With Chicago Mayor William Thompson’s police on gang payrolls, and his wide-open town policy for gangsters and bootleggers, organized crime was further aided by Governor Len Small’s pardon and parole policy. Small’s pardons had been scandalous from the beginning. The matter blew up into a huge scandal in 1926, when it was revealed the Small administration had been operating a pardon mill. For a price, anyone could buy his or her way out of the penitentiary. Gangsters, Spike O’Donnell and Bugs Moran paid their bribes and were able to get their gangs back together to commit more mayhem on the streets of Chicago. The scheme was headed by Will Colvin (left), supervisor of paroles, and Chauncey Jenkins (right), director of prisons. They are pictured here with Governor Small during Small’s trial, for embezzlement and money-laundering, in Waukegan, IL. (Chicago History Museum-Chicago Daily News collection)
Arcadia
