Alvin Karpis "Public Enemy No. 1"

Karpis was demoted to us public enemy number one following the capture of John Dillinger it wasn't until May of 1936 the carpus was finally arrested use reports of the time say Hoover did the job personally it's rumored ever reported that J Edgar Hoover was instrumental in your arrest is there any truth in that is there any truth in that you would further bias mr. Hoover you have no grudges grudges with whom grudges against J Edgar Hoover I never did have let me tell you the depression of the third is well Atlanta live people did most anything just to survive he was a story about a man that made his fortune and fame robbing desperado Elba cops burn in hell combined with Freddie Parker and his mom terrorizing spyfu st. Paul robbing banks payroll Steve Knapp bozzetto L the coppers never did things smoke this time 100 cows got left Yeltsin garages in the rent-free in hundred thirty six hookers boys go get the coppers took the rap for a snatch oh man they gave em life sand up to the rock but he kept it as well couldn't make it tough robbing banks payrolls kidnap is that all Alvin Karpis never then smile first thing you know I was running errands for them pimps gamblers and carrying moves for the bootleggers and instead of making a Senat paper I'd come home maybe midnight willing to o'clock in the morning with a dollar and a half two dollars in my pocket but I'd have much more than that I'd hide do you feel like a big shot sure I do what kid wouldn't attend here's old come on I had more money and any kid in the neighborhood so we're tough to know yeah not to but I was on my own I used to steal sure I'd bone away home like if I see something in a store when it don't forget they didn't have squad cards or anything like that in those days I see something in the store when to the appealed to me on streets going home I'd hide a brick or two around their own this map buddy alley or in the street in the first stormy night white I just rode a brick through the window and going there take what it was I wanted out or maybe destroy a 52 or window for $3 object but somewhere you decided on bank robbery I feel that the biggest celebrities in the 20s with the bank robber well you want to be a celebrity burglars the murderers well I held a fascination for me sure the safecracking part or listen so much I don't think that being a celebrity because via celebrity I had to be known and you can't do that kind of business and be known without going to jail you were a violent man or if you had to be you were I've heard that said yes but I'm not trying to diminish at her major remarks is at times this you once are you're quoted as saying you liked a little bit of excitement even bank-robbing could get dull yes but is there any possibility you went into that knowing it would be exciting we knew it was wasn't going to be the whole era December in 1932 we robbed the bank in Minneapolis and again we knew the guy hit the button you know an alarm well we already had a guy outside the machine gun standing by a mailbox this is a building like this work you know it kind of a triangle building on the corner well in a squad car rolled up there by then another fella went out got a machine with a machine got a machine gun out of the car to help and when the squad car came up there was about 18 below 20 below zero and you couldn't see how many cops were in the car or anything so these guys just so automatically opened up and we could hear the other squad cars coming with the sirens blowing and so forth and so these two cops never got a chance to do any shooting we didn't know there was two or four five or one and one of these fellows that ran out there to help in his haste and eagerness he hit a nice and place on the street and he fell when he fell you missed pulling the trigger and ain't shot no one of our back tires we had a big Lincoln sedan so then when we got out there the shooting was over with could you guess you're relying bed at night and say I wonder how many men I've killed well sometime I've counted them up but am I going to tell you okay what difference does it make there was a few people killed in the robberies I was well they claim the I was arrested they accused me of killing 14 of various states you would have been an accessory anyhow well if that was it I would have been good I mean I would have I wouldn't have been in this so upset about these charges but for some reason or another they'd always say it was me that did the shooting I don't know why they want to establish you the mad dog killer creepy they call yeah that's what they call me the cops did you yeah she already killed three or four cops he was a dead shot you know you know burglaries at night I hear you saying this is hideous the most hideous thing I think I've heard in a long time well I hear you're asking yeah doesn't it give you a twinge when you think what I think about it I just think I must have been wasn't all there probably although I might have had a little mental quirk about these kind of things but as far as the killing and stuff if I Larry was just say well gee it was too bad and listen I don't have the slightest thoughts like that about this thing and I don't know why perhaps even think that I should have but maybe my makeup isn't like that this doesn't matter to you at all what I think of you I it would bother me not as an interviewer I could give a damn less what you thought now you said that Bob Barker was just an old-fashioned Ozark homebody everybody thought she was the brains of the Barker gang the brains of the the carpus Barker again carried a machine gun tell me what well matter of fact is no one ever heard of her until after she had been slaughtered by the FBI down only in Florida now in 1935 and then they built her up over the years gradually as a monster the truth of the matter was he's a whole religious one was Holy Roller religious type in the Ozarks she never read newspapers the only thing she listened to on radio was hillbilly program and her greatest pastime was workin jigsaw puzzles and as far as knowing that we were criminals yes she knew we were criminals but you know what her boys the weren't you just the same his talk yeah that's right tell me about Stroud you you met the Birdman in Leavenworth well yeah that's when I first went to 11 worth I was held or 6 days as I told you formally about this psychiatric but and they put me in a Cell across from Stroud and cell block was an old cell block and it was situated and something like this quarter down the center-based cells facing one another well there was a fella in the cell across from me and the whites had to be on 24 hours a day in these cells mesh screen over the morgue doors well it turned out I noticed this fella I had a typewriter and a microscope on a table in a Cell which I thought very unusual and he got up from the table and he walked toward the wall of his cell and suddenly disappeared and I wondered what the hell's going on here as it turned out they had cut a doorway through one wall of his cell that went into the next one and that is where it turned out he kept his Canaries want to talk about Hoover finally because that's probably the guy that sticks in your craw Morgan's really as much as you might imagine well the story that made Hoover famous was that he personally grabbed Alvin Karpis public enemy number one reached into the car and he disarmed you and grabbed you and that made him a hero when you say I say this that 28 agents arrested me and while we even they were well put a mile if I've been excited most of them and one was shouting put your hands up another one keep your hands down another one so longer running board it was in New Orleans yeah right about 5:00 in the evening and there was a fella behind me with the rifle he was so shaky that in the excitement he wasn't scared don't misunderstand me you feel the barrel vibrating yeah oh yeah he couldn't hold he couldn't hold it still so I asked the man in front of me with the machine gun he seemed to be the coolest in the water I said who's the boss of this outfit anyway and he said oh he'll be here in a minute why and I said well I wanted to tell I kinda with the rifle back of me to get it out of my back because he's so nervous I think he's going to shoot right through me and right through you if he does shoot yeah and this got the guy a little upset he heard me say that he said where you saw him a [ __ ] when we get you to the office I'm going to show you who the boss is and I turn my head like that to answer him and as I did up at the corner of the apartment bowling this was on the corner I see a guy peeping around the corner and I thought what the hell is this and I when I stop talking these other agents that were right close to me they started looking to see what I was looking at why quit talking and finally her came another one around the corner looking around the corner one of the agents doubted we got him chief we got him come on come on everything's all right we got it so here they came and it turned out to be the Gold Dust twins is living Blaz Hoover and Clyde Tolson none of the FBI agents had remembered to bring handcuffs coppices wrists were found with his own striped necktie he was tried in Minnesota for the kidnapping of a wealthy Brewer his sentence life

Channel: Anthony Carr

Views: 138,799

Keywords: alvin, karpis, mob, mafia, Public Enemy (Literature Subject), Sicilian Mafia (Film Subject), Organized Crime (Fictional Organization Type), Alcatraz Island (Island), prison, jail, John Dillinger (Deceased Person)

Id: HX--pkpsvBE

Length: 11min 37sec (697 seconds)

Published: Thu Sep 01 2011