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John H. Dillinger
He was born on June 22, 1903 in Indianapolis, but by the age of 21 he was already convicted and jailed for nine years for holding up a grocery store. After his release he immediately began robing banks throughout the midwest. He was caught twice and jailed, but both times he escaped with help of accomplices, earning him early notoriety and the attention of the FBI’s J. Edgar Hoover, who put the entire town of Mooresville under surveillance, lest he return to his parent’s farm. On January 25, 1934, John allegedly shot and killed East Chicago, Indiana police officer William O’Malley during another bank robbery. He was jailed in Crown Point, but while awaiting trial he escaped and drove a stolen sheriff’s car into Illinois. By fleeing across state lines he committed a federal crime, and thus the ecstatic Hoover gained jurisdiction over his capture. Hoover and his “G-men” would begin a six-month pursuit of John and his gang, who would escape from trap after trap. Most notably, the FBI tracked him to the Little Bohemia Lodge in Mercer, Wisconsin. Tipped off seconds before, the group escaped, but not before the FBI men shot three innocent people, killing one. Embarrassed, Hoover declared John “Public Enemy #1” on his 31st birthday, June 22 1934. Through betrayal by his girlfriend, Anna Sage, the “woman in red”, they tracked him to the Biograph Theater on July 22, 1934, where he was ambushed and shot dead outside as he left the movie “Manhattan Melodrama”.
His body was displayed by the Cook County coroner’s office to thousands before being returned to the Harvey Funeral Home in Mooresville. He lies today in the ground in Crown Hill Cemetery, Section 44, Lot 94, less than 3 miles from where he was born.
American Experience “Public Enemy #1” (PBS) |
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