John Dillinger Public Enemy No I: GREAT CRIMES AND TRIALS

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Discover the story behind a man who turned to crime out of boredom but then found it too addictive to give up. John Dillinger blazed a trail of crime across the States, robbing banks with a violent and authoritative ease.

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John Dillinger
born: 22-06-1903
birth place: Indiana, USA
died: 22-07-1934

But later events were to take a rather bizarre turn after Dillinger’s girlfriend was finally caught and arrested in Chicago. The then increasingly paranoid Dillinger decided to undergo plastic surgery with Van Meter on May 27th, 1934.

Public Enemy No 1
After his jailbreak and continuation to rob banks across several states, Dillinger who turned 31 on June 22nd, 1934, became known as America’s first Public Enemy Number One by the FBI, with a $10,000 reward on his head and a lesser figure simply for information that could lead to an arrest.

It was around this time that a new member joined the Dillinger posse, the psychopathic George Nelson, otherwise known as ‘Baby Face Nelson’ due to his youthful features. It was while the gang were on the run and staying at a lodge called Little Bohemia in Wisconsin, that a shoot out occurred between Dillinger’s mob and the FBI when the agents had been secretly contacted by the lodge owners. After FBI agents crept up on the lodge, Dillinger and his gang were alerted by barking dogs and soon gunfire was exchanged. The brief battle resulted in Baby Face killing thirty-year-old agent W.Carter Baum when he approached one of the mobsters’ cars that contained the violent gangster.

The incident also saw terrible mistakes committed by the FBI themselves when they mistakenly gunned down three innocent workers during the fire exchange. Gunfire didn’t last long and Dillinger and his gang managed to escape in a variety of ways.

On July 4th 1934, Dillinger moved into the apartment of Anna Sage, a Romanian ex-prostitute who was facing deportation charges for operating several brothels. Dillinger, not one to be without a woman for long had a new girlfriend, Polly Hamilton, former waitress and employee of Sage. It’s not known whether Dillinger was aware that Sage was facing deportation charges but what he obviously wasn’t aware of was that she was prepared to play a double game with the mobster and the FBI in order to save her own neck.

Sage did a deal with Melvin Purvis, a young, well-respected FBI agent who was to later become famous for capturing more public enemies than any other FBI agent in history. The brothel owner believed that by turning Dillinger in she wouldn’t be deported. The arrangement wasn’t to turn out as she had envisaged.

On July 22nd 1934, Dillinger invited Sage and girlfriend Hamilton to see the Clark Gable movie ‘Manhattan Melodrama’ at the Biograph cinema in Chicago. Sage had forewarned Purvis and on that hot night the trio went to see the film, while FBI agents including Purvis waited outside. The tense scene was like something from a gangster movie itself and no doubt made the Clark Gable gangster movie look pale in comparison. Sage, who had been asked to wear an orange skirt and white blouse to identify her and Dillinger, knew all along that agents were waiting outside.

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