I watch a lot of old movies from the Golden Age of Hollywood, and I’ve seen my fair share of 1930s gangster flicks (George Raft is my favorite!). Films like The Public Enemy, Scarface, and Little Caesar are filled with slang that is now either obsolete or considered old-fashioned, but I was pretty surprised to …
Tag: criminals
Stealing the Duchess of Devonshire
For a large part of the late 19th century, one man confounded, outwitted, and bemused the police forces of multiple continents: Adam Worth (1844-1902). So difficult was it to catch him red-handed, so wily were his swindles, and so brazen were his thefts that Scotland Yard called him the “Napoleon of Crime.” His greatest and …
The Organization of Scotland Yard
The great deterrent against crime is not vindictive punishment; the more certain you make detection, the less severe your punishment may be. The brilliant sleuth-hound work of which we read so often is a less important factor in police work than organisation. Organisation it is which holds the peace of London. It is organisation that …