canada, he fired another broadside, telling reporters how A. R. had already fixed the Series before he-Abe-had decided on participating. For good measure, Attell filled reporters in on current events, saying: