March 6, 1932. The New York Times
The beginning of the Prohibition in 1920 marked the birth of organized crime in America. Eventually, in the midst of the Great Depression, organized kidnapping rings would often target respectable families for ransom which led to rising kidnapping rates.
March 6, 1932. The New York Times
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Unemployment over the past century (and change), San Jose State University
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March 6, 1932. The New York Times
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Map of the city of St. Louis, showing proximity to Mississippi River, 1911. Mapmaker: George F. Cram Company. Maps of Missouri
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Kidnappers would take advantage of border proximity and travel across state boundaries, hindering prosecution.
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"The fast automobile and the great network of fine roads which followed its development were utilized by the kidnapper... Law enforcement authorities, lacking coordination, with no uniform system of intercommunication and restricted in authority to activities in their own jurisdiction, found themselves laughed at by criminals bound by no such inhibitions or restrictions...."
"....The procedure was simple—a man would be kidnapped in one State and whisked into another, and still another, his captors knowing full well that police in the jurisdiction where the crime was committed had no authority as far as the State of confinement and concealment was concerned." |
-Commentator on St. Louis kidnappings, from "Regulating Intrastate Crime: How the Federal Kidnapping Act Blurs the Distinction Between What Is Truly National and What Is Truly Local" by Colin V. Ram
Two Missouri Congressmen drafted kidnapping legislation for Congress, but the bill was dismissed.
Missouri Representative John Cochran, 1925-1934. Library of Congress
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Missouri Senator Roscoe Patterson, 1929-1935. Congress.gov
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