College for Safe-Crackers

CHAPTER XII 
COLLEGE FOR SAFE-CRACKERS 
EXPERIENCE IS THE BEST TEACHER.
It was this predicate on which C. O. (Head) Revel organized his college for safe-crackers and set up Johnnie Benefield as his Number One, magna cum laude, professor. Revel had the brashness, the tongue, the force that some people consider important to a successful college president. Benefield had the background of experience and know-how. 
Benefield possessed another attribute. He didn't teach his trade to outsiders. To inquisitive busy-bodies he maintained an attitude of dignified shut-mouth. 
Between the president and the professor, safe-cracking became a fine art in the States of Alabama and Georgia; sometimes even leaking over into Florida, Mississippi, and Tennessee. Naturally many loners and gangs operated independently of Revel, but he directed a number of the safe-cracking expeditions which sallied forth in the great Southeast.
While Revel spent a goodly portion of his time masterminding lotteries, he was never too busy to devote his talents to the safe-cracking which he loved so well. His crew would spot a likely looking business and draw up plans on the best method of busting in the store and opening the safe. Once the feat was accomplished, much of the stolen funds would land in Revel's gambling emporium. This was his private means of financing his illegal operations, 
A strong right arm for Revel was Joe Allred, a gent who ran a filling station on the highway to Opelika. Across from his station was a barn-like building whose ownership to this day hasn't been finally determined but it was convenient to Allred as well as to the rest of the gang. It was a storehouse and workshop where all forms of tools were on hand. Not only did employees repair gambling equipment there, but they manufactured their own burglar's tools, sometimes built to specifications for a given job.
Benefield had in his possession a set of the best burglar tools some police officers had ever seen. This gear was found in a revved-up Hudson, one of the fastest cars in Alabama, when Guardsmen raided Benefield*s home in mid-summer of 1954. He had not one but three high-powered cars sitting in his yard. The Hudson was
confiscated and put in the county jail yard while
Benefield was given a nice suite in the jail itself. 
Benefield claimed he was a carpenter. Better to do his job, he carried in the trunk of the Hudson a crowbar, a long-handled sledge hammer, a
thirty-foot, one-inch thick piece of manila rope, soft-soled
shoes, two saws, a pair of coveralls, a tarpaulin, an electric drill,
two Z-shaped pieces of heavy cast iron, and other such
oddments. Nowhere was there a nail or a hammer. 
For the uninitiated, the "carpentry" tools which Benefield had could be put to other uses. The rope, for instance, was handy when a second story man
chose to let himself down through a skylight. The soft-soled shoes would make a marauder catlike on his feet
as well as deaden the sound of the creep as he worked his
way across a wooden floor. The tarpaulin was thrown over
windows so a nosy individual would not wonder at a glare
coming from a darkened room at 2 A.M. Such items as the
drill, the crowbar, the Z-shaped metal, and others all played
their part in peeling, punching, or blowing a safe. 
A good safe-cracker can bore a small hole alongside the combination to the safe. With a light on his forehead, similar to, but smaller than those on
miners' caps, he can peer into the tumblers to watch them
fall as he twirls the dial. This form of safe-busting also
requires a sharp ear. 
This was a tedious way of getting inside the depository and sometimes tiresome if the combination did not respond quickly. Benefield, as well as the
students who studied in Revel's college, carried equipment
with which they could crack the safe violently rather than by
the gentle method. 
Not always but occasionally the crew found it expedient to remove the safe from the
building and complete the task in wide open spaces or in a
secluded rendezvous where the danger of outside
interference was reduced to a minimum. One mark common among all
safe-crackers is that they never return the safe. This is a
safety precaution, as it were. 
Benefield's home contained a number of other items which the average carpenter finds
unnecessary in his work. There was, for example, a .38
caliber pistol. 
Now some people do reverse pistols and use them as clubs. Carpenters, though, find this
an unsound manner of hammering and, unimaginative though
it might seem, they prefer a hammer to a pistol for
driving nails. A drawback to the pistol, also, is that it has no claws
with which to extract a badly-driven nail. 
In Benefield's home were dice, dice table covers, and thousands of chips. While an
unhappy home-owner here and there may complain of being
held up by a carpenter, few of them ever recall a carpenter
offering to roll them high dice, double or nothing, for the
woodwork job. 
Benefield got his start in
the underworld, and drew his first rave notices, when he was arrested in Carrollton, Georgia, for a murder attempt. After that,
he began leaving the rough stuff to the other boys. He
was a man small of stature who preferred the quieter, more
studious aspects of life, although the opportunity and chance
for advancement in the safe-cracking field strongly
appealed to him. Like all boys who wish to get ahead in their
chosen profession, Benefield determined to be a good
safe-cracker. 
He was. His reputation was established throughout the Southeast. 
Benefield must have been a success. Without any visible means of support, he
possessed the three high powered, late-model automobiles and was a
family man to boot. 
The way Benefield claimed to have acquired the Hudson, which got him into so much
trouble, throws a highlight on the manner in which President
Revel's college operated. Benefield's story was that he
loaned fifty dollars to a Negro named Charlie Little, took the
Hudson as security and had never looked into the trunk. Little
said he had picked up the car from another Negro, Robert
Johnson, who no longer needed the vehicle for Johnson had
pleaded guilty to participating in the safe-cracking of a
hardware store in Fitzgerald, Georgia, on October 31, 1953. He was
given a prison sentence of from three to five years. 
The Fitzgerald job turned out to be a real bamboozler. As much as $123,000 was said to
have been stolen in that job while an additional $100,000 in
jewels, in a cigar box within the same safe, was overlooked.
The store owner, J. H. Dorminy, Jr„ said the figure was way
too high. 
The Dorminy job was planned by the underworld, in one of Revel's several
headquarters, and the assignment was awarded to a minor Phenix
City figure named James Bush. 
Missions were parceled out on the basis of competitive bidding. The outfit which
promised to cut Revel in with the biggest commission would get
his blueprints on the place he had cased. So Bush was high
bidder and the chore was his. 
Bush had been in the process of making a name for himself. 
In 1936, he had been convicted of second degree burglary and given three to four
years. Ten years later he was arrested in connection with a $14,000
bond theft from a motorcycle company in Columbus, Georgia. 
His most famous feat did not occur until May 9, 1950. Bush at that time, ran a joint
known as the Spider Web, He employed a nineteen-year-old
boy who, earlier that day, had been the subject of a warrant
sworn out by Lester Davis, a former Florida club operator,
on a charge of attempted auto theft. The accusation
maddened Bush. 
That night he and the youth waited for Davis to get into his own car. When Davis did,
Bush gunned after him, down the main street of Phenix
City, Careening through the area at eighty miles per hour.
Bush opened fire on the fleeing Davis and while he missed the
target he did manage to hit two houses which happened to get
in his way, and almost scared the occupants to death. 
They hadn't heard shooting
like that since the last two attempts had been made on Hoyt Shepherd's life in similar automobile races. 
Bush and his companion were arrested and charged with assault with attempt to
murder. Bond originally was set at $10,000 each and later
reduced, in keeping with Bush's reputation of being able to talk
himself out of a straitjacket 
A fun-loving fellow who
always was ready to crack a skull or a safe, or play a prank.
Bush was a handsome chap, the comedian of the mob. He
generally was well liked even by those who opposed the racket
rulers of the city. 
Once Bush climbed atop the
Manhattan Cafe on Fourteenth Street, hauling an air
gun with him. As soldiers from Fort Benning legged it across
the bridge spanning the Chattahoochee, Bush gleefully
watched their pained expressions as they grabbed for the seat of
their pants when the air gun pellets struck true. 
This continued for half an
hour on the warm Spring night, but discovery was inevitable
as more and more habitues of the sin dives drifted our to
watch the fun. 
When a pellet slapped like
the sting of a wasp against the thigh of a husky paratrooper,
the soldier turned quickly enough to glimpse Bush
ducking behind a ledge of the building. The GI swng to the top
of a filling station and thence to the roof of the Manhattan
after his tormentor. Ever ready for a fight. Bush cracked his
rifle across the soldier's head, but it didn't faze the
enraged trooper. 
As the throng in the street
watched the roof top battle-royal, it appeared Bush was
about to suffer one of his few defeats in hand-to-hand
combat. The soldier knocked him down. They rolled over and
over until Bush grabbed a loose brick. He swung it viciously
at his assailant's head, but as the dogface squirmed away from
the blow that would have brained him, the brick slipped
from Bush's hand and crashed through a skylight into the
"Hawk" Howard Poker Room. 
Howard, wearing a hat he
probably never removes except to have a haircut, was in
the process of dealing. The brick breezed past his hat brim,
knocking it from his head, through his arms, and bounced off his
chair onto the floor. Without taking his eyes off his stack
of chips, Howard whipped his pistol from his holster,
pointed it skyward and emptied it through the roof, forcing
Bush and the soldier to jump for their lives. Howard never
changed expression and never took his cigar from his mouth
during the entire episode. 
Bush, himself, on another
occasion, used the poker room with a buddy to outwit Blink
Roberts, one of the area's shrewdest poker masters. 
Bush tied a string around his
toe, ran the string through a wall and fastened the end of
it to his partner's pants leg. He took up a position behind the
wall from which he could see the hand held by Roberts
and some of the other players. By jerking the string with his
toe, Bush informed his friend when to bet and when to fold. The
skullduggery was discovered and Bush and his cohort were
lucky to escape with their hides intact. 
This was the man selected to
take charge of the Fitzgerald enterprise. Before he could
move in, however, word of the impending burglary ticked out
over the underworld grapevine. Henry Crawford heard
about it while he was in Columbus and the size of the plum
appealed to his love of the finer things in life. Crawford
figured the task too important to be trusted to Bush and organized
his own brotherhood to bust into the score ahead of Bush, 
With three Negroes, Crawford
made his coup d'etat on Halloween night. The safe
was six feet by four feet and required three hours to open.
Crawford's outfit first knocked off the combination and tried
to punch their way inside. When they were unable to make
headway, they used a crowbar to force a crack at the
upper edge of the righthand door, then inserted a lever bar
from a metal cutting machine. 
As they pried the door, a
vial of tear gas broke. One of the men fell prostrate to the
floor but the others continued their task. 
After successfully peeling
the safe, in a manner which would have done credit to one
of Revel's students, Crawford and the Negroes took the loot
to a garage in Fitzgerald wliere Belmont Denniston and his
wife, Mary McCollum Denniston, awaited them. Here a division
of the spoils was made. The Dennistons both were to
receive $10,000; two of the Negroes were to get $9,000 each and
the third was to pick up $2,300. Crawford, as the brains, was
to keep what was left. 
News of the safe-cracking hit
the front pages the next morning. Bush, in Phenix
City, learned who was behind it almost immediately when one
of Crawford's Negroes bought Bush*s Cadillac with twenty
$100 bills. In this way Bush found out who had beaten him
to the punch— or, the peel. 
Man of action that he was.
Bush telephoned Crawford time after time at the latter's
home in Blakely, Georgia. He demanded a share of the
plunder, threatening Crawford with death if he wasn't cut in on
the swag. Crawford refused to budge. Bush, tired of the
conversation, told Crawford on November 14 that he was
coming to Blakely to get his divvy or kill Crawford. Not one to
take a threat lightly, Crawford notified the Blakely police
that his life was in danger. 
Bush arrived after dark with
two unidentified men who remained in the car while
Bush went inside. Crawford sat in a chair with a .38 pistol in
his lap. Bush gave him no time to use it. 
He strode angrily up to
Crawford, grabbed him by the neck and began shaking. Out
from behind a door, where he had hidden for just such an
emergency, stepped Harold Griggs. His first shot struck
Bush in the back of the head and the Phenix City rough man
fell bleeding to the floor. Standing over him, Griggs emptied
his revolver into Bush's neck and head. 
Police swarmed into the
house. Crawford had asked them to wait outside in the belief
that if Bush saw them he would act the part of just
another nice fellow calling on a friend. Crawford and Griggs both
were arrested and later sentenced to life imprisonment. 
The Dennistons were given
time as were the three Negroes who had helped pull the job.
Members of this gang, it was learned later, had been wanted
in Columbus and Russell County for burglaries of a
restaurant, a finance company, a peanut company and other
business houses. 
Pallbearers and honorary
pallbearers for Bush were, among others, "Head" Revel,
Wayne Revel, Frank Gullatt, Horace Webster, Ernest Youngblood,
Ernest Allen, W. T. Thurmond, Jr., and France
Knighton. These gallants were, for the most, night club owners in
Phenix. 
At Harold Griggs' trial, his
defense attorney asked a witness, "Don't you know
Revel is the head of a gang of burglars, dope peddlers and various
other things like that?" 
"I never heard of
it," replied the witness. 
A portion of the Fitzgerald
cabbage found its way to Revel's gambling house on
Dillingham Street. There, Charlie Ltttle won himself a portion
of it. Little and Revel appeared to be good friends. The Negro
owed Revel $1,600 and the only security he put up
was his word as a gambler, while for the fifty dollars he owed
Johnnie Benefield, he had to fork over a Hudson with a
souped-up motor, a siren, and a trunk flull of "carpentry" tools. 
At Benefield's trial for
possessing burglary tools in 1954, Solicitor George C. Johnson
of Athens labeled Revel the "grand cyclops and
chairman of the board of a crowd of burglars." 
There was no doubt that he
ran many institutions, not the least among them being his
college for safe-cracking, A pupil was never too young to be
enrolled. The fifteen-year-old son of a member of the faculty
was arrested for stealing eighty-two dollars and then given
probation. Within a few weeks he had taken a twelve-year-old
accomplice on a mission where they stole an automobile
battery. They returned to the same house the next day to lift
several other pieces of equipment which had appealed to them. 
Alabama National Guardsmen
tracked the boys down at their school. They instantly
admitted their wrong-doing. The younger was put in the
custody of his patents while the fifteen-year-old boy had to
spend a couple of nights in jail while authorities decided
what to do with him. When he was released, he strutted out of
the jail smiling broadly and shook hands with his grinning
father. 
It was almost like millions
of other fathers meeting millions of other sons coming home
from college. Only this time, the father probably was taking
his son to college—the college for safe-cracking. 
Revel's students now and again failed in their examinations and those who did
ended up serving time. Johnnie Lee Vann and Willie Pope, both
Negroes, and Thomas H. Smith flunked at crucial times.
Revel and his bosom companion, Chief Deputy Sheriff Albert
Fuller, went to Uniontown during Pope's trouble and interceded for him but were unsuccessful. When Smith went to
trial in Barbour County, Professor Benefield was at his side
and advised him to plead guilty. 
For "tuition" Revel would accept automobiles. They were actually taken in lieu of
gambling debts and stored in an underground lot beneath the
Bridge Grocery, which had room for eight to ten cars. 
So widespread was the Revel notoriety that people knew where to look when their
property was burglarized. When the Carpenter Tobacco Company
was busted into by thieves on December 13, 1952, the
owner contacted Revel to find out who was responsible.
Revel advised him to see Chief Fuller. 
Carpenter not only saw Fuller but demanded full payment for the $800 worth of
merchandise stolen. Fuller paid him at the rate of $200 monthly
which he in turn had obtained from E. L. (Red) Cook, 
If ''Head" Revel ever is
jailed, authorities had better seal him into a room on which no
locks are required. Otherwise, one of his former pupils is
likely to come around with a hairpin or a shoelace or
sensitive fingertips and open the gateway to freedom for his
ex-boss. Revel would know just what to do with such an opportunity.
== Chapter XII-The Information Line ==
CHAPTER XII
THE INFORMATION LINE 
THE MORNING MAIL ON July 3, 1954,
brought four small, plastic discs to Russell Betterment Association Leader Hugh
Bentley, and thereby touched of the most sensational developments ever to rock
Phenix City's underworld. 
The reverberations were felt in
Georgia, as well as in Alabama, and were to start a Grand Jury in Columbus, Georgia,
on a probe that ended with a blistering report of censure for a city commissioner.
The plain manila envelope which
Bentley fished from his mailbox at the Columbus Post Office, contained
recordings of telephone conversations between Gambler J. Hoyt Shepherd and a host
of political figures, gambles and assorted hoodlums. 
Bentley had been alerted by an
anonymous telephone call the day before, and told that he would receive
evidence bearing on the fight against crime. Bentley informed MacDonald Gallion,
the personal representative of Governor Persons, of the call. 
When the mail arrived, Bentley again
called Gallion before he opened the package. Along with the discs were
instructions to the effect that these recordings should be played before investigators
and newspaper reporters. 
In the backroom of Bentley's
sporting goods store in Columbus, a record was put on the player as those
gathered around waited impatiently. The first voice was that of Shepherd. He
was talking with Jesse Binns, a member of the City Commission of Columbus. 
For two hours the small group
gathered in Bentley 's store listened to the telephone conversation which had
been preserved for almost five years. While everyone agreed it was a highly
interesting development, no one seemed to know how it should be handled. 
The “phantom wire tapper" had
promised that if the records were played and publicized, there would be others forthcoming.
Five days later, on July 8, Bentley
got another telephone call. It was "the phantom" again. 
This time the caller suggested that
Bentley walk down the street a few steps and look in a telephone booth for a
package. The delivery details are disclosed here for the first time: 
When Bentley entered the small
restaurant where he was to pick up the package, he saw a man inside the
telephone booth. The man was dressed in coveralls and carried the tools of a
telephone repairman. He seemed to be tinkering with the telephone. 
Bentley hesitated for a moment, then
walked toward the booth. The man glanced up from his work then turned quickly away.
The RBA leader remarked that he had left something in the booth, and picked up
a paper-wrapped package from the man's feet. As Bentley walked away, the
"repairman" left the booth and hurried off. 
The wire tapper had kept his word.
Inside the package were two hundred and six more green, plastic discs. 
For the next four weeks reporters
listened for an average of eight hours daily to the recording sessions. Day
after day headlines screamed out the secrets of fixed juries, corrupted  public officials, details of murders, safe
crackings, narcotics and gambling operations. 
The secret of the wire taps and the
phantom wire tapper became the chief subject of conversation in Alabama and a large
part of Georgia. 
The first of the records played
disclosed that a Columbus City Commissioner had promised Shepherd to fire the
chief of police, whom Shepherd disliked. The Commissioner, Jesse Binns,
discussed slot machines and gambling at length with the Phenix City slot
machine king. He also sought political advice from the politico-gambler.  
On
another record Shepherd promised Godwin Davis, the gambling figure, to go to the
Courthouse and "steady things," when it appeared that trouble might
be brewing in the gamblers' paradise. 
The
recordings left no doubt that Shepherd was "Mr. Big" in Phenix City.
To one caller, who wanted special information, Shepherd gave complete results
of an election which was yet to be held. 
Always
master of the situation. Shepherd advised calm, when the wife of C. O. Revel
shot the wife of another racket figure, Clyde Yarbrough. Shepherd said that the
newspapers probably would not cause much trouble over the shooting because only
women were involved. 
Nora
Revel, who taught a class of "Sunshine Girls" in a local church,
fired three shots into Mrs. Yarbrough when she found the woman parked in a car
with Nora's husband. Mrs. Yarbrough did not die, but she caused a few anxious
hours among the gamblers who were afraid that it might direct public attention
on the Phenix City vice operation. 
Shepherd,
as usual, took complete command. He quickly restored confidence to the gambling
fraternity, and then turned to his more pressing business of lining up a
Chicago liquor dealer to handle slot machines for him in three counties in
Maryland, including the county abutting on the nation's capital. 
Gamblers
from many parts of the country were frequent telephone callers, and inter-state
gambling was discussed. Shepherd expressed an interest in Florida, Louisiana,
Mississippi, Alabama and Maryland. He talked freely of the Phenix City
operation, and on one occasion told Commissioner Binns, of Columbus, that he
had his house "full of slot machines". 
The
Bama Club, which he operated, was booking horse bets as well as running dice
tables and many other forms of gambling, and he discussed all this with certain
of his callers. 
As
the little green plastic discs continued to spin, Shepherd talked of gambling
payoffs, of attempts on his life, and of the Johnny Frank Stringfellow murder.
He tried hard to insure the conviction of Revel, Godwin Davis and Joe Allred in
that case, and discussed evidence against them with law enforcement officers both
in Georgia and Alabama. 
On
one occasion, he said that he had been told Davis and Revel were behind one of
the attempts on his life, and added that if he knew that to be true he would
leave the country. 
But
whether or not he believed his gambling cohorts had attempted to kill him with
a shotgun blast fired into his car, he pulled every trick to insure their
conviction of murder.  
Later
he was to deny to the two racketeers that he had urged their conviction in the
Stringfellow case, and accused newsmen of a deliberate plot to split the
gambling fraternity. 
The
recordings revealed that the wily Shepherd was well versed in gambling laws of
all states, and that he was sought out for political advice by politicians and
political hopefuls in many parts of Georgia, 
On
one occasion he told Phenix City Commissioner, Elmer Reese, that if he didn't
stop taking "them pills" he would wind up on the needle. 
Reese
remarked that he had taken some tablets one night the week before on Dillingham
Street, and wound up in Miami, adding that he was "through." 
Reese
was later to become mayor. After the cleanup started, he was charged with
willful neglect of duty, and told that unless he resigned his office,
impeachment proceedings would be started. Reese later pleaded guilty to the
charge of neglect of duty and was fined. On that same day he tearfully handed
his resignation in to his fellow commissioners. 
Reese,
a druggist, who beat the machine in 1939 on a reform ticket, later became one
of the principal cogs in the political setup of the city. On one occasion he
pleaded guilty in Federal Court at Opelika to a charge of selling barbiturates without
a prescription. He was fined but not required to serve a prison term. 
Shepherd
often expressed concern over the drinking habits of Reese, and discussed this
behavior with friends on the telephone. On one occasion, a friend told Shepherd
of hauling Reese in a drunken condition from one of the night spots. 
Shepherd
suggested that the friend employ stern measure to keep the City Commissioner on
the wagon in the future.
The
gambling operations and political maneuvers were fully discussed on the
recording discs. No doubt remained that Shepherd was the political, as well as
the gambling boss of Phenix City and Russell County, holding the fate of office
holders in his hands. He was only slightly less influential in Columbus. 
The
recordings disclosed, too, that Shepherd suspected a Russell County deputy sheriff
in one of the four attempts to kill him. On one occasion, he told a caller that
he thought a recent attempt on his life was made by "that girl; a
freckled-faced boy or a deputy sheriff." 
He
offered a large reward for information on his would-be slayers, at the same
time expressing doubt that he would be willing to prosecute in event he found
out their identity. 
Shepherd
knew that his telephone line was tapped, having received four of the recordings
through the mail in 1949. He often discussed the tapping of his telephone, and
sometimes warned callers that their conversations might be recorded. He offered
a reward of $25,000 for information leading to the identity of the wire tapper.
But
knowing that his line was tapped, and that his conversations might be overheard
by unfriendly ears, did not deter Shepherd from talking at great length to
anyone who called. He was a confirmed blabber-mouth, a fact which often caused concern
and discomfort among his associates. 
The
recorded conversations could roughly be divided into four categories: Personal
family matters; business calls dealing with gambling or politics; top-level
strategy matters with Shepherd's partner, Jimmy Matthews, Sheriff Ralph
Mathews, Commissioner Binns, or other political figures; conversations dealing
with the Stringfellow murder or with attempts on Shepherd's life. 
Listening
reporters skipped through the personal conversations and little of these
reached the newspapers. They often concerned Shepherd's first wife, a confirmed
alcoholic, who talked drunkenly about divorce. 
Odd
though it seemed, it was Mrs. Shepherd who wanted the divorce and Hoyt who kept
putting it off. On several occasions he promised to sign the divorce papers the
first time she called him when sober. 
She
pointed out that this meant never, as she had no intention of ever being sober.
Josephine,
whom Shepherd later married, answered many of these calls, and sometimes the
verbal exchange would become heated with harsh name-calling. But Josephine
seemed tolerant of Mrs. Shepherd, and on many occasions would obtain medical
aid for her without mentioning it to Shepherd himself. 
Perhaps
she felt she was in a position to be charitable toward the woman she had
superseded in the affections of the gambling man. Her new position lent
prestige and enchantment to the former high dice girl, and she wore the new
mantle with grace and forbearance.
At
home, Shepherd was a frugal man who wanted every buck spent to bring a full dollar
value. The man who thought nothing of wagering $25,000 on a gambling table
complained about the price of a movie. 
He
would regularly question Josephine about the price of things she purchased,
even groceries and drug store items. He had a second-hand tractor in use on his
farm located ten miles from Phenix, and he spent much time shopping around for used
parts to keep it running. 
Under
the heading of business, however, he spoke of money as a mere commodity that
was necessary in the building and running of a huge political and gambling
empire. He was always open to a good business tip and could analyze it quickly,
figuring from his own vast store of experience the mathematical probabilities
of success. On one occasion he told a caller that a commercial swimming pool
was the poorest type of investment, and listed facts and figures to prove his point.
As
a business man, Shepherd knew that dollars poured into the right political
channels could return a flood of profits, directly or indirectly. He and his
associates were never miserly in contributions to political candidates who met
their qualifications. Shepherd talked of putting money into a city race in
Columbus, as well as all kinds of elections in Russell County and the state of
Alabama. 
On
one of the records he discussed with Matthews the amount they should contribute
in a Congressional race in their district, and in the same conversation,
decided to give "twenty-five" to the campaigns of Alabama's junior
senator, John Sparkman, and Georgia's senior senator, Walter George, 
It
is to be supposed neither of the two senators knew that they numbered Shepherd
and Matthews among their financial supporters at campaign time. On at least one
occasion, however, the suave Matthews was received in Washington's highest
political circles, and had his picture taken in a group which included Senators
Sparkman and Lister Hill, of Alabama, and several House members, including
then-Representative Laurie C. Battle, whose district included Birmingham. 
The
"twenty-five," which the gambling duet decided to contribute to
Sparkman and George, was not further identified or explained. To those who knew
best the political operations of Shepherd and Matthews, however, the figure mentioned
did not mean twenty five dollars, but could have meant any multiple of that
amount. 
The
recordings revealed how agile Shepherd could be on his political feet when he
had backed the wrong man— which didn't happen often. 
He
once agreed with a friend that the election of James E. Folsom as Alabama's
Governor in 1946 was an "awful thing," but he wasn't long in getting
his political fences in repair. 
A
candid conversation between Shepherd and Commissioner Binns began with the
gambler saying that he had an engagement to meet one of Governor Folsom 's
brothers, who had just come into town. 
Binns:
"That's an awful thing Alabama has done." 
Shepherd:
"Awful." 
Binns:
"Oh, it is. You'll agree with that, won't you? " 
Shepherd:
"You just don't know. You don't know." 
Binns:
"What do you mean by that?" 
Shepherd:
"Some time you come over here and I'll tell you confidential some stuff I
know is going on." 
Binns:
*'Well, I'll run over some night now," 
Shepherd:
"There is an old boy over here fixing to get $100,000 worth of insurance
and one of them whisky accounts." 
Binns:
"Yeah?" 
Shepherd:
"They came over here and sold four or five thousand worth of those
Forums." (Folsom's Forum, a political magazine.) 
Binns:
"Is that right?" 
Shepherd:
"Hell, yeah. I paid S200 worth on buying them papers for voters to be sent
around here. I get two a week. This is the damndest administration that ever
was ..." Shepherd cautioned Binns not to repeat anything he had said about
the Governor, and Binns replied, "Yeah." 
Shepherd
said Folsom "is all right in my book. He said he's got Russell County in
his vest pocket." He quoted the Governor as remarking, "You know what
I like about them fellows down there? They can produce." 
Binns:
"Well, he's a pistol, ain't he?"      
The
talk shifted to the race for delegate to the national Democratic Convention,
and Shepherd told Binns that Folsom wanted them to support "those other
fellows over there instead of Hill and Sparkman." He said that Mayor Homer
D. Cobb had told Folsom he wasn't going to do it. (Cobb was mayor and machine
boss at that time.) 
Binns:
"Cobb is a good man." 
Shepherd:
"They can't make him change it. He said he can't leave his old friends. He
said, now, if it was Big Jim running it would be something else, but he's
asking me to take his friends against my lifelong friends and he said “I can't do
it." Folsom later became a candidate for delegate and announced also that
he would accept the nomination for President, if offered to him. He was not
elected delegate and his presidential aspirations— for the time being— were
crushed. 
Binns:
"Well, I don't blame him for that." 
Shepherd:
"Weil, we ain't going to do it. We may get in bad, but I think we can
settle any bad situation we get into," 
Binns:
"You do?" 
Shepherd:
"Yeah." 
Binns:
"I don't doubt you can. You were against him to begin with and you settled
that." 
Shepherd:
**Yeah, we're his first love now." 
Binns:
"That . . . sonuvabitch's getting it everywhere, ain't he?" 
Shepherd:
"I don't know if he is or not, but it's all around him." The buzzer
at the door announced the arrival of Shepherd's expected guest, ending the
conversation. 
As
the commander-in-chief of the gambling fraternity, Shepherd always was alert
for possible danger, and met every threat in his own decisive way before it got
started. 
He
left nothing to chance. He placed carefully selected members on every Grand
Jury which sat in Russell County for many years, and was always sure of having
enough friends on the Grand Jury to beat down any adverse report or indictment.
When necessary the entire force of the syndicate would be turned loose on
rebellious jurors. 
The
boss man maintained constant contact with the local officials. In one
conversation with Sheriff Ralph Matthews, the sheriff told Shepherd that his
chief deputy, Albert Fuller, was making "a little drive" because too
many slot machines were being pushed into the city area where they were
"piling up." 
Shepherd
thought that was a good idea, but wanted to be sure they didn't bother some
machines he had loaned to City Clerk Jimmie Putnam. He said he was just trying
"to make an operator out of Jimmie."
Sheriff
Matthews said he would tell Fuller to handle the matter in the way Shepherd
suggested. Shepherd told the sheriff not to mention this conversation to
Putnam. Shepherd said he would absorb Putnam's losses if the machines were picked
up. 
Shepherd
did call Putnam, and assured him it was all right for him to operate. He warned
Putnam in another conversation that the machines loaned him by Shepherd made
liberal payoffs, and if they paid too much he should call C. C. Griggs "and
have him come out and block it out for you. But don't tell anybody what you're
doing." 
Shepherd
talked of many things to many people. To Sheriff Earnest Howell of Muscogee
County, Georgia, he frequently talked about murders, especially the sensational
Stringfellow murder already mentioned. Sheriff Howell, who has since been
cleared by a Grand Jury investigation of any improper trafficking with Phenix
City's gamblers, told Shepherd that he knew who was responsible for one of the
attempts on Shepherd's life. Sheriff Howell asserted that the men who tried to
kill Shepherd were supposed to be his friends. This upset Shepherd, who
remarked that if he knew this to be true, he would leave the country. His
children, he said, had been urging him to leave. Howell said it would be
impossible to prove a case against the attackers, since nobody would appear in
court to testify. 
"They
know it would be death if they do," the Sheriff said. 
Shepherd
brought up the subject of a body that had floated up out of the Chattahoochee,
and asked the Sheriff if he knew anything about that. The body had been
weighted down, but came untied and floated to the surface. The victim never was
positively identified. 
The
Sheriff said he had some information on that but didn't know the man's
identity. 
Shepherd
said the man might be "old Turk Hall that I told you about once." He
said Hall was the man who first was believed to have done the Stringfellow job.
The
conjecture of whose the floating body might be turned to Willie Pittman, the
tax assessor's son, who had dropped from sight mysteriously a couple of years
before. Even today the disappearance remains shrouded in mystery like a score
of other murders and disappearances of local citizens. 
Next
on the Shepherd information line was a Columbus lawyer Shepherd wanted to
represent him in a slot machine case there. The talk turned to politics and
Shepherd, the master politician, analyzed the coming election. He said Columbus
was "pretty much an enforcement town," and added that the people
would vote for the men in office if they didn't get too far out of line. 
"I'm
setting over here and looking at that town," Shepherd said, '*and I see
how those people vote.'* 
The
lawyer agreed that Shepherd could sit on the Alabama side of the river and
'*tell more about our politics than we can over here." 
Shepherd
complained that he was always being approached by candidates for financial
support, and often contributed to all sides just to play it safe. "They expect
the sugar out of me," he said, "and I can't go in there and give them
both too much." He noted that such contributions were not deductible on
income tax. 
Shepherd
returned again and again to a discussion of the attempt on his life in which he
and Josephine both were wounded. Shepherd said the people who did it were
local, despite the fact he had put out the word they were out-of- town
professionals. 
"If
they had been professionals," Shepherd said, "I'd be kicking up daisies."
He
said one of the men had used a tommy gun, and that he could have gotten the
federal government in on the case from that angle. He hadn't, he said,
'^because my shirt tails ain't so clean now," 
Shepherd
had a wry sense of humor, and liked to refer to himself sometimes as a
"hoodlum." With a political race coming up, Shepherd talked with
State Representative Ben Cole about lining up the candidates. 
"Ben,
don't you think that we should take Pittman (tax collector), Roberts (tax
assessor), Shannon (probate judge), the Sheriff, you, your brother, Dudley,
Uncle Joe, four of the city commissioners and two or three of us hoodlums and have
us a meeting and decide on these people? If we do it might keep a lot of them
people from coming out and running." 
A
one sentence telephone call from an unidentified person informed Shepherd that
"that fellow is back in town." This set off a chain reaction, with
Shepherd and Matthews discussing information received to the effect that Head
Revel and Godwin Davis were planning to hold up the Ritz Cafe, to get the
$30,000 in the safe. Davis and Revel had a simple plan, Matthews said, of
throwing the night watchman in the river before pulling the job. 
"They're
no good bastards," Shepherd said. 
The
talk turned to a murder and Shepherd theorized that a man had killed his own
brother while under the influence of dope, or to get money for dope.
"They'd kill a baby for that stuff," he said. 
Binns
was back on the line, and Shepherd told him he was not going to keep any large
amount of money at his home any more because he didn't want "folks coming
out here burning my toes to make me tell where it is," 
Lum
Griggs, one of Shepherd's gambling house employees, called next to say a
"Mr. Folsom from Montgomery” was there and wanted to see Shepherd. Griggs
said he didn't know which Folsom it was "but he looks just like Big
Foot." That was the nickname for Alabama's towering Governor. 
Shepherd
invited the visitor to come out to his home and the offer was accepted. 
A
woman known as "Goldie" died in bed with Shepherd's estranged wife,
and it looked for a time that trouble might be brewing. Goldie was the daughter
of "Ma" Beachie, operator of the famous "Beachie's Swing Club."
Goldie was a dope addict and died from an overdose. 
The
recorded talk between Shepherd and Matthews revealed that Goldie, shortly
before her death, had been drinking with a man "'Snooks' (Grady Shepherd)
had sent to have a good time." 
Shepherd
was worried about why the details of Goldie's death had been withheld from the
press. 
"There
ain't no point in that," he said, "unless they are trying to find out
who that fellow was she was with. . . . Them waiting like that, seems like they
might be trying to jiggle it around someway." 
That
call was followed by one from a woman who said Shepherd's wife had just called
for aid. She quoted Mrs. Shepherd as saying "they could give me
twenty-five years, and now I don't know what to do." 
The
gambling boss seemed little concerned with that bit of information, but in
another call he dispatched one of his house men, known as "Fats," to
scout around Columbus as if looking for a job, and see what was going on there.
In
quick succession, Shepherd discussed City Clerk Putnam; a meeting of the League
of Women Voters in Columbus; a petition which he and a Columbus lawyer were having
circulated; referred to two other Columbus lawyers as "the brains"
and "fixers" and revealed that there was danger that some of Phenix
City's spots might be placed off-limits by Fort Benning authorities. 
Shepherd
said Putnam would be after the probate judge job "hot and heavy if he knew
he did not have to be a lawyer to qualify for the post." 
The
lawyer Shepherd talked to promised that he would have his wife propose a
political resolution at a meeting of the League of Women Voters that afternoon.
They talked about progress of the political petition they had "fourteen
citizens" circulating, and gloated over the fact that they had a powerful
labor organization lined up for the election. 
Suddenly,
the busy line brought news of more trouble brewing at home. This time it grew
out of an argument in the Sheriff's office, which was discussed at length by
Shepherd and his partner. Matthews said a man he identified as Dalton, had told
"J. D." (Mayor J. D. Harris) that Chief Deputy Fuller had told him he
could open up and operate. 
Shepherd
received this bit of news with something less than enthusiasm, and turned to a
fight between James Bush and Lester Davis, over some lOU's. They discussed
Fuller at some length, and were distressed that the swashbuckling law officer
seemed to be taking sides. 
Shepherd
asked Jimmy Matthews whether he had told Sheriff Mathews the latest about his
Chief Deputy. Matthews said he didn't know what his partner meant. 
"About
Fuller propping Bush?" Shepherd said. 
Matthews:
'I’m not talking about that." 
Shepherd;
"I'm talking about Fuller propositioning Bush to go into business with
him." 
The
partners got into a heated argument at this point, with Matthews saying "I
didn’t tell the man anything about that." 
It
soon simmered down to a discussion about Fuller's arrest of some girl,
sweetheart of an Army lieutenant, and the threat that had been posed by that.
Shepherd said Buck Billingsley (later to be operator of The Ritz) got all the girl's
money and an $85 wrist watch for making her bond. 
Shepherd
was worried about a threat from the girl's boyfriend that he was going to tell
the Alabama Attorney General about the case. 
The
bitter rivalry between the Phenix City gamblers and the Columbus, Georgia,
groups led by Fayette Leebern and his son, Donald, and the subsequent killing
of the elder Leebern, became the subject of much discussion on the Shepherd telephone. 
As
related elsewhere in this book, Leebern was killed at a political victory
celebration at the Southern Manor Club, in Phenix, and Hoyt Shepherd was one of
the three charged with the murder. The other two were Jimmy Matthews and Grady
Shepherd. 
After
all had been cleared, Hoyt Shepherd laid the actual killing on Grady. He also
told James Carpenter of an offer he said the eider Leebern had once made to
Grady to kill Godwin Davis. 
It
was right after a store which Leebern owned in Phenix City was burned to the
ground, and Davis was suspected as the arsonist. 
Shepherd
said his brother told him about Leebern's offer of $3,000 to kill Davis. He
related the conversation, as it had been repeated to him: 
Grady:
"Do you mean kill him?*' 
Leebern:
"Yeah, dammit, i want that bastard killed, and you'll never regret
it."
Grady:
"Hell, man, I ain't in the killing business.”
Shepherd
said Grady had assured Leebern that he "wouldn't let Davis run over
him" and that Grady added he would kill Davis or any other person who tried
to run over him. 
Carpenter:
"There wasn't nothing that Leebern wouldn't hire done." 
A
new officer of the Alabama Beverage Control Board arrived in Phenix, and the
racket fraternity set about quickly to see whether he would cause trouble. 
Fuller
called Shepherd and told him about the new man, and Shepherd told the Deputy to
tell the Sheriff that the number of special investigators from the state were
"going to be cut to zero." 
Fuller
said that was a good idea, as there were too many people running around. 
The
new man, according to Fuller, was assigned by Folsom as a special investigator
to work with ABC Agent Ben Scroggins. He said the man never had taken a civil
service examination but that the Governor had wanted to put him on, so he
"just stuck him on something," 
Shepherd:
"Special investigator in his office?" 
Fuller; 
"That's what he said. But he's just an ABC agent." 
Shepherd:
"What's his name?" 
Fuller:
"Brantley. From down in Pike County, Troy. Old country boy. Seems like a
pretty good fellow. First time he policed at all. We let him stay down in jail
to see what kind of fellow he is." 
Shepherd:
"He's liable to put a fire under the whole works before election time,"
Fuller:
"I don't think so, I talked to Walter Hendricks yesterday (ABC license
inspector), and he told me that Ralph Suttles, his supervisor, told all of them
license men, like Walter, that he had orders not to bother no music or nothing beer
parlors, unless cities had exercised an option right to machines, nothing. (At
that time a state law forbade music authorize it by special election.) It was
strictly up to the local authorities. Didn't want none of these state men picking
up or bothering or molesting any of these places at all. So they must be fixing
to loosen up all over the state— more than they are," 
Shepherd:
"I talked to the people over there last night and they said if any
son-of-a-hitch comes around saying they want this or that, tell them to go to
hell." 
Fuller;
"They're just coming from too many angles, Hoyt." 
Shepherd:
"Bucking them ain't been doing nothing but popping.”
Fuller:
"That's what I say. Too many riding." 
Shepherd;
"We haven't been hit so hard yet, but we're not getting any benefit out of
it. I think we finally got it straightened out." 
Fuller:
"Good." 
Shepherd:
"I don't think we're going to have much of that either. I’m going to tell
Big Jim to send me an order. I'm going to tell them the goddam man to see.
Ain't nothing to them people." 
Fuller:
"Aw, hell, they can't do nothing. They ain't going to do nothing without
he tells them to." 
Shepherd:
*'They do, they'll lose their jobs. I look for the whole state to open up.
myself." 
So
it was that the recordings made by the phantom wire tapper revealed many things
that had before been matters only of whispered gossip— indicating that the state
administration, from the lowest ABC agent right up to the Governor's mansion
was deeply indebted to, if not controlled, by the underworld of Phenix City, 
These
revelations were made little more than two months after the voters of Alabama
had voted Big Jim Folsom into the Governor*s office for a second term, which
began January 18, 1955, 
Will
Phenix City again rise and flourish under the influence of a friendly
administration? Folsom has promised that he will keep it clean. The people of
Alabama, and especially Phenix City, are anxiously awaiting developments of the
next four years. 
*       
              *                            *
The
mystery of the phantom wire tapper may never be solved. But this much is known.
The man did not make the recordings for blackmail purposes. If he had been
interested in a profitable transaction, Shepherd would have provided a ready
market. When the first stories on the recordings hit the street, Shepherd paid
a call to Acting Attorney General Bernard F. Sykes. He offered a
"deal" if Sykes would stop the playing of the records. 
Shepherd
said he would bring to Sykes the signed resignations of Sheriff Matthews, Mayor
Reese, and Solicitor Ferrell. On that occasion. Shepherd evidenced much
distress about the recordings, and even talked about trying to obtain a federal
court injunction to halt publication of the contents. 
Many
attempts were made by newspaper men and the RBA to contact the wire tapper, but
all failed. Reporters did learn the identity of the man Shepherd had accused of
making the recordings. He was Pat Patterson (no relation to the slain Attorney
General nominee) who operated a drive-in restaurant in Columbus. Patterson was interviewed
and denied making the recordings. He did confirm the information that Shepherd
had accused him of tapping his telephone. 
Patterson,
a close friend of Donald Leebern and Fayette Leebern, the man Shepherd was
tried for killing, told the reporters that he had tapped his own telephone in
order to learn what his wife was doing. He said the electrician who attached a
tap on his line, later told Shepherd that he, Patterson, was the one who had
made the recordings of Shepherds telephone conversation. 
Shepherd,
Patterson said, called him up and asked him to come to Phenix City to discuss
the matter. He told the gambler, he said, that he wasn't fool enough to come
over the river "after what you did to Leebern." 
Shepherd
also suspected Patterson of being behind one of the attempts on his life,
though Patterson said he was registered in a hotel in Miami Beach at the time,
and told Shepherd of that fact. 
Today,
Patterson, a sick man, lies in a back room of his drive-in with a pistol beside
his medicine bottles. He is not scared— just cautious. 
The
recordings were sent to at least two persons, other than Bentley. Shepherd
received four, which referred to the attempt to kill him. 
At
about the same time, a small packer of the recordings saved the job of Police
Chief John Newberry, of Columbus. In the recordings received by the RBA, Police
Commissioner Jesse Binns, of Columbus, was on record as telling Shepherd that,
if he didn't like the chief, "he's dead." 
Binns
apparently was promising to fire the police chief should Shepherd give the
word. 
On
the day before Newberry was scheduled to get the axe, he received in the mail,
recordings of talks between Binns and Shepherd. Newberry was never fired. 
Binns
was at the meeting the next day, but did not propose the firing of Newberry. 
The
man whose job was saved by the timely arrival of just the right recording was
one of the closest friends of the man whom Shepherd accused of making those
recordings- Pat Patterson. 
== Chapter XIV-Murder in the Rogues' Morgue ==
CHAPTER XIV
MURDER
IN THE ROGUES MORGUE       
A
DEAD MAN TELLS NO TALES. Neither does he serve as a witness in the court trial
of his murderer. If the man who shot him has an observer who swears the killer
fired in self- defense, what can a poor corpse do but turn over in his grave?
Unless, of course, he was shot in self-defense. 
What
a turning over in graves must be going on in Phenix City! 
A
reason always exists for a killing- jealousy, rage, ambition, frustration,
greed, self-defense, temptation. There was no lack of motives for Phenix City's
wholesale slaughter. Most of the victims were not pure as the driven snow.
Phenix City butchering was done in gangland style and the man who pulled the
trigger as often as not might be a cop "in line of duty," 
In
this chapter are outlined three of the murders which still are talked of in Phenix
City. A number of odd circumstances surrounds each. At this writing, no one has
been punished for two of the homicides. In the third, justice was delayed four
years because nobody could be found to fit the description of the missing man’s
corpus delicti. 
When
retribution did triumph, it managed to win only two-fifths of a victory. The
three men who hired the killers got away scot free. The two actual triggermen
have been given life time social security In a federal pen in Georgia, 
The
first execution goes like this: 
Once
upon a time there was a soldier named John Frank Stringfellow. John Frank was
no angel and he was placed in the federal detention barracks for violation of
the military code. There the government could and did keep an eye on him,
until, as it happened, they concluded that John Frank would be able to help
them in a liquor conspiracy case. They told him what he was to do and turned
him loose. The year was 1944. 
Pretty
soon they got to missing John Frank. He had got around somewhat but where he
was now nobody knew. At least, those who knew weren't saying. 
It
was known that John Frank had made contact with two men named Dave Walden and
Johnny McVeigh, and that the three had been scouting around in Georgia. This
was in performance of John Frank's duty but while Walden and McVeigh still were
roaming the countryside, John Frank had disappeared completely. 
On
a clear day in 1948, bones were found near the surface of the ground ten miles
from St. Augustine, Florida. Now this was not normal. Especially since the
bones appeared to be human. The sheriff was told. He recognized foul play and
went to work. 
The
trail led into Georgia and soon it began to look as though John Frank finally
had turned up at this late date. Walden and McVeigh were apprehended for the
murder. Shown the error of his ways, McVeigh confessed to his part in the crime
and said that he and Walden had killed John Frank Stringfellow on September 21,
1944. His confession was introduced at his trial. A condensed version of it
follows: 
"We,
Dave Walden and I, went to the Manhattan Bar in Phenix City, and there we had a
conversation with Joe Allred, "Head" Revel, and Godwin Davis, and
there they agreed to give us $1,000 to do away with John Frank Stringfellow,
who was a witness against the three for a violation of the alcoholic tax law. 
"Dave
and I got John Frank Stringfellow down at Brunswick, Georgia. Around seven
o'clock in the evening Dave and I started to give ourselves a shot of morphine
and John asked me for one too. I fixed his shot. I melted this by putting a
match under the hypo gun. He shot himself in the main line and in a few seconds
he said a cuss word and fell over on the bed. He lay there on the bed about one
and a half hours, then we put him in the car and drove slowly to Rebecca, and
by the time we got to Rebecca, he was dead.”
"We
then drove to about ten miles out of St. Augustine to what is known as Ponte
Vedra, We then took John Stringfellow's body out of the car, then we shot him
with a .22 pistol. We then went to St. Augustine and called up Mr. 'Head' Revel.
He told us to come to his home. 
"We
went and told him what we had. 'Head' Revel got a shovel and we put it in our
car. We then went to the body. Revel looked the body over and then returned in
about an hour with some lime. We stayed there and dug the hole while he was
going for the lime. I saw Reve! hand Dave the money— $1,000 in one hundred
dollar bills." 
That,
according to Brother McVeigh, was how John Frank came to no good end. McVeigh
later repudiated the confession but he was up against some stiff evidence by
that time. 
John
D. Dorminy, foreman of the Grand Jury which indicted him, testified that
McVeigh had described to the Jury how John Frank was killed, McVeigh, said
Dorminy, told of putting a glass over John's Frank's mouth to see if he made moisture
on the inside. John Frank didn't, being dead to this world. 
Sheriff
E, L. Howell of Muscogee County in Columbus, Georgia, said McVeigh admitted to
him that John Frank had been given two grains of morphine and four tablets of H.M.C,
which stands for hyoscine morphine cactus, a tablet containing narcotic. The
sheriff said McVeigh claimed Revel had paid them the $1,000 and that $500 of it
came from Davis and $250 each from Revel and Allred. 
In
stepped the federal men to tell how John Frank was supposed to have been
helping them. C. W. Peets, of the United States Treasury Department, said John
Frank was to have been a witness against Davis, Revel, and Allred in a liquor
case. McVeigh, said Peets, had told him that was why John Frank was killed. The
liquor case against Davis, Revel, and Allred fell to pieces without
Stringfellow's testimony. 
What
actually killed John Frank either was the shot he gave himself in Georgia or
the shot with the .22 Walden gave him in Florida. A fine point arose, with
Georgia authorities insisting death had occurred in their state. Georgians feared
that should Walden and McVeigh be tried in certain parts of Florida, they would
be freed because their employer, "Head" Revel, was known thereabouts
as "Mr. Head Revel." 
Walden
had done the actual trigger work after McVeigh chickened out. McVeigh had the
pistol and was aiming it at John Frank's head when he broke down. 
"I
can't do it," he said. "Johnnie served time for me at Kilby without
ratting. He's sort of a friend." 
"Gimme
th' damned gun," Walden said, and fired the bullet into John Frank's head.
The body didn't even twitch. 
McVeigh
wasn't as squeamish later when he was in the back seat of the car with Walden's
wife. Some sort of to-do took place and Mrs. Walden became unruly just as the
car was going past a policeman. McVeigh put his hands over her mouth and then
her throat to keep her quiet. 
When
they were at a safe enough distance from the officer, McVeigh loosened his
hold. He took one look at Mrs. Walden, gulped, and punched his buddy on the
shoulder. 
"Dave,"
he said. "I've killed your wife." 
They
buried her in Florida, too, in the Okefenokee Swamp. 
At
McVeigh's trial for John Frank's death, no witnesses came to his aid, although
he denied any knowledge of the killing. It seems the jury did not believe him,
McVeigh was sentenced to life imprisonment. He appealed to the Georgia Supreme
Court which upheld the jury verdict. Walden pleaded guilty. 
Here,
then, was a cute little drama. The triggermen were in cold storage but the
paymasters were on the outside, doing business as usual. Davis, Revel, and
Allred were arrested for complicity, but the cases against them were dismissed
when McVeigh and Walden repudiated their confessions and refused to testify
against the other three. In Georgia, a statement can be used against the person
who makes it, but not against someone else without supporting witnesses. 
There
have been reports that McVeigh and Walden are ready to spill once more. Maybe
so, maybe not. Perhaps they feel that a life in prison is better than a dirk in
the dark. For, as they have reason to know, a dead witness gets so little out of
life these days. 
It
is quite possible that Walden and McVeigh are going to do some singing yet. Now
safely in prison, they feel they have been double-crossed. Lawyers for Davis,
Revel, and Allred visited the two shortly after their terms began. The attorneys
urged them not to talk. The lawyers said they would support the families of
Walden and McVeigh and would get to work at once on a parole as soon as one was
possible. This bargain, if made, appears not to have been kept. 
Walden
and McVeigh insist that the arrangement was agreed to but has not been fulfilled.
Each day that passes should make their bitterness grow worse until the time
does come when they figure the part of the nobleman doesn't become them. 
On
that day, no doubt, they will confess once more. 
*                   *                           *
Can
a man fire a pistol in a closed house without leaving a bullet mark somewhere
on the inside? Witnesses, for the state, who were present in the home of Pete
and Guy Hargett on the eve of March 3, 1949, claim that's exactly what
happened. None of them say that the bullet went out the window. According to
their versions, the bullet struck neither a wall or ceiling. 
The
man who pulled the trigger, if a trigger was pulled, was Guy Wilson Hargett. He
was in no position to argue with the official findings. He was dead, you see,
shot five times by the Chief Deputy Sheriff, Albert Fuller. Five bullets lined
Hargett from belt buckle to forehead. It was Albert Fuller's first killing.
From it dated Fuller's new swagger, his importance in Russell County as a quick
man with a gun. The feeling it gave Fuller was one of power, but in his whining,
sissified voice, he professed deep remorse. 
"It
was him or me," he said, "I saw him draw a gun from his belt when we
went in the room where he was, and he fired, I hate it. Why, I’ve never even
wounded a man before in tine of duty." 
The
shooting took place, according to what Sheriff H. Ralph Matthews, Jr., told the
papers the next day, because Federal Alcohol Tax Agent Grady C Cook had visited
the Hargett home with F. R. Williams and Jasper B. Merk, Georgia alcohol
agents. Hargett's house was in Phenix City, Alabama. The agents wanted to
determine if Hargett was transporting and selling illegal whisky. 
As
the agents arrived, a friend of the Hargett brothers, Sam Beck, backed his auto
into the road, blocking the officers. Beck and the two Hargetts all pulled guns
on the officials who decided that discretion was the better part of valor. They
reversed their field and departed. 
Agent
Cook reported the unfriendly greeting to Sheriff Matthews. Chief Fuller and
Deputy Ben Scroggins were sent back to the Hargetts', with the alcohol tax men.
This time the lawmen got into the house. To the right, in the hallway, was a
door standing slightly ajar. 
Thus
far in this narrative, there seems to be no conflict in testimony. From here
on, there are choices to be made. 
The
sheriff said that when Fuller spotted the half open door he pushed it open
wide. There was Guy Hargett with a gun and quick as a flash he fired at Fuller.
The bullet missed. Fuller drew and pumped five bullets into Hargett before the man
could fire another shot. After filling Guy Hargett full of hot lead, Fuller
slapped a gun from the hand of Pete Hargett, thus heroically preventing further
bloodshed. 
Deputy
Scroggins was not in entire agreement with Sheriff Matthews' version— it neglected
to describe Scroggins' own mammoth feats under duress. 
"I
went in just ahead of Fuller," Scroggins declared. "Guy Hargett was
seated and I saw a gun sticking from his belt. He cursed us and pulled his gun.
I grabbed for him and he jumped up. I hit his gun hand, and he fired into the
air. Then Fuller shot him." 
So
there you had Scroggins saying that Hargett's bullet went into the air, where
it would have hit the ceiling, and Sheriff Matthews saying the shot whistled
past Fuller, in which case it would have had to go into the wall. 
At
times of quick action, it would be entirely possible- and, in fact, happens all
the time— for people on the scene to have different impressions of an event.
But under no conditions could a bullet hit a ceiling or wall without leaving
some kind of mark, providing it did not fly through an already existing hole. 
Arch
B. Ferrell, then circuit solicitor, and Coroner Ralph B. Thornell investigated
before Hargett's body was removed. They both ruled justifiable homicide. They
said Fuller fired in line of duty. 
Two
women who were in the house at the time of the shooting said Guy Hargett was
asleep in his chair when he was shot. His gun was not fired, they added.
In
1954 when Coroner Thornell was asked about the killing, he remembered that when
he arrived Hargett had been sprawled in a chair. He remembered one bullet had
been fired from Hargett's weapon, but, he admitted, no bullet hole ever was
found. He had no explanation for this phenomenon. 
Sheriff
Matthews said a large number of lottery tickets were found in the house along
with several stacks of money. The Hargetts had been in the lottery business for
a year and a half before the shooting. Here was the crux of the matter. Their
operations were interfering with those of the boys in the syndicate. This
interference ceased the night of March 3, 1949.
*                      *                            *
Eighteen
months later, Billy Kent, a bartender, stood behind the rail at the Manhattan
Cafe, ready, willing, and able to satisfy the wishes of his customers. In came
Clarence Franklin Johns, and what he desired was not something served out of bottles.
He wanted all the cash in the joint. With his pistol drawn, he didn't get much
opposition from anyone present on that September 2, 1950. With the cash in
hand, he turned and fled. 
Kent
grabbed his own pistol and blasted at the fugitive, hitting Johns twice, but
Johns made the getaway car and roared away with a man later identified as Clyde
Gordon behind the wheel, Gordon drove to a Negro cemetery where Johns got out,
and once again Gordon gunned the motor and careened down the road. 
He
didn't get far. Seven miles west of Phenix City, Gordon's car swerved across
the road, striking another vehicle. Both Gordon and the woman driver of the
other auto were killed. 
In
the cemetery. Chief Deputy Fuller showed up with Deputy Scroggins. They said
they had received a tip that Johns was hiding there. In a few moments they
flushed him and blazed away. Besides the two non-fatal holes placed in Johns by
Kent, he now had thirteen fresh ones, a baker's dozen, one more than two full
guns can hold. 
Self-defense,
said Fuller. Johns had pointed his gun at Scroggins first and then had turned
it towards Fuller. It was Fuller or Johns, Fuller said, and from thirty feet
away Fuller began firing, advancing as he shot, with each bullet apparently
hitting Johns. 
With
both bandits dead, one might think the cash they had stolen from the Manhattan
Cafe would be returned. Well, it wasn't. No trace of it ever was found. Nobody would
say how much cash was involved. The Manhattan Cafe, incidentally, was owned by
Godwin Davis, one of the threesome who had John Frank Stringfellow eliminated. The
word spread that anywhere from $3,000 to $30,000 had been stolen. Davis
encouraged belief in the lower figure, not wanting the income tax crew to think
he had too much dough. 
The
story which made the rounds was that the holdup men hid the money before they
were killed. Davis did not believe the money was either lost or hidden. He made
it plain that he was of the opinion that Fuller, and perhaps Scroggins, could
tell him where every cent was. Of course they never did. 
National
Guard investigators, during their stay in Phenix City, had the bodies of
Hargett and Johns exhumed. Guardsmen never explained their purpose in doing so.
But
to outsiders it became clear that Fuller was a quick man with a pistol when he
could hide a gutless heart behind a tin badge which offered him the full
protection of the corrupt political machine that valued a cracked blue chip
more than a human life.