Uncle John’s True Crime

by Bathroom Readers' Institute

  END OF AN ERA

  After suffering a stroke in 1869, Pinkerton began turning more and more of his responsibilities over to his sons, Robert and William. But he never retired, and he was still working at the agency in June 1884 when he tripped and bit his tongue while taking a walk. In the days before antibiotics, such injuries were very serious—a few days later gangrene set in, followed by blood poisoning, and on July 1, Pinkerton died.

  The world of law enforcement has changed a great deal since the Pinkerton National Detective Agency opened its doors in 1850, and if anything, the pace accelerated following Allan Pinkerton’s death. The biggest change of all: in 1908 the Bureau of Investigation opened for business. The Pinkerton agency’s detective services became increasingly redundant—why pay good money to hire private detectives when the FBI, backed by the resources of the federal government, would investigate crimes for free? As the crime detection side of the business dried up, the agency’s security guard division, founded in 1858, came to assume a larger share. By the late 1930s, only a fraction of the company’s revenue came from its original detective services. In 1965 Allan Pinkerton’s great-grandson, Robert Allan Pinkerton II, acknowledged the inevitable by dropping the word “Detective” altogether and renamed the company Pinkerton’s, Inc. He was the last Pinkerton to head the Pinkerton Agency.

  So can you still hire a Pinkerton agent today, at least as a security guard? No—in 1999 an international security company headquartered in Sweden, Securitas A.B., bought the firm and stopped doing business under the Pinkerton name.

  * * *

  He who holds the ladder is as bad as the thief.—German proverb

  Quick! Log off! Someone is a victim of a cybercrime every 10 seconds.

  CRIMINAL HEADLINES

  Calling the grammar cops: It’s these headline writers who should have been brought up on charges.

  Juvenile Court To Try

  Shooting Defendant

  MAN ROBS, THEN

  KILLS HIMSELF

  NJ Judge to Rule on Nude Beach

  Mayor Says D.C. is Safe

  Except for Murders

  Man, Shot Twice in Head,

  Gets Mad

  Deadline Passes

  for Striking Police

  COCKROACH SLAIN,

  HUSBAND BADLY HURT

  MAN SHOOTS NEIGHBOR

  WITH MACHETE

  32 Ignorant Enough

  to Serve on North Jury

  Hostage Taker Kills Self;

  Police Shoot Each Other

  Potential Witness to Murder Drunk

  Prosecutor Releases Probe

  Into Undersheriff

  BOMB HIT BY LIBRARY

  ROBBER HOLDS UP

  ALBERT’S HOSIERY

  Multiple Personality Rapist

  Sentenced to Two Life Terms

  Stolen Painting Found By Tree

  MAN STRUCK BY LIGHTNING

  FACES BATTERY CHARGES

  Man Found Dead

  in Cemetery

  BAR TRYING TO HELP

  ALCOHOLIC LAWYERS

  Defendant’s Speech

  Ends In Long Sentence

  42 Percent of All Murdered Women

  Are Killed by the Same Man

  Silent Teamster Gets Cruel

  Punishment: Lawyer

  CRACK FOUND IN

  MAN’S BUTTOCKS

  Two Convicts Evade Noose,

  Jury Hung

  What is CODIS? The “Combined DNA Index System”—the world’s largest DNA data bank.

  KOOKY CROOKS

  Over the years, we’ve written about all kinds of criminals: dumb ones, nice ones, even clever ones. But some law breakers can make it difficult for us to classify them. That’s why we created a “Kooky Crooks” page.

  WHEN ART REALLY BOMBS

  In 2002 Luke Helder, a University of Wisconsin art student, was arrested for planting 18 pipe bombs in mailboxes in half a dozen states. It was all part of a bizarre “art” project: When plotted on a map, the bomb sites formed a “smiley face,” with the “eyes” in Nebraska and Iowa and the left side of the “mouth” in Colorado and Texas. The right side remained unfinished because police caught Helder after his father turned him in. (Nobody died.)

  SLEEPY CRIME

  Two women approached a man in a park in Sibu, Romania, and struck up a friendly conversation with him. In the course of conversation they asked him to let them hypnotize him. The man agreed, thinking it might be fun. A half hour later the man woke up from his trance. The women were gone, and so was his wallet.

  STRESSLING

  Simon Andrews of Osbaldwick, England, was sentenced to six months house arrest in 2003. The crime: Andrews had attacked four random men on the street, wrestling them to the ground and taking off—but not stealing—their shoes and socks. Why’d he do it? Andrews, an accountant, says he was “stressed out.”

  LIFE ON MARS

  Dusco Stuppar, 32, of France was able to con an old childhood friend, known only as “Christophe H.” into giving him 650,000 francs (about $62,000) to help fund the construction of a city to be built under a secret river on the planet Mars. Stuppar informed Christophe that he was part of a secret society of ultra-intelligent people who had the technology possible to make the underwater space city possible. Even more bizarre: Stuppar claimed his evil clone (also part of the Mars project) had injected him with explosives. If Christophe didn’t hand over the money, he said, the clone would blow up Stuppar. Christophe later told the story to a psychiatrist, leading to Stuppar’s arrest and an 18-month jail term.

  In Hong Kong, a wife may legally kill her adulterous husband (but only with her bare hands).

  HE JUST WANTED TO WATCH TV

  A couple living in Dorset, England, called the police in 2001 when they realized their home had been broken into while they were out. An investigation revealed that the thief hadn’t actually stolen anything, but had left behind a new television and an unopened bottle of Zima.

  CRIME PLAGUE

  A biological terror alert went out in January 2003 when Dr. Thomas Butler, an infectious disease researcher at Texas Tech University, informed police that 30 vials of bubonic plague were missing from his lab. Police feared the vials were stolen by terrorists who could convert the samples into a chemical weapon. Even President George W. Bush was briefed about the incident. A day later, Dr. Butler was arrested when it was discovered he’d accidentally destroyed the plague vials himself, and had lied to cover up the error.

  IT’S ELECTRIC

  In fall 2005, a strange crime wave hit Baltimore, Maryland: Over the course of six weeks, 130 light poles were stolen. Each pole measured 30 feet tall, weighed 250 pounds, and cost $1,200. There were no witnesses and police were baffled. More baffling is why the thieves were so neat—when they stole the poles, they left all the high voltage wiring cleanly wrapped in black electric tape.

  OH, THAT’S WHERE I LEFT THEM

  In 2003 a 23-year-old woman from Tyrol, Austria, went to a police station to report that her expensive pair of ski pants had been stolen. Officers quickly solved the case—they pointed out to the woman that she was wearing the pants. “I was so nervous that I forgot to take them off,” she said.

  Of the 14 escape attempts from Alcatraz, none were known to be successful.

  THE MONA LISA CAPER

  How one small act of thievery turned a picture into a worldwide sensation.

  NOW YOU SEE HER...

  August 21, 1911. Louis Beroud, a painter, was setting up his easel in the Salon Carré, one of the Louvre’s more than 200 rooms, directly facing the spot where the Mona Lisa smiled out at her admirers. Beroud was going to paint her as he had done many times before, but there was an empty space where the painting should have been.

  When he asked a guard about it, he was told that it was in the photography room, where copies were made. Beroud waited three hours for the painting’s return, but eventually, his patience gave out. He asked the guard what was taking so long. The gu
ard checked again. When he came back, he sheepishly admitted that the Mona Lisa was...gone.

  A STAR IS BORN

  The most famous painting in the world today wasn’t quite that famous at the turn of the 20th century—she was certainly revered among art aficionados. But news of the mysterious theft of the mysterious woman caught the public’s collective imagination, transforming Da Vinci’s masterpiece from mere painting to cultural icon. All of a sudden, the Mona Lisa was a cottage industry: Her likeness showed up on posters, postcards, mugs...in nightclubs, silent movies, magazines...she was everywhere. Perhaps strangest of all: Record crowds showed up at the Louvre just to view the empty space where the painting had been hanging.

  But where was the actual Mona Lisa? Theories abounded in France. Some thought it was an elaborate practical joke; others, a political ploy by the Germans to humiliate the French. Rumors even flew that it was the work of local Paris artists—Pablo Picasso among them. They were rounded up and brought in for questioning.

  It took a week for the entire museum to be searched thoroughly. All that turned up was the painting’s empty frame, found at the top of a staircase that must have been the thief’s escape route. Months passed. Then two years. There was still no sign of her.

  What is the “School of Turin”? A group of diamond thieves that never uses violence.

  THE DA VINCI CODE

  The big question: What would an art thief do with the painting? At the time, it was worth about $5 million—today, it’s priceless. To whom would the thief sell it? Even if a buyer were willing to spend that much, the painting was too high-profile to be passed along the art-theft network. It was too easy to trace. The crook would be caught.

  The answer came on November 29, 1913. A wealthy Italian art dealer, Alfredo Geri, received a letter from a man who called himself Leonard Vincenzo. He offered to return the Mona Lisa to France...for a fee. Geri figured it was a hoax, but was intrigued enough to set up a meeting at a hotel in Florence, Italy. Geri took along Giovanni Poggi, the director of Florence’s Uffizi Gallery. The two men walked into the hotel room to find Vincenzo, a short, mustachioed Italian man who told them he’d been working in Paris at the time of the theft. Vincenzo reached underneath the bed and retrieved an object wrapped in red silk. Geri unrolled it, and Poggi verified its authenticity: It was the Mona Lisa.

  THE PATRIOT

  Leonard Vincenzo didn’t receive his ransom. Instead, he was taken to the police station, where he admitted his real name was Vincenzo Peruggia... and it was he who stole the Mona Lisa. On the morning of the theft, he explained, he entered the Louvre dressed in a painter’s smock and went straight for the Mona Lisa. No one else was in the Salon Carré that morning, so Peruggia simply removed the painting from the four wall hooks and hid it under his smock—frame and all. When he reached the staircase, he removed the painting from the frame and walked out. The entire heist took about 20 minutes.

  So why did Peruggia do it? “For the love of country,” he said in court. “She belongs in Italy, where Leonardo painted her.” (Peruggia also said he was upset with Napoleon for his various Italian conquests.) But his past criminal record of burglaries, along with a list of art dealers that police found (including Geri), convinced the judge that his motivations were less than patriotic. Peruggia spent seven months in jail. He went to his grave in 1927 still believing he was one of Italy’s greatest patriots.

  As for the Mona Lisa, she made a triumphant return to the Louvre. Today, she smiles out—from her nearly impregnable, climate-controlled, bulletproof glass case—at more than five million admirers each year.

  Panda car: British slang for a police car (because it’s black and white).

  UNCLE ZU’S DICTIONARY

  Want to talk like a mobster? These underworld terms will get you started. (But don’t you go tellin’ no one where you got it from, crumb!)

  Zu. Translates as “uncle,” a term of endearment for a senior member of the underworld.

  Oobatz. Crazy.

  Ace of Spades: The wealthy widow of a dead mobster.

  Babbo. An underling who has been deemed useless.

  Shy. Short for “shylock,” a mobster who lends money at an extremely high rate of interest.

  Left-handed wife. A mobster’s mistress, also called a comare.

  Candy brains. A mobster who also partakes of the drugs he sells.

  Bubble gum machine. Police car.

  Government securities. A set of handcuffs.

  Fortune teller. The sentencing judge, who knows your future.

  Guest of the state. A mobster serving time in prison.

  Do a dime. Ten years in prison.

  Chased. Banished from the Mafia (a merciful punishment considering the alternative).

  Turban. To give a man a turban is to crack his head open.

  Serious headache. A bullet to the head.

  Dracula. The guy who has to clean blood from a crime scene.

  Buttlegging. Bootlegging untaxed cigarettes.

  Crumb. A “regular Joe” who is not a member of the Mob.

  On the pad. A cop who receives payment to ignore Mob crimes.

  Stugots: From stu cazzo, it means “testicles.” (It’s also the name of Tony Soprano’s yacht.)

  Cowboy. High-ranking mobster who carries out his own hits.

  Omertà. The “code of silence” that prohibits cooperating with the government.

  Flip. To abandon the omertà and squeal to the authorities. Do that and you’ll likely be...

  Whacked. Murdered. Also “hit,” “popped,” “rubbed out,” “bumped off,” “iced,” “gone for a ride,” and “sleeping with the fishes.”

  Texas Rangers were said to “ride like a Mexican, shoot like a Kentuckian, and fight like the devil.”

  CANADIAN GANGLAND

  Canada: the land of big lakes, lots of snow, friendly people—and a whole bunch of dangerous, violent gangs.

  BACKGROUND

  Most people don’t think of Canada as a place where violent gangs roam the streets, but in the past two decades, the number of gangs in the country has grown exponentially. Today there are today literally thousands of them, and their turf wars and drive-by shootings make the headlines more and more often. Here’s a rundown of some of the most notorious—and dangerous—of them all.

  Gang: Indian Posse (IP)

  Base: Winnipeg, Manitoba

  History: Indian Posse, believed to be the first “aboriginal gang” (or “First Nations” gang), was founded by a handful of disaffected teenagers in Winnipeg around 1990. IP quickly grew from a petty-theft operation into a criminal powerhouse specializing in drug trafficking, robbery, and prostitution on reservations, in cities, and inside prisons. Today it’s the largest of the many existing aboriginal gangs, with hundreds of full-fledged members and many more “associates” who can be identified by their red bandannas and “IP” tattoos. IP members are believed to be responsible for hundreds of violent crimes, including many murders, mostly of rival gang members in drug wars. Co-founder Richard Wolfe was sentenced to 19 years in prison for armed robbery and attempted murder in 1996, and still maintains a leadership position from his cell.

  Gang: The Galloway Boys, or G-Way

  Base: Scarborough, a section of Toronto, Ontario

  History: In 2000 this small but deadly gang was founded by a youth named Tyshan Riley, who, at the age of 18, became one of Scarborough’s leading gangsters. In 2002 a high-ranking G-Way associate was shot to death by members of their main rivals, the Malvern Crew, from Toronto’s nearby Malvern district. That led to a gang war that saw dozens of drive-by shootings and several murders. In 2004, after a two-year undercover police investigation, Riley and 16 other G-Way members were arrested. Riley alone was charged with 39 offenses, including three murders and five attempted murders. He and two other members were convicted of first-degree murder in July 2009, and each was sentenced to two consecutive life sentences.

  Luminol, the chemical that makes blood glow, can destroy ot
her crime scene evidence.

  Gang: Mad Cowz

  Base: Winnipeg, Manitoba

  History: This gang formed in the early 2000s around crack dealing in Winnipeg’s crime-ridden west end. Members are African Canadians, most of them refugees from nations ruined by decades of civil war, such as Somalia and Sudan. New members are recruited from recently arrived immigrants, mostly teenagers already accustomed to violence. The gang quickly became a successful, wealthy, and dangerous force in the city. In late 2005, their success led to a split, and a new rival gang, the African Mafia, was born. That same year, the son of a prominent Manitoba surgeon was shot and killed in the streets by battling Mad Cowz and African Mafia members. His death dominated local news for weeks, and a resulting police crackdown put most of the Mad Cowz’ leadership behind bars. Still, they continue to operate in the city and in prisons.

  Gang: Ace Crew

  Base: Ottawa, Ontario

  History: Formed sometime in the early 1990s, the Ace Crew was involved in activities common to most gangs, including drug dealing and extortion, but they became infamous all over Canada in August 1995 when they abducted four teenagers in retaliation for a perceived slight to the gang by one of the teens. They tortured all four and murdered 17-year-old Sylvain Leduc. Ace Crew member John Wartley Richardson was sentenced to life in prison for the murder, with an additional 73 years added for other crimes. The gang faded, but some members are still active in Ottawa.

  Gang: The Independent Soldiers, or IS

  Base: Vancouver, British Columbia

  History: IS became an organized gang in the early 2000s and is now one of Canada’s most well-known gangs. The membership is multiracial, but the leaders are Indo-Canadians; the gang grew up out of Vancouver’s large Punjabi Sikh community. Dealing in drugs, prostitution, gun-running, and money laundering, the gang has spread across British Columbia and into several towns in neighboring Alberta. IS has been linked to hundreds of shootings and dozens of murders, mostly in Vancouver, since 2005. In January 2009, a crackdown on Mexican drug cartels led to a brutal war between the IS and other Vancouver gangs over dwindling drug supplies, with more than 100 shootings and stabbings and more than a dozen murders in just two months.