June 17, 1933: The Kansas City Massacre

[Valin]

FBI

 

On the morning of June 17, 1933, a mass murder committed in front of Union Railway Station in Kansas City, Missouri shocked the American public into a new consciousness of the serious crime problems in the nation. The killings that took the lives of four peace officers and their prisoner are now known as the Kansas City Massacre.

 

Scene in front of the Kansas City railroad depot moments after the attack

 

The Kansas City Massacre involved the attempt by Charles Arthur Pretty Boy Floyd, Vernon Miller and Adam Richetti to free their friend, Frank Nash, a federal prisoner. At the time, Nash was in the custody of several law enforcement officers who were returning him to the U.S. Penitentiary at Leavenworth, Kansas, from which he had escaped on October 19, 1930.

 

Nashs criminal record reached back to 1913, when he was sentenced to life at the State Penitentiary, McAlester, Oklahoma for murder. He was later pardoned. In 1920, he was given a 25-year sentence at the same penitentiary for burglary with explosives and later pardoned. On March 3, 1924, Nash began a 25-year sentence at the U.S. Penitentiary at Leavenworth for assaulting a mail custodian. He escaped on October 19, 1930.

 

(Snip)