![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.blongerbros.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/08\/Drunken-Orgy.jpg\" "\\"The")
<\/a>The sketch depicts\u00a0Lou Blonger,\u00a0manager Adolph “Kid Duffy” Duff, bookmaker John Homer “Dapper Jackie” French, and Sheriff’s Deputy Tom Clarke, king of Denver’s West Side Criminal Court. They are all singing the praises of Lou’s old pal Mayor Dewey Bailey, who had been questioning\u00a0Van Cise’s\u00a0entire operation, suggesting it was\u00a0plot by the city’s stock brokers to legitimize their own racket and crush the competition in one fell swoop.<\/p>\n
By all accounts, the three main defendants were feeling good about their chances as the jury began their deliberations. Things\u00a0seemed to be\u00a0going their way; three of the jurors\u00a0were bought and paid for, and in a pinch they’d\u00a0been told\u00a0they could\u00a0expect a favorable result on appeal. \u00a0<\/p>\n
On the other hand, in all likelihood Lou, Duff and French would be spending the night in the county jail, and maybe longer than that.\u00a0While some of the smaller fry\u00a0never made bail at all — which\u00a0Lou would later regret\u00a0—\u00a0the three principals had\u00a0been free\u00a0since their arrest, but no more;\u00a0with the jury out they would be guests\u00a0of Dep. Clarke…<\/p>\n
But their cozy cells,\u00a0across the “Bridge of Tears” to the county jail, would have to wait. Instead they were sequestered in the Grand Jury room as they waited (prematurely) for a verdict. Clarke procured several bottles of whiskey,\u00a0and a\u00a0few young ladies for good measure, fans of Mr. French, no doubt. Meanwhile, one floor below, Van Cise and his team worked on the case into the night.<\/p>\n
Both\u00a0Van Cise and Forbes Parkhill tell this story in their books, from different perspectives. Parkhill recalls that the\u00a0press pool had been at the bottle as well, and at one point conducted a mock rape trial as\u00a0curious bystanders in the gallery\u00a0were supposedly unaware of the charade.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Van Cise recounts how the drunken Clarke had burst into his office, bellowing and blustering, incensed that\u00a0the Colonel\u00a0would try to give him orders in his own court. The jury had just retired for the night, and the prosecutor had ordered the defendants be taken to their cells. Clarke would have none of it.<\/p>\n
Unfortunately for Clarke, Van Cise could see\u00a0a whiskey bottle in his back pocket, and the next day a grand jury was convened. Clarke lost his job. The papers buzzed about the “drunken orgy” in the West Side Court.<\/p>\n
As for the rest? They endured five more days of deliberation, when the final juror broke, and Van Cise got his convictions. Lou and his pals would soon be on their way to the penitentiary at Canon City.\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
To commemorate the Great Raid on the Blonger gang, we present this cartoon from the Denver Times, March 27, 1923. Scott photgraphed it on a recent trip to Denver. The original clipping was found in the papers of Robert Maiden, part of the collection at the Denver Public Library. Maiden was working for the Federal […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-340","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-breaking"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.blongerbros.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/340","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.blongerbros.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.blongerbros.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blongerbros.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blongerbros.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=340"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.blongerbros.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/340\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.blongerbros.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=340"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blongerbros.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=340"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blongerbros.com\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=340"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}