Missing Judge Case, a break?

[Madame Butterfly 0]

Letter Renews Hopes of Solving Crater Case

By LARRY McSHANE, AP

 

 

 

NEW YORK (Aug. 19) - Move over, Mark Felt. Just three months after the identity of "Deep Throat" was finally made public, authorities are chasing a new lead in one of the 20th century's other great unsolved mysteries:

 

What ever happened to Judge Joseph Crater?

 

A recently discovered letter asserting that Crater was murdered and buried near the Coney Island boardwalk prompted tabloid headlines Friday about a case that has puzzled authorities ever since the newly minted judge entered a cab in midtown Manhattan and exited in parts unknown.

 

"1930 CRATER VANISH 'SOLVED,"' proclaimed the New York Post, although police said that wasn't quite the case. A Long Island woman discovered a letter left by her late grandmother, who claimed her husband once heard over drinks that a cop, his cab-driver brother and several accomplices had killed Crater and buried him on the current site of the New York Aquarium.

 

Police were uncertain about the letter's legitimacy, although they said they were combing through records to determine if any bodies had been unearthed during the aquarium's construction in the 1950s.

 

The letter was discovered by Barbara O'Brien, whose phone rang unanswered Friday at her Long Island home.

 

Long before Elvis, Judge Crater sightings were an international phenomenon. There were reports of Crater in a Manhattan nightclub and a Maine cottage, of Crater wandering through Havana and playing bingo in North Africa.

 

The Crater saga became a part of the collective national psyche: First as a news story on par with the O.J. Simpson trial, later as a synonym for unsolved mysteries, and eventually as a punchline for Groucho Marx.

 

 

 

Before her death in 1969, Crater's wife, Stella Crater Kunz, said she thought he might have been killed because of political dealings.

 

"If this had happened today, it would dominate all the talk shows and cable shows for the next five years," said Tom Reppetto, co-author of the book "NYPD."

 

But for the first month he was gone, almost no one was aware Judge Crater was missing.

 

On the evening of Aug. 6, 1930, Crater dined at a West 45th Street steakhouse with a group of friends that included a showgirl. Crater had earlier withdrawn $5,150 from a pair of bank accounts. He was last seen at 9:15 p.m., climbing into the cab.

 

The taxi disappeared into the night.

 

So did Crater.

 

Only his wife and a few close friends were aware of what happened. The NYPD was not summoned until Sept. 3, one month after the judge received a phone call at his summer home in Maine and quickly left for New York.

 

All sorts of theories quickly emerged, with The New York Times reporting many of Crater's friends believed he was "done away with for the sake of the money he carried." Reppetto, who mentioned the Crater case in his NYPD history, thinks otherwise.

 

"It looked as though he was getting set to flee," Reppetto said, citing the judge's huge cash withdrawal and potential problems. "Things were beginning to unravel for him."

 

At the time, it was rumored that a prospective judge needed to pay off politicians a year's salary before joining the bench. Crater withdrew $23,000, just $500 more than the annual pay, before his appointment. He was involved in a dicey real estate deal that drew unwanted attention. And he was a target of an investigation that eventually toppled Mayor Jimmy Walker.

 

For the next 75 years, there were rumors and rumblings but never any resolution. Whether this letter provides an answer or not, Reppetto said, there is at least one thing for certain in the Crater case.

 

"They won't," he said with a laugh, "find him alive."

 

Associated Press Writer Michael Weissenstein contributed to this report.