and then, when that supply was exhausted, shooting one another. Our banditos—from Black Jack Ketchum to Butch Cassidy—were giants in the land. Even our lawmen, I point to Wyatt Earp and the infamous Sheriff Brady of the Lincoln County War as notable examples, were often criminal enough to warrant hanging.
Alas, that was yesterday. Today, as your complaint notes, we can boast only of quantity. My own smallish city, Albuquerque, tallied fifty-two bank robberies last year—so many that the gunmen were reduced to robbing the same places two or three times. Not one of these felonies showed the slightest sign of originality or imagination. Nor were any of those elements applied by the police. The only arrests made recently were of a robber who used a bicycle as his escape vehicle and wasn’t very good at it and another who parked at the drive-up window, handed the teller his note demanding money, and waited patiently until the police came to lead him away. The once proud Federal Bureau of Investigation, formed in large part to protect our banks back in the halcyon days of John Dillinger and Pretty Boy Floyd, was finally stirred from its lethargy. To what end? It issued a press statement criticizing bank security systems, then went back to investigating librarians whom it suspects of checking out subversive books to Democrats.
In defense of the FBI, and real policemen too, it should be said that the sort of crime we have been offering hardly inspires the gendarmes. Thus I am pleased to join in your effort to uplift the genre.
Here is the way your murder will work:
You will call the 911 number, tell the operator that you have drowned your wife in the bathtub, provide your name and address, and wait for the police to arrive. When they do, you will show them into the bathroom where your wife will be floating face down, nude, in the tub. You will explain that you had arrived home, noticed that your wife was in the bathroom, and took advantage of her occupation to make a quick search of her desk because of your suspicions that she was having an affair with a friend of yours. In this search, you turned up a draft of a prenuptial contract which confirmed your fears that she planned to leave you. Thereupon, insane with jealous rage, you rushed into the bath, grabbed your wife by the neck, and held her head under water. Finally you noticed she was limp and still. You recovered your senses, felt instant remorse, and called the police. Now you are ready to pay the penalty for your crime.
At this point you must think that I am about to disappoint you, that this is no perfect crime. This scenario is typical of today’s low standards—just what the bored police have come to expect.
Exactly! That is exactly the impression we wish to make and to maintain.
Unfortunately, you will now have to endure the only unpleasantness of this project—but only briefly. Your rights will be read to you and you will be led away, taken downtown in a police car, fingerprinted, officially booked, allowed to call your attorney, and put in a holding cell until he arrives. We might do all this in the morning, thereby allowing enough hours to get you bonded out before the judges quit for the day. But that creates other problems with our conspiracy. Best we do it in the evening. A night in jail won’t kill you, if you’ll allow the pun. Take along something to read. A few novels by this author (and properly noted by title and publisher in your memoirs) would be a fitting nod to your mentor.
When your lawyer arrives, remember what Ben Franklin said of his ilk:
“God works wonders now and then;
“Behold! A lawyer, an honest man!”
Or John Keats, who suggested that lawyers should be “classed in the natural history of monsters.”
In other words stop thinking of this fellow as a Wednesday golfing partner. Think of him as one of an incredible 725,000 predators admitted to the American bar—1 attorney for every 300 honest citizens, 1 wolf for every
Alas, that was yesterday. Today, as your complaint notes, we can boast only of quantity. My own smallish city, Albuquerque, tallied fifty-two bank robberies last year—so many that the gunmen were reduced to robbing the same places two or three times. Not one of these felonies showed the slightest sign of originality or imagination. Nor were any of those elements applied by the police. The only arrests made recently were of a robber who used a bicycle as his escape vehicle and wasn’t very good at it and another who parked at the drive-up window, handed the teller his note demanding money, and waited patiently until the police came to lead him away. The once proud Federal Bureau of Investigation, formed in large part to protect our banks back in the halcyon days of John Dillinger and Pretty Boy Floyd, was finally stirred from its lethargy. To what end? It issued a press statement criticizing bank security systems, then went back to investigating librarians whom it suspects of checking out subversive books to Democrats.
In defense of the FBI, and real policemen too, it should be said that the sort of crime we have been offering hardly inspires the gendarmes. Thus I am pleased to join in your effort to uplift the genre.
Here is the way your murder will work:
You will call the 911 number, tell the operator that you have drowned your wife in the bathtub, provide your name and address, and wait for the police to arrive. When they do, you will show them into the bathroom where your wife will be floating face down, nude, in the tub. You will explain that you had arrived home, noticed that your wife was in the bathroom, and took advantage of her occupation to make a quick search of her desk because of your suspicions that she was having an affair with a friend of yours. In this search, you turned up a draft of a prenuptial contract which confirmed your fears that she planned to leave you. Thereupon, insane with jealous rage, you rushed into the bath, grabbed your wife by the neck, and held her head under water. Finally you noticed she was limp and still. You recovered your senses, felt instant remorse, and called the police. Now you are ready to pay the penalty for your crime.
At this point you must think that I am about to disappoint you, that this is no perfect crime. This scenario is typical of today’s low standards—just what the bored police have come to expect.
Exactly! That is exactly the impression we wish to make and to maintain.
Unfortunately, you will now have to endure the only unpleasantness of this project—but only briefly. Your rights will be read to you and you will be led away, taken downtown in a police car, fingerprinted, officially booked, allowed to call your attorney, and put in a holding cell until he arrives. We might do all this in the morning, thereby allowing enough hours to get you bonded out before the judges quit for the day. But that creates other problems with our conspiracy. Best we do it in the evening. A night in jail won’t kill you, if you’ll allow the pun. Take along something to read. A few novels by this author (and properly noted by title and publisher in your memoirs) would be a fitting nod to your mentor.
When your lawyer arrives, remember what Ben Franklin said of his ilk:
“God works wonders now and then;
“Behold! A lawyer, an honest man!”
Or John Keats, who suggested that lawyers should be “classed in the natural history of monsters.”
In other words stop thinking of this fellow as a Wednesday golfing partner. Think of him as one of an incredible 725,000 predators admitted to the American bar—1 attorney for every 300 honest citizens, 1 wolf for every
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