"He must have done something. They don't kill you for nothing." - Chicago Gangster Ted Newberry. Rubbed out January 7, 1933

Friday, January 18, 2008

Trifecta

The bullets were flying on this date back in 1915. In Manhattan four members of either the Gophers or Hudson Dusters waited outside of the Miner’s Eighth Avenue Theatre for a guy named Martin Sullivan to emerge from the show so they could kill him. Why? Who knows but when Martin exited, with approximately two hundred other people, the four gunmen opened fire and succeeded in only wounding their target with two bullets in the hip and one in the thigh. The gunmen then took off running but there was a couple of cops nearby who managed to captured two of them (Wm. MacNamara age 16 & Henry Thompson, 17) after a running gunfight. Sullivan was taken to Bellevue Hospital but did not comment on the shooting.

Meanwhile in Brooklyn
There was another shoot out when members of the White Hand gang ambushed members of a gang known as the Never Come Home Boys. The latter gang was holding a dance and when members, Joseph Martini, James McNealy and Thomas Ryan left the hall, a half dozen White Handers opened fire on them. The three Never Come Home Boys fought back but were all wounded, the New York Herald stated that Ryan would probably die.

It wasn't all Irish that day.

Brooklyn was also the scene of the one sure murder. Frank Solli came walking up to his house when two men opened fire on him. One of the killers was in front of him and used a pistol while the other man came up from behind with a shotgun. Sadly, Solli’s daughter was watching from a window when her father was cut down.

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