by Edward Behr
Franklin N. Dodge was a Justice Department agent working directly for Deputy Attorney General Willebrandt on Prohibition cases of exceptional importance, infiltrating bootlegging rings, posing as a wealthy potential investor. Despite his outstanding record, Remus’s friend Willie Haar, another millionaire row inmate, thought that Dodge might be persuaded to use his influence to get Willebrandt to grant them both a pardon. Dodge, he told Remus, would certainly be a useful man to know — and who could sound him out more effectively than Imogene? Remus wrote her (sometime between March 16 and May 1, 1925): “Why do you not look up Dodge?”
Dodge came regularly to Atlanta to debrief other prisoners on separate cases (he had not been involved in the Remus case). Imogene got in touch with him, and it was in Atlanta, but outside the jail, that she and Dodge first met.
It was an immediate “fatal attraction.” Imogene fell head over heels in love with the tall, handsome agent. Whether Dodge, a known womanizer, fell for her too, or simply used her, remains unclear. Nor is it clear whether, subsequently, Imogene initiated some of the moves against Remus herself, or blindly followed Dodge’s instructions. In any event, shortly after that first meeting, Imogene started playing a devious, dangerous game.
Coached by Dodge, who abruptly resigned from the Justice Department shortly after Imogene became his mistress, she kept up her visits to Atlanta — ever the loyal, loving wife — but now did so on Dodge’s instructions. Behind Remus’s back, Imogene and Dodge embarked on a perfect crime. Not only did they set about appropriating his fortune (this was relatively easy, in that Imogene had power of attorney), but plotted to have him deported as an illegal alien. If that failed, they even considered having him murdered.
Given the straitlaced atmosphere of the time, their behavior was singularly careless. Not only did they travel together, staying in hotel rooms with communicating doors, sometimes even in the same room as a married couple under an assumed name, but Dodge moved into the Price Hill mansion with Imogene for weeks at a time, sleeping in Remus’s bed, even appropriating Remus’s hats, tiepins, and cufflinks — everything but his suits and shoes, which did not fit.
While Remus was serving the last months of his Atlanta sentence, Imogene, by stages, emptied his bank accounts, transferring the money into four separate accounts in Dodge’s name in Lansing, Michigan, Dodge’s home town. She also made over some of Remus’s distillery certificates to Dodge, selling the rest at a loss and transferring the money into the Lansing accounts.
Imogene’s infatuation with Dodge was total. Remus maintained charge accounts in various Cincinnati stores, and here Imogene bought Dodge clothes and jewelry, also making him a gift of Remus’s personal jewelry, worth $100,000. Some of her tokens of love were childishly romantic. As George Remus’s housekeeper, William Mueller, would later testify in court, Imogene had the initial R removed from the silver cutlery in the Remus mansion, substituting a D, similarly changing the initials G. R. on the door of Remus’s Lincoln to F. D.
Shortly before Remus was released from jail, she stripped the mansion of all its valuable contents, leaving behind only some basic furniture. The costly paintings, and Remus’s collection of George Washington’s letters, of which he was inordinately proud, were discreetly sold or pawned. All of the valuable fittings and furniture, including the chandeliers, were stored in Cincinnati warehouses and garages.
While dismantling the Price Hill mansion, Imogene ordered Mueller to take a clock down from a sitting room wall. Mueller refused. “That’s the master’s clock,” he said.
“Why, don’t be afraid,” Imogene told him. “Mr. Remus will never come back. We’re going to have him deported. We have it all arranged. He’ll go back the same as he came, with a little bundle.” All this would eventually come out in court.
When Remus had testified against Daugherty in Washington, Imogene had been in the audience, very much the loyal, supportive wife. But two days before his release from jail, a lawyer he had never previously heard of came to see him, notifying him of Imogene’s demand for divorce proceedings on the grounds of “cruelty.” Remus would find out later that he was her third choice: two lawyers, consulted earlier, had refused to take her case, saying there were no grounds for divorce.
It was his first intimation of her betrayal — and its impact was devastating. He flew into a blind rage, smashing up the cell furniture until restrained by guards. Subsequently, between catatonic spells, the outbursts returned, to begin with, several times a day. “She’s driving me mad,” Remus told the Post-Dispatch’s John Rogers shortly after his release. “She has outraged me. After all I’ve done for her.” He burst into uncontrollable sobs, shrieking that he was “being persecuted beyond endurance.” George Conners, his trusted aide, and John Rogers, who were with him a great deal of the time, would later tell the court that it was their conviction that Imogene’s conduct had driven Remus insane.
His rage returned when, in the company of a newspaper cartoonist, he came back to the now empty Price Hill mansion. Its windows and doors were boarded up, and Remus had to break in. As he surveyed the stripped, dilapidated rooms, he became aware of his full predicament for the first time. Entering the swimming pool compound, he shouted “She hasn’t taken the water, I’ve still got the water!” bursting into a fit of hysterical laughter.
He was soon to learn that Imogene had planned everything extremely thoroughly. Her last fifteen affectionate letters to him in jail prior to the lawyer’s visit had been written at one sitting, then posted at intervals by a friend, while she and Dodge were in Lansing and meeting with immigration authorities in Atlanta — all part of their plan to get Remus deported. Dodge, though no longer a member of the Justice Department, used his influence to get Remus returned to prison for another year, on other charges related to his original conviction. Remus served this extra term not in Atlanta, but in Troy, near Dayton, Ohio, where, for the first time, he was treated like an ordinary inmate.
Mabel Walker Willebrandt agreed to his eventual release but extracted a singularly vengeful price: she compelled him to testify that he had paid large sums of money to prison governor John Sartain. Millionaire’s row was closed down and Sartain eventually went to jail. Under pressure from her peers, she also threatened to send him back to jail unless he withdrew his charges (made before the Senate Investigating Committee) concerning Daugherty. Remus would later confess his shame at having done so, but there were so many other independent witnesses (including Jess Smith’s ex-wife) with lurid accounts of Daugherty’s corrupt, predatory ways that this vindictive measure was virtually ignored. In the media and in Senate circles, no one doubted that Remus had told the truth.
It was Imogene’s betrayal that led him, shortly after his release from Troy, to cooperate with prosecutors in the Jack Daniel’s case. Accompanied by the faithful Conners, and John Rogers, who was researching the series about him in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, he went to Indianapolis with one purpose in mind: to reveal Imogene’s part in the conspiracy. Not only had she invested $20,000 of her own money in Jack Daniel’s whiskey certificates, but had been influential in persuading the rogue syndicate to empty the Jack Daniel’s warehouse fast — and cut the whiskey with water. To Remus — ruined, disgraced, and betrayed — this was the ultimate perfidy: not only was he a cuckold, but — through sheer greed — Imogene had destroyed his reputation as America’s finest quality bootlegger.
To his dismay, the charges against Imogene were dropped. Although she had filed papers for a divorce, she was still legally his wife and he was unable to testify against her. While the Jack Daniel’s case proceeded with the other accused, Imogene and Dodge even showed up in Indianapolis as interested spectators, living in a hotel as man and wife. There was one unexpected confrontation, witnessed by Rogers. A scared Imogene threw up her hands, shouting “Daddy, don’t kill me, don’t hurt me.” Remus ignored her and turned away.
It was in Indianapolis that Remus learned that Imogene — who had found proof of his entry into the
United States and of his citizenship in the Price Hill mansion and destroyed them — was trying to have him deported. While in Indianapolis, Remus also discovered that his life was in danger. Rogers learned that Dodge had contacted some gunmen in St. Louis, members of a gang called the Regan Rats, and promised them $15,000 to have him killed. Remus applied for, and received, a gun permit.
At the Indianapolis railway station, Conners caught sight of one of the gang, and persuaded Remus to take a later train. The gunmen, Conners found out later, intended to take Remus’s train, stage a brawl, and kill him on board. Conners too was in danger, he would later tell the court, for Dodge and Imogene had also taken out a contract on him.
At times, Remus’s attitude toward Imogene was ambiguous. Although his outbursts of rage remained an almost daily occurrence, he sometimes found excuses for her. “I knew the little woman wouldn’t do this of her own free will,” he told Conners on one occasion. Most of the time he was in a less forgiving mood. “I picked her out of the gutter and tried to make a lady out of her, but she didn’t have it in her,” he said. He would ask Conners repeatedly: “Did you think she was doing anything like this?” Conners replied that “everyone in Cincinnati was expecting something like this to happen.” “My God, I must have been blind,” Remus replied.
Conners had also been present when Imogene had telephoned Remus, listening in on their conversation. Imogene asked him: “You won’t hurt me if I come in to see you?” Remus told her she had nothing to fear, adding: “You know I would have done the right thing by you if you had let me know.” Remus asked if she was still seeing Dodge. “I’ve been going around with Mr. Dodge, Daddy,” she said, “but there’s nothing wrong morally. I’ve got to see him again because he has something very valuable and I must get that.”
But later she called to taunt him. “Hello, Daddy, still waiting? You certainly are a mighty good waiter. I may be in tomorrow.” Remus had had enough. “You aren’t Mrs. Remus any more,” he told her. “I’ll file a cross-petition, and if you think you’re going to get my property, I’ll follow you to China if necessary.” Rogers had been with Remus when Imogene had phoned once more. Remus asked her to name a single instance of his mistreatment of her. There was a pause, and then she said: “Your kind treatment of Romola” (her step-daughter). Remus replied: “Well, she is my daughter.”1
Because Conners and Remus were convinced their lives were in danger in the Price Hill mansion, they moved into a downtown Cincinnati hotel, the Sinton. Apart from Conners, two of Remus’s former staff had remained close to him: George Klug, his driver, and his secretary, Blanche Watson. All four had dinner together on the evening of October 5,1927 — the eve of Imogene’s divorce proceedings, and, as it turned out, her death.
On the morning of October 6, Remus ordered Klug to drive him to the Alms Hotel, where Imogene was staying. “There’s something I want to discuss with her before we go before the judge,” Remus told him. It was a ruse, to allay any suspicions Klug might have, for he did not attempt to talk to her as she left the hotel. According to a later police report, when he shot and killed her she was wearing “a black silk dress, silk stockings and a small black hat from Paris.”
The meeting with Judge Dixon was at eight A.M. While he waited in vain in his chambers for them to show up, a dying Imogene was on her way to Bethesda Hospital, and Remus, having given himself up, was in police custody. The police asked him if he wanted to make a statement. “I’m at peace now after two years of hell. I’m satisfied I’ve done right,” he told them.
In the Hamilton County Jail, Remus got special treatment once again. He kept a sizeable wardrobe (twenty suits, according to the Cincinnati Enquirer), and was allowed unlimited visitors, including reporters and photographers — cooperative wardens even brought him liquor for his “hospitality bar.” He was photographed doing his morning exercises on the prison rooftop, and was given an additional cell, which he used as an office.
Charged with first-degree murder, which carried the death penalty, Remus was determined to defend himself. Surprisingly, for his conviction should by rights have disbarred him, Judge Chester R Shook agreed to let Remus act as co-counsel to Robert Elston, an aristocratic-looking former district attorney and the best legal talent in Cincinnati.
This in itself ensured that the Remus trial would be a cause célèbre. Even before it began, it was attracting considerable media attention. Reporters were expected from all over America, as well as from Canada, London, and Berlin. At the Hamilton County courthouse, a courtroom was earmarked for the press. A note to them from County Clerk Frank Lewis banned the use of “artificial lights” but stated that “within reasonable limits, hand cameras can be used.”
By today’s standards, preliminary procedures were remarkably swift: jury selection took only four days, and a mere thirty-nine days after the murder, the Remus trial began. If it failed to make headline news that day, this was only because of an even more compelling story: the day Remus’s trial began — November 14,1927 — was also the day Charles Lindbergh was given a hero’s welcome in Washington after his Atlantic crossing.
The prosecution team was an almost caricatural illustration of the gulf between America’s patrician establishment and “new Americans” such as Remus. The chief prosecutor, Charles P. Taft II, whose brother ran the Cincinnati Enquirer, was a member of Ohio’s most famous political family. Their father, former United States President William Howard Taft, was currently serving his country in another prestigious capacity, as chief justice of the Supreme Court. In an early altercation with prosecutor Taft, Remus pointedly referred to “this young man’s father.” “It has been the pleasure of this defendant to appear before the High Chief Justice, but the specimen as given by the offshoot of that great renowned character is pitiful, if the Court please.”
The other prosecutors, though from less prestigious backgrounds, were also from well-connected Ohio families. Taft let Walter K. Sibbald do the bulk of the talking, while Remus reserved much of his venom for Harold Basler, the most aggressive member of the prosecution team.
As is often the case in American jury trials, jury selection marked the first clash between prosecution and defense. Remus, a convicted boolegger, was eager to discover whether any of the potential jurors were fanatical drys or otherwise prejudiced against him. The prosecutors objected to a defendant cross-examining them at all. As they knew he would, Remus lost his temper, alleging harassment.
Remus particularly resented the prosecution’s attempt to discredit him as a lawyer. Basler based his allegations on an incident in Chicago years ago, in a case opposing employers and the Chicago Machinists’ Union. Remus had acted for the unionists, and his court opponents had appealed to the Chicago Bar Association in an unsuccessful effort to have him disbarred. This led to the first of his many violent clashes with Basler and Taft.
REMUS: Five hundred judges and members of the Chicago Bar have volunteered to come down here as character witnesses, and just because the son of the Chief Justice in this wonderful United States makes that kind of assertion — man, if I had you in the corridor, I would wreck you physically.
BASLER: How much of this stuff is the court going to stand, this personal vilification? There is absolutely no excuse for it.
REMUS (to Basler): When you were on the Eastern trip you drank two pints of whiskey — you did so!
BASLER: Is that so?
REMUS: That will be shown. Yes, sir, I will show you up.
BASLER: Now then, your Honor sees what kind of vilification is going to be permitted here if this man indulges in such liberties as this.
REMUS: Murder is the charge. My life is at stake, and I will show that you drank liquor by the pint, not by the ounce.
BASLER: There is no occasion for this, as you can see.
REMUS: My life is at stake, not yours.
BASLER: He is turning around to talk to the newspapermen and it is not for the benefit of the court at all.
JUDGE SHOOK: I am ready to pas
s on the matter. Sit down, Mr. Remus. The court will disregard everything stated by Mr. Remus of any personal character.
The clash had been more violent than the official court proceedings inferred. At one point, Remus rose and strode menacingly over to Basler, waving his fists. Basler (overheard by newsmen, but not, apparently by the court stenographer) hissed: “Get back to your side, or I’ll punch you.”
Judge Shook allowed Remus to continue cross-examining potential jurors, but cautioned him against any more “spectacular outbursts.” It was widely assumed that Remus knew so much about Basler’s drinking habits because back in 1921 he had regularly supplied him with liquor.
As it turned out, most of the excused jury members were dismissed because they opposed the death penalty, not because of their attitude toward Prohibition. One juror was excused because he was a machinist, and might therefore be prejudiced in Remus’s favor. Another Afro-American juror, described as “Ben Boner, negro,” was also dismissed for prejudice of a different type. “I had a wife who ran away with my money too,” he told the courtroom, to loud laughter, in which Remus did not join. The twelve-person jury ended up all-white. Ten were men. Its youngest female member, Mrs. Ruth Cross, was twenty-three; the oldest, Mrs. Anna Ricking, sixty-three.
Remus had rashly announced before the trial that he would not plead temporary insanity, but changed his mind after a talk with Elston, who also persuaded him not to intervene too often in the course of the trial. His more dispassionate, polished co-counsel dominated the proceedings from the very start. This was, to a large extent, the prosecution’s own fault.
In his opening statement, Walter Sibbald not only accused Remus of “cold-blooded, deliberate and premeditated murder,” but claimed “Remus had the assistance and the encouragement of others of the Remus gang,” and that even his secretary, Blanche Watson, “was in on the conspiracy.” Remus’s prompt objection to the word gang was sustained.