Editorial
The January 1947 escape of nine inmates from Brooklyn’s aging Raymond Street Jail added to the facility’s reputation as a “Swiss cheese” prison. Alarmed New Yorkers paid close attention to law enforcement efforts to round up the escapees and demanded that a more modern institution be built to hold Brooklyn prisoners. However, the public’s short attention span permitted long construction delays for what ultimately turned out to be an undersized facility, and the deteriorating Raymond Street building remained in use for sixteen more years. In this issue, Thomas Hunt examines the 1947 escape and other sensational escapes from Raymond Street and outlines the series of official missteps that grew the prison’s “Swiss cheese” reputation (PREVIEW).
For a time, it must have seemed to law enforcement officials that they were battling the ghosts or doppelgangers of “Pretty Boy” Floyd and Adam Richetti. Jeffery S. King looks at the lives, careers and deaths of bank robbers and cop-killers George McKeever and Francis McNeiley (PREVIEW).
Also in this issue:
- An excerpt from Christian Cipollini’s new book, Lucky Luciano: Mysterious Tales of a Gangland Legend (PREVIEW).
- Richard N. Warner concludes his Warner Files series on Religion and the Mafia (PREVIEW).
- Ryan Artis reviews The Mob and the City by C. Alexander Hortis (PREVIEW).
- Thomas Hunt discusses a traditional publisher bias and reviews The Milwaukee Mafia by Gavin Schmitt and Lucky Luciano: Mysterious Tales of a Gangland Legend by Christian Cipollini (PREVIEW).
Preview/purchase electronic edition through Scribd.
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