Some might argue they are a textbook example of the free market, but nothing they sell comes free, and those who break the rules of the game often pay with their lives.
Unemployment in Los Angeles County ha s hovered in the 15 to 20% range for most of this decade. The have-nots, praying to hit it big, would risk what little they carried in their poke on a roll of the dice or the turn of a card. They lusted for a night or an hour of escapism from the suffocation of their money troubles. On the other side of the economic town, the haves toss their dough around in search of pleasure. Everybody’s a customer for the mob, and business is always good. So much so, that these purveyors of “feeling good” often kill to move up in line or to take away a territory serviced by a competitor. Once in the business, mobsters generally stay until death do they part, the death sometimes coming earlier and more suddenly than they expected.
Earl y yesterday morning, Harry Raymond, special investigator for the Citizens Independent Vice Investigating Committee (CIVIC) walked into the garage of his Boyle Heights home. He expected a day like a lot of other days. Only yesterday wasn’t like a lot of other days. For Raymond, it would be like no other day. He planned to drive his wife to the market, and then take her to lunch. That changed when he started his car. The engine blew apart along with a good portion of Raymond’s garage.
Harry Raymond, a former LAPD officer, had for a brief time in 1933 held the top job, Chief of Police, Los Angeles. According to rumors, Raymond, under the employ of CIVIC, had recently gathered massive amounts of evidence proving that a corrupt LAPD and City Hall provided protection for organized vice crimes throughout our city’s reputed chain of over 1,800 bookies, 600 brothels and 200 gambling dens. The story was that Raymond planned to take his extensive report and evidence to the Los Angeles County Grand Jury.
Not wanting this to be done, t he bad guys had wired his car to put an end to Raymond’s inquiries. But, Harry Raymond had the last laugh. This gristly veteran of law enforcement beat the bad guys. He survived the blast. Although, this time it hurt him to laugh about it. As I write this, Raymond is in Georgia Street Receiving Hospital where he has become the proud owner of over 100 stitches in addition to treatments for multiple fractures and two chest punctures. Yeah, it hurt him a lot to laugh.
More on th is story later …
On a lighter note, the Philharmonic Auditorium will be presentin g the fabulous George Gershwin musical “Porgy and Bess” starting February 4, 1938.
Please tune in to my mid-week radio crime report on Wednesdays where I bring up new development on crimes covered in my column and new items of interest from the underworld and the celluloid world of movies.
Good night, Mr. and Mrs. Los Angeles and all the gambling ships at sea … Good Luck, Suckers! Matt Kile
Chapter Three
April , 1938
As the Friday sun slipped below the western horizon, I poured two fingers of Tullamore Dew, my favorite Irish, over crushed ice and sat back in my second floor office in the section of Spring Street known as the Wall Street of the West. I like a squeeze of lemon in my Dew, but I didn’t keep lemons in my office. I kept meaning to, just never seemed to think of it when I was at a store which sold lemons.
Some nights I hung around to meet someone with a secret they wanted to see in the paper. Tonight, I stayed late to put some finishing touches to my column. Other nights I lingered simply because I had nowhere else in particular to be.
The outside light silently slid in between the horizontal blinds which started one-third down from the curved top of the window. These shards of light grew into thicker and longer rows of dark and light against the far wall. The light from above the blinds charged in all bulky-like, only to be chopped up in endless battles with the blades in
Unemployment in Los Angeles County ha s hovered in the 15 to 20% range for most of this decade. The have-nots, praying to hit it big, would risk what little they carried in their poke on a roll of the dice or the turn of a card. They lusted for a night or an hour of escapism from the suffocation of their money troubles. On the other side of the economic town, the haves toss their dough around in search of pleasure. Everybody’s a customer for the mob, and business is always good. So much so, that these purveyors of “feeling good” often kill to move up in line or to take away a territory serviced by a competitor. Once in the business, mobsters generally stay until death do they part, the death sometimes coming earlier and more suddenly than they expected.
Earl y yesterday morning, Harry Raymond, special investigator for the Citizens Independent Vice Investigating Committee (CIVIC) walked into the garage of his Boyle Heights home. He expected a day like a lot of other days. Only yesterday wasn’t like a lot of other days. For Raymond, it would be like no other day. He planned to drive his wife to the market, and then take her to lunch. That changed when he started his car. The engine blew apart along with a good portion of Raymond’s garage.
Harry Raymond, a former LAPD officer, had for a brief time in 1933 held the top job, Chief of Police, Los Angeles. According to rumors, Raymond, under the employ of CIVIC, had recently gathered massive amounts of evidence proving that a corrupt LAPD and City Hall provided protection for organized vice crimes throughout our city’s reputed chain of over 1,800 bookies, 600 brothels and 200 gambling dens. The story was that Raymond planned to take his extensive report and evidence to the Los Angeles County Grand Jury.
Not wanting this to be done, t he bad guys had wired his car to put an end to Raymond’s inquiries. But, Harry Raymond had the last laugh. This gristly veteran of law enforcement beat the bad guys. He survived the blast. Although, this time it hurt him to laugh about it. As I write this, Raymond is in Georgia Street Receiving Hospital where he has become the proud owner of over 100 stitches in addition to treatments for multiple fractures and two chest punctures. Yeah, it hurt him a lot to laugh.
More on th is story later …
On a lighter note, the Philharmonic Auditorium will be presentin g the fabulous George Gershwin musical “Porgy and Bess” starting February 4, 1938.
Please tune in to my mid-week radio crime report on Wednesdays where I bring up new development on crimes covered in my column and new items of interest from the underworld and the celluloid world of movies.
Good night, Mr. and Mrs. Los Angeles and all the gambling ships at sea … Good Luck, Suckers! Matt Kile
Chapter Three
April , 1938
As the Friday sun slipped below the western horizon, I poured two fingers of Tullamore Dew, my favorite Irish, over crushed ice and sat back in my second floor office in the section of Spring Street known as the Wall Street of the West. I like a squeeze of lemon in my Dew, but I didn’t keep lemons in my office. I kept meaning to, just never seemed to think of it when I was at a store which sold lemons.
Some nights I hung around to meet someone with a secret they wanted to see in the paper. Tonight, I stayed late to put some finishing touches to my column. Other nights I lingered simply because I had nowhere else in particular to be.
The outside light silently slid in between the horizontal blinds which started one-third down from the curved top of the window. These shards of light grew into thicker and longer rows of dark and light against the far wall. The light from above the blinds charged in all bulky-like, only to be chopped up in endless battles with the blades in
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