TRAPPING GUNMEN.

Franklin Times, Volume XIX, Issue 93, 12 August 1929, Page 3

TRAPPING GUNMEN.

SCIENTIFIC TERROR.

TRACKED BY TELL-TALE BULLETS.

Science has now been put to the task of halting Chicago’s gang wars. This was revealed when Coroner Herman N. Bundesen reconvened the inquest into the slaughter of seven Moran gangsters in the now famous St. Valentine’s Day massacre on North Clark street.

The lore of bullets, tell-tale bullets which, recovered from the bodies of the, slain point a scientific finger of guilt at the slayers who sped those bullets'on their way, was unfolded before the coroner’s jury. Major Galvin H. Goddard, of New York, noted expert in ballistics, which is the science of fire arms, told the jury of his investigations of the bullets and the guns which have figured in Chicago’s five years of gang outlawry. Coroner Bundesen hailed the application of the new science as of equal importance with the now universally accepted science of finger-printing. Briefly, the science of ballistics may be explained thus: No two revolvers ever made are exactly alike. Every revolver makes characteristic marks upon a bullet, and upon the shell of a cartridge. These marks appear almost identically upon every bullet fired from that particular revolver. Good Murder Proof. Thus given the bullet which is found in the body of the victim and given the revolver of the suspect to the crime a test bullet may be fired from the revolver, and if it has the same markings as the fatal bullet — there is good murder proof for the grand jury. The science, Dr. Bundesen declared, is as infallible as fingerprinting; there is no chance for error. Before going into the discussion of this field of criminology, the events which led up to its application to the Chicago crime situation and the results obtained thus far are of interest.

When the seven men were lined up against the wall of the garage at 2122, North Clark street, and riddled with machine-gun bullets, the coroner empanelled a jury of business men. The bodies of the victims were drilled with so many bullets that it seemed that the bullets themselves might give a clue, so Coroner Bundesen determined to conduct an investigation of the bullets and the many shells scattered about the garage floor. The expert was given 41 weapons seized from notorious gangsters in the past, and he was given bullets taken from the bodies of 74 of the gang-war victims. Hundreds of test bullets were fired from the weapons of the police and the gangsters. Weapons were discharged into a large can filled with waste, and the bullets were recovered, embedded in the waste.

As to the results of Major Goddard’s research, the expert testified before the coroner’s jury that he had fasten ed indisputably, upon George Maloney, a Chicago gangster and beer runner, the murders of three men. Maloney has been indicted for and has pleaded not guilty to the murder of two of the men, Hugh (Stubby) McGovern and William (Gunner) McPadden, hoodlums who were shot to death as they sat in the Granada Cafe at Sixtyeight Street and Cottage Grove avenue, on December 31, 1928.

Bullets Were Identical.

Maloney was caught at the scene with a revolver in his hand, but no one had seen him tire the weapon. He denied having shot the two men. But the tell-tale bullets found in the bodies of McGovern and McPadden and examined by Major Goddard were found to match exactly with test bullets fired from Maloney’s revolver. But there was a more startling result in another case. Studying the bullet which killed Thomas Johnston, south side gangster, a year ago, Major Goddard found that it, too, had been fired from the Maloney weapon, and that the bullet in Johnston’s body matched perfectly with the test bullet from Maloney’s gun. Johnston had been taken for a ride, and his body, pierced with many bullets, was found on a roadway. There were no clues whatever as to his slayer. But a year later, the science of ballistics points to Maloney as the slayer, and Coroner Bundesen ordered the arrest of Maloney, who was on bail awaiting trial for the McGovernMcPadden murders.

Johnston’s body was exhumed by Coroner Bundesen's orders. Coroner Bundeseh asked the jury to hold Maloney to the grand jury as the slayer of Johnston. If he is indicted the case is expected to furnish the first murder trial in Cook County in which proof is based almost entirely on the science of the tell-tale bullets.