Read Online The Purple Gang: Organized Crime in Detroit, 1910-1945 by Paul R. Kavieff - Free Book Online Page B

for
trial.
    The
trial opened dramatically when Chief Assistant Prosecutor James
Chenot explained to the court how the Purple Gang had systematically
extorted money from Detroit area cleaners and dyers. He outlined the
gang's method of extortion, painting a picture of the gang at its
headquarters—the Jacoby cleaning plant— taking target
practice and twirling pistols around their fingers.
    The
defense argued that the State's chief witness, Harry Rosman, and
Labor President Frank X. Martel had extorted the unions and sold out
the Retail Tailors to get a price increase for his racket. Abe
Bernstein had merely been a reluctant arbitrator for the Wholesalers
Association, and the Purple Gang a fiction created by Rosman and
Martel.
    But
the Prosecution had checks. All of them had been signed by Harry
Rosman and endorsed and cashed by Charles Jacoby.
    Frank
Martel complained to the Detroit press that the Purple Gang Trial was
ignoring the crimes of the gang and turning into an indictment of his
Detroit Federation of Labor. Martel would not testify as a witness,
deeming it "a betrayal of the Detroit Federation of Labor."
    On
June 27th, 1928 the trial neared its end. Defense attorney Samuel
Rhodes declared that when the State rested he would make a motion
asking for a verdict of not guilty. Defense attorney Brown argued
that his clients had not been effectively tied to a conspiracy and
that their suspicious activities were "merely . . . isolated
incidents]". Defense also contended that the conflicting nature
of the state's witnesses' testimony had cleared his clients.
    On
July 2nd, 1928 an unusual incident occurred. Samuel Rhodes asked
Judge Bowles to reopen the case so that Charles Jacoby could be
placed on the witness stand. Rhodes told the court that his client
wanted to vindicate himself.
    Jacoby
blamed the terrorism on Frank Martel and labor leaders in the Detroit
Federation of Labor. He maintained he hired Purple gangsters to
succeed where the Detroit Police Department had failed, in protecting
plants during a vicious industry war. He stated that labor leaders
had gone so far as to attempt to poison a public food supply.
    In
its summation the State pleaded with the jury to consider the facts,
emphasizing that the trouble in the Detroit cleaning and dyeing
industry did not begin until the industry was organized by Chicago
labor racketeers. Jacoby was the man who represented the association;
he had been chosen as the only man with whom Chicago labor racketeers
would do business; he had the Purple Gang force wholesalers to pay
for protection, and when the money was forthcoming the pillaging
ceased. The biggest threat to society was that the gang had used the
Cleaners and Dyers war to infiltrate legitimate business by
exploiting the gangster/businessman relationship between Abe
Bernstein and brother in law Jacoby.
    Defense
attorneys Rhodes and Kennedy argued that rather than conspirators,
Jacoby and gang were actually victims of the Cleaners and Dyers War.
They characterized Frank Martel as "a ruler of stench bombers,
window breakers and perjurers" declaring that the trail of
corruption "leads directly to the door of the labor temple!"
    On
September 13th, 1928, the case was given to the jury. At the trial's
inception, conviction had seemed certain but the defense had made a
dent in the state's armor. The jurors were out little more than one
hour before bringing in a verdict of not guilty.
    Fear
had colored the testimony of state witnesses. Following the acquittal
Frank Martel was brought up on charges of extortion based on
testimony given during the Purple Gang trial. Martel stood mute, a
plea of not guilty was entered on his behalf, and he too was
acquitted.
    Estimates
of tribute paid and damages incurred by shop owners during the
Cleaners and Dyers War vary considerably. One cleaning plant owner
claimed that certain Detroit labor leaders were getting as much as
$200,000 dollars a year in graft from the industry. Detroit