John Dillinger

John Herbert Dillinger was an American gangster of

the Great Depression. He led a group known as the
"Dillinger Gang", which was accused of robbing 24 banks
and four police stations. Dillinger was imprisoned several
times but escaped twice. He was charged, but not
convicted of the murder of an East Chicago, Indiana,
police officer who shot Dillinger in his bullet-proof
vest during a shootout; it was the only time Dillinger was
charged with homicide.
Dillinger courted publicity. The media ran exaggerated
accounts of his bravado and colorful personality and cast
him as a Robin Hood. In response, J. Edgar Hoover used
Dillinger and his gang as his campaign platform to evolve
the BOI into the Federal Bureau of Investigation,
developing more sophisticated investigative techniques as
weapons against organized crime.
 Escape from Crown Point
On January 25, 1934, Dillinger and his gang were captured in Tucson,
Arizona.He was extradited to Indiana and escorted back by Matt Leach the
chief of the Indiana State Police. Dillinger was taken to the Lake County Jail
in Crown Point, Indiana and imprisoned to face charges for the murder of a
policeman who was killed during a Dillinger gang bank robbery in East
Chicago, Indiana, on January 15, 1934. The local police boasted to area
newspapers that the jail was escape-proof and had even posted extra guards
as a precaution. However, at 9:30 a.m. on Saturday, March 3, 1934, Dillinger
was able to escape. During morning exercises at the jail with 15 other
immates, Dillinger produced a pistol, catching deputies and guards by
surprise, and he was able to leave the premises without firing a shot. Almost
immediately afterwards conjecture began whether the gun Dillinger displayed
was real or not. According to Deputy Ernest Blunk, Dillinger had escaped
using a real pistol. FBI files, on the other hand, indicate that Dillinger used a
carved fake pistol. Sam Cahoon, a trustee who Dillinger took hostage in the
jail, also believed Dillinger had carved the gun, using a razor and some
shelving in his cell.
By July 1934, Dillinger had dropped completely out of
sight, and the federal agents had no solid leads to follow.
He had, in fact, drifted into Chicago where he went under
the alias of Jimmy Lawrence, a petty criminal from
Wisconsin who bore a close resemblance to Dillinger.
Working as a clerk, Dillinger found that, in a large
metropolis like Chicago, he was able to lead an
anonymous existence for a while. What he did not realize
was that the center of the federal agents' dragnet
happened to be Chicago.