Rothstein (21 page)

Of course they did.

“Gambling will be inquired into in general. We are particularly anxious to know about the Rothstein matter. Men who witnessed the shooting will be given ample opportunity to refresh their memories. Those who elect to testify falsely before the Grand jury will have to stand the consequences. The penalty for perjury, if I am not mistaken, is still seven years in State prison.”

Swann assigned the investigation to Assistant District Attorney James E. Smith, but he failed to refresh any memories. No one feared perjury. In fact, no one remembered much of anything-about Rothstein, about any shots, about anything at all. A gambler named Dubin testified he saw a shot fired-but couldn’t tell who fired it. Nobody else went even that far.

Already the case smelled suspicious. As Smith took the case to the grand jury, the New York Times reported “rumors that several thousand dollars were spent by a wealthy gambler to keep the facts hidden and prevent prosecution.”

In March 1919, New York City Mayor John E “Red Mike” Hylan wrote privately to Police Commissioner Richard E. Enright. Hylan was a former Brooklyn Elevated Railroad motorman, fired after almost running down a company superintendent. He worked his way through New York Law School and boss John H. McCooey’s Brooklyn Democratic machine into a series of judgeships. He was honest but uninspiring, all in all, not much better as judge than as motorman. In 1917 he became mayor, entirely on the strength of backing from McCooey and the Hearst papers.

Hylan demanded that Enright investigate the accusations, fleshing them out in detail:

There seems to be a common report around town that Rothstein, the gambler gave $20,000 [sic] to a lawyer who was formerly a Magistrate [Fuchs], which, so the report goes, was divided up equally between an Assistant District Attorney [Smith] and a Magistrate [McQuaid]. However, the case against Rothstein was dismissed.

Nothing happened until June 5, 1919. Arnold’s old associate (and treasurer of the New York Giants), Judge Francis Xavier McQuade, dismissed charges against everyone save Rothstein. Swann and Smith could have assembled a case against Rothstein only with cooperation from his fellow gamblers, because police hadn’t seen who fired the shots that came whizzing through the door. Only those on the other side could testify against A. R.-and now Magistrate McQuade had removed any reason for their cooperation.

Nonetheless, Swann’s grand jury dutifully delivered two indictments against Rothstein: for first-and second-degree felonious assault: the first count for shooting Detective McLaughlin, the second for wounding Detective Walsh. There were no consequences for winging Detective Oliver and, as Rothstein possessed a valid pistol permit, no weapons charges. Judge Thomas C. T. Crain ordered Rothstein’s arrest, but before police laid a hand on him, A. R. presented himself to judge William H. Wadhams in General Sessions. Wadhams released A. R. on $5,000 bail.

With no one testifying against A. R., only one possible outcome existed: dismissal. On June 25, Swann’s office brought the case before Judge John E McIntyre. Jim Smith was conveniently out of town on vacation. Rothstein attorney Emil Fuchs sprang to his feet, moving for dismissal:

The record is barren of any evidence tending directly or indirectly [sic] to connect the defendant with the commission of any crime. Much time was spent and, doubtless, much public money expended, in an effort to fasten the crime on the defendant, and, I might add, that in the Court’s judgment, the time was uselessly spent. Not a word of evidence appears in the Grand jury minutes showing that the defendant committed an assault upon anybody. All that is disclosed is as follows:

Q-Do you know who did the shooting?

A-No.

Q-Did you see Rothstein have a gun, or did you see him do the shooting?

A-No.

Q-Well, who in your opinion did the shooting? Give us your best opinion.

Q-From reading the papers, my opinion is that it was Rothstein.

Judge McIntyre agreed:

This appears to be the only evidence that in any way relates to Rothstein.

Under our system of jurisprudence, fortunately, a surmise, a conjecture, or a guess can have no place as evidentiary of the commission of a crime. Why the Grand jury ordered an indictment in this case is incomprehensible. It should not have been voted. It was idle to do so. The motion to dismiss is granted.

Rothstein was free. A gambler shoots three cops in front of nineteen witnesses and walks. The failure of the system can be interpreted in one of two ways. One: The underworld wall of silence had once again thwarted justice-an unfortunate but understandable situation. Two: The system had gone into the tank.

In 1920 many believed the latter, particularly in cases involving the Manhattan District Attorney’s office or Arnold Rothstein. In cases involving both, cynicism increased exponentially.

William Randolph Hearst’s American had little personal interest in Rothstein, but great curiosity about “Big Tom” Foley-A. R.‘s primary contact at Tammany Hall since Big Tim Sullivan’s unfortunate demise. Foley began as a blacksmith, moved to saloon keeping and thence to politics, serving as alderman and county sheriff, but primarily deriving his power from leadership of a downtown assembly district.

He had repeatedly helped derail Hearst’s political ambitions, and Hearst hated him for it. Out of professional courtesy, Hearst’s staff also hated Herbert Bayard Swope, who had made the World into the city’s most respected paper. By striking against Rothstein, the American hit both Foley and Swope.

The American hinted broadly that Rothstein bribed his way to freedom. “It is believed,” they wrote, “that Rothstein’s bankroll is now some $32,000 lighter than it was when he was placed under arrest.”

Police Commissioner Richard E. Enright now demanded that Dominick Henry tell him what he knew. Henry responded with a number of accusatory affidavits against Assistant District Attorney Smith, alleging both graft and antiSemitism. (Smith, Henry claimed, had told him he “was going after the Jew gamblers, but would not touch a hair of the head of any Christian who was running a place.”) Smith in turn called Henry a grafter who allowed vice to overrun his precinct, fattening his bank and brokerage accounts in the process.

Mayor Hylan hinted broadly that Herbert Bayard Swope had acted as a bagman for Rothstein, writing Commissioner Enright, “it is common knowledge that Swope knows Rothstein and has long been friendly with him.”

District Attorney Swann convened two new grand juries: the first investigating Rothstein, McQuade, Fuchs, and Swope, the second investigating Inspector Henry. The case against Swope collapsed immediately and spectacularly: Swope had been abroad during the whole imbroglio, from December 1918 through September 1919, covering the Versailles peace conference. “I ask to go before the grand jury to scotch this lie and to brand the liars, whoever they may be, and to ask satisfaction for this criminal libel,” Swope blustered.

“The mayor,” jibed Emil Fuchs, “ought to be man enough to come out and say he was mistaken.” Fuchs, McQuade, and Rothstein appeared before the grand jury. All denied wrongdoing.

Swann cleared Smith and indicted Henry for failure to shutter his precinct’s “disorderly houses.” Henry won quick acquittal, but Swann and Smith indicted him once more, this time for perjury regarding his testimony to the grand jury. In June 1920, they convicted Henry, who faced expulsion from the force and four years in prison.

The Appellate Division reversed Henry’s guilty verdict. He returned to active service, and should have received both back pay and reimbursement for his considerable legal fees. Authorities stubbornly refused to pay the latter. In 1922 the New York State Legislature passed an act mandating payment. Governor Nathan Miller vetoed it. In 1923 Alfred E. Smith, now returned to the governorship, signed it. Still, Henry was not paid. A local judge ruled the law unconstitutional. Not until 1924 would Henry receive his back pay.

Arnold Rothstein had wounded three police officers and retained not only his freedom-but his pistol permit. In 1926 newly elected Mayor Jimmy Walker appointed a tough new police commissioner, George V. (“George the Fifth”) McLaughlin. McLaughlin cracked down on gambling wherever he found it-even in the numerous Tammany clubhouses that sheltered highstakes games. McLaughlin also ordered A. R.‘s pistol permit revoked. Rothstein and an attorney traveled downtown to the Police Department’s ornate Centre Street headquarters, demanding to see McLaughlin. News of the visitors infuriated McLaughlin. “Tell the gentleman [except that McLaughlin did not use the word `gentleman’],” he ordered his subordinates, “to get out of the office and out of the building and if he does not throw him out.”

People didn’t talk like that to Arnold Rothstein. By the time the message reached A. R., it became more polite: The commissioner is not available to see you now.

Arnold turned to a high-ranking friend in the department, who interceded with McLaughlin. “I have ordered this man put out of the building,” the commissioner exploded. “After I have ordered him out of the building you have permitted him to come to your office, ask for your aid and have come to me to plead for him. Go back to your office and throw those people out of it. Have them thrown out on the street and see that they never get in again.”

Commissioner McLaughlin’s orders were finally implemented, but Tammany continued pressuring Mayor Walker to halt McLaughlin’s embarrassing raids of their local clubhouses. McLaughlin finally had enough and resigned-and when he did, A. R.-shooter of three police officers, got his pistol permit back.

Mystery shrouds the death of Arnold Rothstein-the mystery of highstakes poker games, a close-range gunshot in a hotel room, codes of silence, botched investigations, political fixes.

Business as usual on Broadway.

Another great mystery shrouds not his death, but his life. The 1919 World Series, ostensibly a celebration of sport’s highest ideals, in reality featured crooked ballplayers, betrayed fans, gamblers doublecrossing players, players doublecrossing gamblers, missing witnesses, perjury, stolen confessions, purposely mistaken identities, and cover-ups that would make Tammany proud. The Black Sox scandal is the ultimate corruption of our sports heroes, the ultimate corruption of American heroism, period. It remains a linchpin of our popular history-recalled in books, magazine articles, movies, documentaries, and, yes, in everyday conversation and literature.

“Say it ain’t so, Joe!” a heartbroken Chicagoan begged fallen idol Shoeless Joe Jackson, and his plea entered the American language. The following became part of our literature:

“Meyer Wolfsheim? No, he’s a gambler.” Gatsby hesitated, then added coolly: “He’s the man who fixed the World’s Series back in 1919. “

“Fixed the World’s Series?” I repeated.

The idea staggered me. I remembered of course that the World’s Series had been fixed in 1919 but if I had thought of it all I would have thought of it as a thing that merely happened, the end of some inevitable chain.

It never occurred to me that one man could start to play with the faith of fifty million people-with the single-mindedness of a burglar blowing a safe.

-F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby

Arnold Rothstein was Meyer Wolfsheim. Meyer Wolfsheim was Arnold Rothstein. F. Scott Fitzgerald met A. R. only once, but it was enough for Fitzgerald to include him in his greatest novel. Fitzgerald really didn’t get Rothstein right. He saw him as crude and uncouth, a vulgarian who mispronounced words and sported human teeth as cuff links. F. Scott Fitzgerald got A. R. wrong, and it’s not surprising no one has gotten A. R. and the World Series fix right since.

A. R. planned it that way.

To untangle what A. R. tangled we must start at the beginning, with fairly incontrovertible facts. A cabal of players (“the Black Sox”) on the highly favored American League champion Chicago White Sox conspired to lose the 1919 World Series to the National League Cincinnati Reds. The Sox were a talented but unhappy and factionridden ball club. Money played a part in their unhappiness. Some players felt underpaid and hated owner Charles Comiskey for it. But on the Sox were men who would have stolen even if they had been millionaires.

Not one, but two sets of gamblers, financed the fix. The players stretched out their greedy hands and took money from both. Ultimately, both gambling cliques welshed on their promises, shorting the players on the cash promised them. The players retaliated by winning Game Three against Cincinnati, bankrupting one gambling clique and sending them home from the series. However, under threat of violence, the Sox ultimately lost the Series to the Reds.

It was not the perfect crime. Perfect crimes require discretion and intelligence. In 1919, so many players and gamblers flaunted their actions that suspicions surfaced almost immediately. But nearly a year passed before baseball and civil authorities exposed the plot. In July 1921 eight Black Sox players-pitchers Ed Cicotte and Lefty Williams, outfielders Shoeless Joe Jackson and Oscar “Happy” Felsch, first baseman Chick Gandil, shortstop Swede Risberg, third baseman Buck Weaver, and utility man Fred McMullin and a ragtag assortment of gamblers stood trial in Chicago. After several signed confessions disappeared mysteriously, all won acquittal-but not exoneration. None of the eight Black Sox ever played major-league baseball again.

This we know for sure. Less certain is Arnold Rothstein’s connection.

A. R. did very little in direct fashion, and until he caught a bullet in his gut, he never paid for his actions. If things happened-illegal things, immoral things, violent things-and he profited from them … well that was just how things turned out. No one could ever prove anything. If he shot a cop-or even three-he walked, and the detective who wondered aloud whether shooting cops should be punished by civil authorities found himself indicted. If the feds indicted A. R. for questionable activities on Wall Street, the case conveniently never came to trial. If A. R. fixed a World Series …

“Why isn’t he in jail?”

“They can’t get him, old sport. He’s a smart man. “