BEST 1931 NY Times newspaper GANGSTER killer "MAD DOG" VINCENT COLL MURDER TRIAL

Description: BEST 1931 NY Times newspaper Gangster Hit Man "MAD DOG" VINCENT COLL on TRIAL for MURDER in NY City - inv # 8G-406 SEE PHOTO----- COMPLETE, ORIGINAL NEWSPAPER, the NY Times (printed on high quality rag paper) dated Dec 23, 1931. This newspaper contains a prominent front page heading and long front page LOCAL report of the TRIAL of mob "hit man" VINCENT "Mad Dog" Coll for the murders of several bystanders including a 5-year old child in attempted mob "hit." The Coll trial began in December 1931. He retained famed defense lawyer Samuel Leibowitz. Coll claimed that he was miles away from the shooting scene and was being framed by his enemies. Coll added that he would love to tear the throat out of the person who killed Vengalli. The prosecution case soon fell apart. Their sole witness to the shooting, George Brecht, revealed on the witness stand to having a criminal and mental health record, and to making similar testimony in a previous murder case in St Louis, Missouri. At the end of December, the judge issued a directed verdict of innocence for Coll. Immediately after the Vengalli verdict, a New York City police inspector told Coll that the police would arrest him whenever he was spotted in New York City. He was soon re-jailed for carrying a gun. When the inspector referred to Coll as a baby killer, Coll hotly replied, "I'm no baby killer". This is the BEST newspaper I have seen with LOCAL coverage of the murder trial of 1920's era mob "hit man" Vincent "Mad Dog" Coll for the murder of a 5-year old child in an attempted mob "hit.". Vincent "Mad Dog" Coll (born Uinseann Ó Colla, July 20, 1908 – February 8, 1932) was an Irish American mob hitman in the 1920s and early 1930s in New York City. Coll gained notoriety for the alleged accidental killing of a young child during a mob kidnap attempt. Coll was raised in The Bronx by an elderly woman who took him in as her own. At age 12, Coll was first sent to a reform school. After being expelled from multiple Catholic reform schools, he joined The Gophers street gang. Later he went to work for Dutch Schultz. Coll and his brother first met Schultz as patrons of one of Schultz's bars in Harlem. As Schultz expanded his criminal empire, the boys started working for him. Coll's ruthlessness made him a valued enforcer to Schultz at first. As Schultz's criminal empire grew in power during the 1920s, he employed Coll as an assassin. At age nineteen, Coll was charged with the murder of Anthony Borello, the owner of a speakeasy, and Mary Smith, a dance hall hostess. Coll allegedly murdered Borello because he refused to sell Schultz's bootleg alcohol. The charges were eventually dismissed, though many suspect this to have been from Schultz's influence. Schultz was not happy about Coll's actions. In 1929, without Schultz's permission, Coll robbed a dairy in the Bronx of $17,000. Coll and his gang posed as armed guards to gain access to the cashier's room. Schultz later confronted Coll about robbery, but rather than being apologetic, Coll demanded to be an equal partner; Schultz declined. By January 1930, Coll had formed his own gang and was engaged in a shooting war with Schultz. One of the earliest victims was Peter Coll, shot dead on May 30, 1931, while driving down a Harlem street. On June 2, Coll and his gang broke into a garage owned by Schultz and destroyed 120 vending machines and 10 trucks. As the war continued, Vincent Coll and gang killed approximately 20 of Schultz's men. To finance his new gang, Coll kidnapped gangsters and held them for ransom. Coll knew that the victims would not report the kidnappings to police; they would have a hard time explaining to the Bureau of Internal Revenue why the ransom cash had not been reported as income. One of Coll's best-known victims was gambler George "Big Frenchy" DeMange, a close associate of Owney Madden, boss of the Hell's Kitchen Irish Mob. According to one account, Coll telephoned DeMange and asked to meet with him. When DeMange arrived at the meeting place, Coll kidnapped him at gunpoint. Coll released DeMange 18 hours later after receiving a ransom payment. On July 28, 1931, Coll allegedly participated in a kidnapping attempt that resulted in the shooting death of a child. Coll's target was bootlegger Joseph Rao, a Schultz underling who was lounging in front of a social club. Several children were playing outside an apartment house. A large touring car pulled up to the curb, and several men pointed shotguns and submachine guns towards Rao and started shooting. Rao threw himself to the sidewalk, however, four young children were wounded in the attack. One of them, five-year-old Michael Vengalli, later died at Beth David Hospital. After the Vengalli killing, New York City Mayor Jimmy Walker dubbed Coll a "Mad Dog". On October 4, 1931, after an extensive manhunt, New York police arrested Coll at a hotel in the Bronx. Coll had dyed his hair black, grown a mustache, and was wearing horn-rimmed glasses. Coll surrendered peacefully. During a police lineup, a defiant Coll said that he had been in Albany, New York for the past several months, and refused to answer any other questions without an attorney present. On October 5, a grand jury in New York city indicted Coll in the Vengalli murder. The Coll trial began in December 1931. He retained famed defense lawyer Samuel Leibowitz. Coll claimed that he was miles away from the shooting scene and was being framed by his enemies. Coll added that he would love to tear the throat out of the person who killed Vengalli. The prosecution case soon fell apart. Their sole witness to the shooting, George Brecht, revealed on the witness stand to having a criminal and mental health record, and to making similar testimony in a previous murder case in St Louis, Missouri. At the end of December, the judge issued a directed verdict of innocence for Coll. Immediately after the Vengalli verdict, a New York City police inspector told Coll that the police would arrest him whenever he was spotted in New York City. He was soon re-jailed for carrying a gun. When the inspector referred to Coll as a baby killer, Coll hotly replied, "I'm no baby killer". Soon after his acquittal, Coll married Lottie Kreisberger, a fashion designer in New York. In September 1931, between the killing of young Vengalli and his acquittal for that death, Coll was hired by Salvatore Maranzano, who had recently crowned himself the Mafia boss of all bosses in New York City, to murder his right-hand man, Charles "Lucky" Luciano. Luciano had previously helped Maranzano win the infamous Castellammarese War in New York and gain control of the New York Mafia. However, Maranzano suspected Luciano of wanting to kill him and seize power for himself. Coll agreed to murder Luciano for a $25,000 payment in advance and a $25,000 payment on completion of the job. On September 10, 1931, Maranzano invited Luciano to visit his office. The plan was that Coll would turn up and kill Luciano. However, Luciano had received a tip-off about this plan (although probably not the identity of the hitman), so he instead sent over a squad of his own hitmen who stabbed and shot Maranzano to death. According to the 1963 testimony of government witness Joseph Valachi, Coll arrived at the office to kill Luciano, only to meet Luciano's hitmen fleeing the scene. After learning from them that Maranzano was dead, Coll immediately left the building, $25,000 richer. It was said that both Dutch Schultz and Owney Madden had put a $50,000 bounty on Vincent Coll's head. At one point, Schultz had actually walked into a Bronx police station and offered "a house in Westchester" to whoever killed Coll. On February 1, 1932, four or five gunmen invaded a Bronx apartment which Coll was rumored to frequent and opened fire with pistols and submachine guns. Three people (Coll gangsters Patsy Del Greco, Fiorio Basile, and bystander Emily Torrizello) were killed. Three others were wounded. Coll himself did not show up until thirty minutes after the shooting. A week after the Bronx shootings, at 12:30 a.m. on February 8, Coll was using a phone booth at a drug store at Eighth Avenue and 23rd Street in Manhattan. He was reportedly talking to Madden, demanding $50,000 from the gangster under the threat of kidnapping his brother-in-law. Madden kept Coll on the line while the call was traced. Three men in a dark limousine soon arrived at the drug store. While one waited in the car, two others stepped out. One man waited outside while the other walked inside the store. The gunman told the cashier to "Keep cool, now", drew a Thompson submachine gun from under his overcoat and opened fire on Coll in the glass phone booth. Coll died instantly. The killers took off in their car. They were chased unsuccessfully up Eighth Avenue by a foot patrolman who had heard the gunshots and commandeered a passing taxi. However, the car got away. A total of fifteen bullets were removed from Coll's body at the morgue; more may have passed through him. Coll was buried next to his brother Peter at Saint Raymond's Cemetery in the Bronx. Dutch Schultz sent a floral wreath bearing a banner with the message, "From the boys". Excellent condition. This newspaper is printed on high quality rag paper and is as white and supple as the day it came of the press in 1931. This listing includes the complete entire original newspaper, NOT just a clipping or a page of it. STEPHEN A. GOLDMAN HISTORICAL NEWSPAPERS stands behind all of the items that we sell with a no questions asked, money back guarantee. Every item we sell is an original newspaper printed on the date indicated at the beginning of its description. 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Price: 28 USD

Location: Oxford, Maryland

End Time: 2025-01-09T14:49:58.000Z

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