Murder of a Journalist , livre ebook

225

pages

English

Ebooks

2009

Écrit par
Thomas Crowl

Publié par
The Kent State University Press

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225

pages

English

Ebooks

2009

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Publié par

The Kent State University Press

Date de parution

15 avril 2009

Nombre de lectures

EAN13

9781612775555

Langue

English

Poids de l'ouvrage

1 Mo

Private detectives, crooked cops, gangsters, and bootleggersThe July 1926 murder of the editor of the Canton, Ohio, Daily News, Don R. Mellett, was one of the most publicized crimes in the 1920s. For less than a year, Mellett was the editor of the Daily News, owned by former Ohio governor and Democrat presidential candidate James Cox. Having promised Cox he would turn the unprofitable News into a success, Mellett combined personal conviction with marketing savvy and in 1925 embarked on an antivice, anticorruption editorial campaign. The following year, the Daily News and Mellett, posthumously, received the Pulitzer Prize for his columns.His editorials were often aimed at the Canton police chief, S. A. Lengel, making the News law and order crusade personal. An unholy alliance of bootleggers and corrupt police, angered at Mellett's interference with business as usual, hired an ex-con from Pennsylvania, Patrick McDermott, to attack and scare the editor. When the intended assault spiraled out of control and Mellett was murdered, the national press became outraged and saw this situation as an attack on the First Amendment, demanding justice in editorials appearing on the front pages of newspapers throughout the country.Author Thomas Crowl, using newspaper and magazine accounts, interviews, and other primary source material (some previously unavailable), follows the investigation into the Mellett murder by a private detective who was hired by the Stark County prosecutor. The arrest of the prime suspect and the sensational trial of the cocky hitman received nationwide media coverage. The murder investigation also netted the two local hoodlums who hired McDermott. Additionally, a former police detective was arrested and convicted as the originator of the plot, and he in turn implicated police chief Lengel in the murder conspiracy. Nearly a year and a half later, however, Lengel was ultimately acquitted of the charges.This compelling and intriguing story is the first in-depth study of the Mellett murder. Historians and true crime buffs will welcome this as a valuable addition to the field of true crime history.

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Publié par

The Kent State University Press

Date de parution

15 avril 2009

Nombre de lectures

EAN13

9781612775555

Langue

English

Poids de l'ouvrage

1 Mo

True crime Media

Murder of a Journalist

TRUE CRIME HISTORY SERIES

Twilight of Innocence: The Disappearance of Beverly Potts James Jessen Badal Tracks to Murder Jonathan Goodman Terrorism for Self-Gloriﬁcation: The Herostratos Syndrome Albert Borowitz Ripperology: A Study of the World’s First Serial Killer and a Literary Phenomenon Robin Odell The Good-bye Door: The Incredible True Story of America’s First Female Serial Killer to Die in the Chair Diana Britt Franklin Murder on Several Occasions Jonathan Goodman The Murder of Mary Bean and Other Stories Elizabeth A. De Wolfe Murder of a Journalist: The True Story of the Death of Donald Ring Mellett Thomas Crowl

Murder of a Journalist

U U U

The True Story of the Death of Donald Ring Mellett

U U U

thomas crowl

The Kent State University Press Kent, Ohio

library of congress cataloging-in-publication data Crowl, Thomas. Murder of a journalist : the true story of the death of Donald Ring Mellett / Thomas Crowl. p. cm. — (True crime history series) Includes bibliographical references and index. isbn 978-1-60635-002-7(pbk. : alk. paper)d 1. Mellett, Donald Ring,1891–1926.2. Murder—Ohio—Canton. 3. Murder victims—Ohio—Canton.4I. Title.. Trials (Murder)—Ohio—Canton. HV6534.C282C76 2009 364.152'3092—dc22 2009005098 British Library Cataloging-in-Publication data are available.

13 12 11 1009

5 4 3 21

This book is dedicated with love to my daughters, Jennifer and Laura

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Contents

Preface

1The Newspaperman

2Mellett in Canton

3The Murder42

4 Unraveling the Conspiracy

5The Gang of Three

6The Slugger Goes on Trial

7The Rich Man Faces a Jury

8Mazer Confesses

135

9The Detective’s Day in Court

124

142

10The Dutch Baker Defends Himself

11McDermott Has the Last Word

12 Unanswered Questions

13The Aftermath

Notes

186

Bibliography

Index

206

178

203

174

168

154

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Preface

he late-nineteenth-century press lord and father of journal-tereTsted public spirited press, with trained intelligence to know right, ism’s highest award, Joseph Pulitzer, wrote in1904, “Our republic and its press will rise or fall together. An able, disin-and courage to do it, can preserve that public virtue without which popular government is a sham and a mockery.” Pulitzer knew something about journalism as a profession and the role of the press in a free society, having himself become rich cru-sading against public and private corruption. Pulitzer introduced a populist appeal to newspapers, asking the public to accept them as a champion of the little guy. His splashy investigative articles and edi-torial crusades worked. Circulation went up and with it proﬁts and inﬂuence. Every successful publisher of the day would have to follow some version of Pulitzer’s model. There were critics, and charges of yellow journalism, but the industrialization of newspapers by large corporations seeking proﬁt ensured that Pulitzer’s template would endure. Despite this new aggressiveness by the press, violence against journalists was very unusual.

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