You are now listening to True Murder, The most shocking killers in true crime history and the authors that have written about them Geesy Bundy, Dahmer, The Nightstalker VTK Every week another fascinating author talking about the most shocking and infamous killers in true crime history. True Murder with your host journalist and author Dan Zufanski.
Good Evening Murder. Molly and the Mob, a nineteen fifties shocking true crime story by Rod Cackley, delves into one of the most chilling, unsolved mysteries from the heart of
nineteen fifties America. Set against the gritty backdrop of Joliet, Illinois, urban outpost of Chicago's criminal underworld, this true crime narrative follows the life and sudden disappearance of Mollizelco, a fearless journalist whose scathing pen became her weapon against corruption, organized crime, and the rampant gambling that threatened to poison her community.
Mollie Zelco was no ordinary woman. As the editor and publisher of The Spectator, a small but fiercely independent weekly newspaper, she made it her mission to expose the sinister ties between local politicians and the Chicago mobsters were bringing gambling dens and criminal enterprises into Joliet. Her editorials were hard hitting, unflinching, and deeply personal, so much so they earned her powerful enemies.
In an era where women were expected to remain silent, boldness stood out, and her voice became a rallying cry for those who shared her vision of a safer, more just community. But crusading against the mob came with a price. On the night of September twenty fifth, nineteen fifty seven, Maliseelco left the offices of the Spectator, telling her colleagues, I'll see you tomorrow, but that tomorrow never came. Molly vanished without a trace. At its core, this is a
story about courage in the face of overwhelming odds. Maliseelco knew the risks of standing up to the mob, but she never wavered in her commitment to her community and her principles. The story is also a gripping, suspenseful journey through one of America's most enduring unsolved mysteries, shining a spotlight on a woman whose legacy remains as powerful as
the question surrounding her disappearance. Was she a victim of her own relentless pursuit of justice or did she know too much becoming a target in a game she couldn't win. The book that we're featuring this evening is Murder Molly and the Mob, a nineteen fifty shocking true crime story with my special guest author Rod Cackley. Thank you very much for this interview and welcome back to the program, Rod Cackley.
Thanks Dan, How are you well fine?
Thanks, thank you so much, and congratulations on your latest book, Murder Molly and the Mob.
Yeah, thank you. I had a lot of fun writing it.
It's a wild story. Certainly, let's get right to introducing you're talking about April nineteen thirty eight, but let's go back and talk about William McCabe. Tell us about his education, his background, and his political history.
William McCabe Dan was born in Morris, Grundy County, Illinois. He worked for daily newspapers in Joliet and even briefly ran one. In his journalistic career, McCabe also found time to study law and was admitted to the Illinois Bar Association in nineteen fifteen. Now, his political career includes serving as a state representative from the forty first District from nineteen twelve to nineteen twenty two, followed by a term as a mayor of Lockport from nineteen twenty three to
twenty five. After that he worked as an attorney general. He specialized in criminal law until nineteen thirty. He then served as the state's attorney of Will County from nineteen thirty two to thirty six, and it was during that time, from thirty two to thirty six, that he hired a seventeen year old secretary by the name of Amilia Joe malzelto When McCabe left office, he took control of the Spectrum, a weekly newspaper in Joliet, Illinois, and Molly followed him.
Now, what was their editorial focus? What kind of newspaper was the Spectator? And who do they target specifically in this paper and their editorials?
Yeah, this was a time when weekly This is a weekly newspaper, okay, and it doesn't sound like much in twenty twenty four, But a weekly newspaper back in the thirties, forties, fifties, and even the sixties had a real voice. They were really big and McCabe and Molly did a lot more than just published school lunch menus and what was on sale at Sam's butcher shop. He really went after gangsters. They remember Joliet, Illinois. Remember al Capone. Of course al
Capone the founder of the Chicago Syndicate. He brought the mob his outfit into Joliet. That was one of the cities that he took over back in the days of prohibition. And so Molly and Molly, following McCabe's lead, mccab really went after the gangsters who were in Juliet.
You say that in his background he had mckayb had studied law in the Minister of the Bar in nineteen fifteen, and he was also, as you mentioned, the mayor of Lockport, and he was an attorney specializing in criminal law. So he didn't come into the journalism business without a background in the law specifically.
I think that's important to realize. You're right, You're right, Dan, he had a real background in the law and he had a background in journalism. It was really quite a one two punch.
Now let's get to introducing Liam Kelly, because again April sixteenth, nineteen thirty eight, and there's an incident between Liam Kelly tell us who Liam Kelly is and what happens that day.
Liam Kelly was a county Sheriff's deputy, and he's a great example of what Juliet was like. He also ran a couple of outsits if you will, or cruised Liam Kelly. As I wrote the lead line here is there was a long line of people furious with William McCain. Liam Kelly had just stepped to the front of the queue. Liam Kelly was upset with what McCabe had written, angered by a Spectator editorial that suggested Liam Kelly be removed
from office. Well that was you know, Liam Kelly's connection to the world of Joliet and the Chicago crime syndicate. So on April sixteenth, nineteen thirty eight, he walked up and punched McCabe in the eye, knocked in flat in broad daylight.
Now what's reaction from the editor of the Spectator, McCabe. What does he do in response?
McCabe? Now, remember this is a guy. You don't rise in politics back in these days without being able to handle yourself in a situation like this. He walked away from the encounter with the black eye, but he did not press charges. He told police, quote, I'll handle the matter myself en quote.
Now tell us what happens the next day at the office of McCabe's spectator in Joliet.
Yeah, In the next day, two men jump out of the car in front of the Joliet's headquarters in one thirteen Cass Street. They jump out of the car, they throw bricks through five plate glass windows, and then they speed off. Now McCabe was not shocked by this. He tells police that Kelly, after he punched him in the eye, he looked down at him on the sidewalk and said, I'll bust the rest of your windows. And the eye, of course the window back in that day was slang
for your eyes. So he says, I'll bust the rest of your windows. So McCabe told police he was not surprised by the attack on his building. And again, though McCabe says, I'll take it up with him, it's Kelly rather says I'll take it up with him. It's silly to connect me with the window breaking.
You're right that Liam Kelly does lose his job as court bailiff, but you say, needless to say he climbs the ladder in corruption in Joliet for nearly eight years raining as Will Counties jukebox king, also a powerful figure in the local Democratic Party.
Yeah, the jukeboxes were controlled by the outstit, the mob, the syndicate, if you will. So that's a real important point. He was making a lot of money losing his job as a court bailiff when his mentor, if you will, the judge that McCabe was after, got knocked out. There's really an intricate story here. Kelly was also a powerful figure in the local Democratic Party and told the night of October thirteenth, nineteen forty six, he and his wife
and his family. They're driving home from a restaurant. Somebody's following him. He can tell there's a car behind him, but he doesn't know if it's friend or full. So he pulls into the driveway of his house at five ho two Fourth Avenue and Juliet. His suspicions, though that it's the Full are confirmed. The car, carrying at least two men, possibly a third man, pulled in right behind him. Now Kelly's a big guy, as I wrote here, he sports a double chin, big enough to have its own name.
Didn't miss many meals. After the McCabe fight, he steps out of the car. He doesn't know yet what's facing him. He gets out of the car. His wife, Alice, and their four year old daughter, Mary Susan are inside the car. One of the men from the trailing car doesn't hesitate. He pulls out a pistol and fires six shots from a forty five caliber semi automatic. One bullet hits Kelly in the head in the temple. Four more tear into his left side, and the sixth bullet hits him in
the left shoulder. Liam Kelly was dead before his body hit the blacktop, and his wife, Alice later told police she had no idea why anyone would want to kill Liam.
So what happens with that investigation, as far as you know.
The investigation goes nowhere. That investigation goes nowhere. You have to realize that in Joliet, Illinois at the time, jukeboxes and pinball games, so they called them pinballs at the time, they were critical revenue streams for the syndicate. So obvious if Liam got whacked in his own driveway, he had
upset somebody, somebody was trying to take over. You wouldn't kill somebody like Liam without having the approval of people in Chicago, and if they approved it, then the tops were not going to go after him.
Now you take us to April seventh, nineteen forty eight, and William McCabe is now sixty four years old, crusading publisher for The Spectator, and you write that he'd always believe the pen was mightier than the gangster's gun or the sword.
Yeah, yeah, the gangster's gun in this case, and tonight he was about to test that belief. Now, not unlike Liam Kelly, he's driving alone, but he's driving, but driving alone on a lonely country road from the office of the Spectator in Juliet to one hundred and sixty acre farmy owns, just two miles outside of Lockport. He sees a car tailing him. Now, he's made a lot of enemies over the years. Both corrupt polock hissuons and gangsters
are after him. They hate him, and the people who control crime in northern Illinois see McCabe as a real enemy. And he figures that one of those enemies is behind him, and he's exactly right. He accelerates, the car behind him accelerates, They speed up even faster. Mccab floors it. He pushes the pedal to the metal. His car is going faster than it's ever driven on this battered, bumpy road. He smashes into every bump, soars over every pothole that the
dustry track can throw at him. The car chasing him, though, is faster. It pulls up alongside him and forces him off the side of the road into a ditch. Three men from that car that ran him into the ditch. They pull open the driver's side door of McCabe's car. Even though he's hanging onto the handle on the inside with all of his strength. He's no match for them. They drag him outside, They punch him, they blindfold him. They toss him into the backseat of their car, and
they demand five thousand dollars. Well, mccab doesn't carry that kind of money. Five grand of those days with a heck of a lot of money. Tells him he has thirty five dollars in a watch. Not good enough, the men say. They pull them out, and they've got baseball bats spiked with roofing nails, and they were beating their crap out of mccab mercilessly. They smashed his head, fractured his skull, broke one of his arms and shattered both of his legs.
They might have killed him, but a farmer happened upon the scene. Elmer Rowley.
Yeah, Elmer Rowley, who's not only a farmer, but he was dean of Joliet Junior College. He drives up, he sees McCabe's body broken, bloody, hears him screaming. Elmer stops his car, gets out the attacker's flee. One of them, though, pull turns around, draws a revolver and fires have shot
at McKay before speeding off. Then Elmer bills to McCabe's side, gets him into the car and drives him to Saint Joseph's Hospital and Joliette, where doctors list McCabe in critical condition and say that he'll be lucky to live the knight. To survive the.
Night, you say, though, the next day, April eighth, nineteen forty eight, McKay does wake up in hospital and survives, and least visit him and he told them the attack was definitely from his political enemies.
Yeah, he says, as Mattabe put it, they sent their dogs after me. There's no doubt about that. But he's just remember he's just hanging on still. He's alive, but just barely. Casts on both of his legs. He's got a cast on his arm and bandages around his head from his fractured skull. He knows. He tells the police right then. He says it was orchestrated by those who feared what would be in the pages of the Spectator when it hit the Juliet's newsstand in a few hours.
But he doesn't really think the cops are going to go after these guys, because he figures more than a few cops and Juliet are on the take, serving the interests of Chicago gangsters left over from the Capone era.
He's also running in the primary in a few days for the GOP Precinct Committee man of the forty sixth district in Juliet.
Yeah, and he's running against the guy by the name of it. I mean, mccab is just an incredible character because he does have he's got this law experience, he's a publisher of a newspaper, and he still finds time to run in the GOP primary against a guy by the name of Alfred Shupp, a man that McCabe had been battling for years, Jack, who claimed to be shocked by the attack that left McCay bedridden. He's the chairman of the Illinois State Central Republican Committees Association and the
incumbent forty six District precinct committeemen. So this is a powerful guy. This is where it gets really complicated because he's McCabe also alleged that he'd been ordered to drop out of the election by someone involved in the slot machine racket, another racket in will County. So was the guy. Were the guys who were after him because of the threat to throw him to get out of the election, or was it because of the Chicago mob they didn't
want him talking about slot machines, tinballs and jukeboxes? Or could it have been something else? See, the police don't know either, and I shouldn't say that the cops might have backed off from this investigation. But there were some good cops on the force, and they'll come up later in the story. But again, mccave is still running for office.
But he looks at Molly. Now, Molly. Remember he was forty two when he hired Molly at the age who was at seventeen, right, And he looks at Molly at his bedside and she'd been at the hospital all night with him. Mccave gives her the instructions, you'll be running the Spectator. So now it's up to her as really the lone voice in Juliet's wilderness now to battle the Chicago mob.
And she's going to be writing the editorials, and she's going to be handling everything, not only as the editor but as the secretary. She has multiple tasks at this Spectator, doesn't.
She she's running the paper? Yeah, she really is. For all intent and purposes, she's the publisher.
Now.
He runs day to day and she runs the overall philosophy of the paper. Although still she's getting her instructions from mccab but he groomed her all the way up, so she knows exactly what to do, and she's on board with mccaby. She's after these gangsters as much, if not more than she was.
Let's just as an opportunity to stop to hear these messages. Now, talking about suspects, the police do round up three men on April eighth, considered suspects from the Chicago area. Tell us about these three characters. Louis Juliani, John Nurcie and Anthony Noriano.
Yeah, these guys were all taken to the Leonard Keeler Crime Lab in Chicago at three forty one East Ohio Street in Chicago. And I've seen pictures of these guys in the newspapers that I used for research on this story, and the cops did not treat these guys gently, okay. Robert reported seeing a car similar to theirs near mccave's Lockport home, and a local tavern keeper saw three men circling his establishment in the same building, so that's what
led the cops to these three. They were hooked up to a light detector machine, a polygraph machine and grilled by lab examiner Alex Gregory. And Gregory concluded that the two men he interviewed first, that would be Louis Giuliani and John Nirschi. They seemed to know the identities of the attackers, but neither of them had actually laid a hand or a club on the cave, so they didn't
have blood on their hands. Okay. The third man, the twenty seven year old from Chicago Heights, Anthony Notoriano, he also took a light detective test and it also told him Gregory the same thing, that he probably knew who did the attack, but he also did not have blood on his hands. So is that right after some intense quote unquote questioning, detectives determined that none of the three
had blood on their hands. Still, they believed they knew who inflicted the beating, but getting them to write out their bosses proved to be an impossible task. And it could be that there were so many layers or buffers between these guys and the people who actually ordered the attack that they really didn't know who had ordered the beating.
You say that that. Meanwhile, McCabe is focusing on his recovery. Molly decides as editor that a reward for information leading to those responsible needed to be offered.
Yeah. Meanwhile, back at the ranch, at the Spectator, Molly decides she's going to do her own. She's going to beat the cops to the punch. And she figures, now, no one's putting up any money, okay as a reward, So if she comes up with two hundred dollars to pay for our as a reward, and she finds a low level criminal thug, a real street guy by the name of the Lloyd Imbray, and he says that he
can tell her. If she'll give him two hundred dollars, he will give her the names of those who attack McCabe. She turns over the two hundred, he hands her an envelope, but as soon as she takes the envelope, embrace smirks and confesses that it was all alive. The names in the envelope are alive. But if she'll give him another one hundred dollars, he'll tell her the real names. Oh,
Molly's not going to put up with that. She may be young, she may be naive, but she goes right to the sheriff's office and files a complaint against Inbray, so they arrest him. But what does Inbray care getting busted? As part of his game, this is what he does. He quickly admits he has absolutely no idea who attacked McCabe, and he says, actually, the names in that envelope I got him out of a magazine. They were just like three names at random that he put together. He was
just trying to flee Smiley. What she did, yea, But of course she got her money back.
You take us to May seventeenth, nineteen forty eight and Judge James B. Bartley, and he has a decision to convene a grand jury of will County in will County and proceed with the investigation into the brutal assault on William McCabe.
Yeah. Now you got to realize. At this point, Cave is saying, I forgive them, you know, I don't want to get into this, but let this go. I'll take care of it, Bartley says. The judge says, h this is my courtroom and not even you William McCabe can control it from a hospital bed. So they do investigate it. There is a grand jury, two broken legs, a shattered
arm or fractured skull. McCabe has no choice now but to watch from the sidelines as the truth is dragged into the light, whether he likes it or not.
So what happens with that dragging these people into the light.
Well, the police and the Sheriff's department, they maintain the assault on McCabe was nothing more than a viol robbery three guys who were after five thousand dollars. The Spectator, though, in editorials written by Molly and probably ghosted by McCabe, say the attacks stemmed from, as they put it, political intrigue because really now he's still up for election, and he loses. He lost that April thirteenth election for a seat on the County Republican Committee to his nemesis Alfred
Shop So again it continues. About nearly a month after the after losing the election, McCabe informs Edward Powers, who's the investigator for Will County's State Attorney's office, that he's ready to move on as far as he's concerned. McCabe says it should be a closed case, even though no one has been identified or arrested. Judge Bartley is not
ready to let it go. They convene a testimony a grand jury rather, and here testimony from one of the real characters in this story, Francis the thin Man Curry. They call him the thin Man because he is a thin man, but he's also kind of a classy guy. Remember the old movie The Thin Man, the series The Thin Man. He looks kind of like that guy. He could play that part in the movies. So they call
him the thin Man. And he is said to be the head of Will County's slot machine racket, and he's a known associate of Paul Rica, a parole Capone era gangster. Now the grand jury testimony is kept secret. Reports indicate, though that Curry offered no substantial information about the McCabe case. McCabe himself denied having an argument with Curry in the days leading up to the attack. Still, the grand jury continued to hear testimony through May, keeping the case alive
against McCabe's wishes. Molly says she has reason to feel optimistic the villains will be brought to justice. Molly, as young and naive. McCabe, however, shakes his head in size. His protoge just doesn't understand. He believes the depths to which the Chicago Syndicate and the politicians they own can sink love to see these behind bars. But he's smart enough to know it's not going to happen. And he's smart enough to know that you never bet more than you can afford to lose.
Yes, you take us to December ninth, nineteen forty eight, and a character named John Irving Pierce, who's fifty five years old.
He takes over. He's the new will County State's Attorney. Okay, the old guy got bounced out. The new guy is in and he sits down to look over the McCabe case and oh no, it's all gone, not a scrap left. Somebody threw all the evidence away. Believe it or not, he just disappeared. It vanished all the evidence. Now, so Pierce has got the problem. He's the first Democrat to hold this position since eighteen seventy six. He took over from James Burke, who launched the grand jury probe into
McCabe's assault. So now he's faced with the situation of trying to investigate this with no evidence at all. It all disappeared. Now Pierce is not younger. Now he's a fifty five year old who clamsy knows the hoodlums running Chicago and expanding into Joliet all too well. He was born in Chicago's Sherman House Hotel. That's where his grandfather
worked as a facility's manager. Now Capone made the Lexington Hotel his headquarters, but it was the Sherman House where Capone on October twenty one, nineteen twenty six, convened a meeting with the city's top gangsters to settle a feud between those controlling crime on the North Side and those running the south Side. So Pierce knew Capone, those who worked for him, and those left standing after the gangster's death, and he wants to drive them out of Will County.
You talk about Pierce John Pierce, but he goes to his former state attorney and says, what's up with this information missing? John James Burke.
Yeah, right, and he says well. Berg says, well, I told Edward G. Foxy Powers Foxy and the chief prosecutor for every Will County state's attorney since nineteen ten. He says, Sureff Foxing cleaned out the files, but they take it back to nineteen ten and they weren't important. That didn't sit well with Pierce. He vowed to call in Burke and Powers, putting them up before a grand jury if necessary, to get to the bottom of the missing files. Burke's
nonchalance was apparent in his response to the threat. I'll be glad to cooperate it with Pierce, Burke says, But all the routina reports are available from the police, the coroner, and the sheriff. The only pertinent thing that might have been dumped were some statements taking during crime investigations. Well, that's just what Pierce wanted. He wanted the statements taken during the McCabe and Kelly investigations. Kelly, of course, the
guy shot down in his driveway. Okay, So now there's nowhere to be found and likely never will As for the grand jury investigation in McCabe's case, it looks like Juliet at this point, we'll never know the truth unless Molly can get to the bottom of this.
Now, say from the beginning that William McCabe had bodyguards to bodyguards, but you talk about that, even with that threat for McCabe, Molly stayed late as an editor at the Spectator, and you take us to September twenty fifth, nineteen fifty seven.
Yeah, nineteen fifty seven, September twenty fifth. You got to remember that. Now, this is a weekly paper. And I kind of grew up in radio, okay, where if you made a mistake, it only had to be you could look with a mistake because fifteen minutes later you'd had another newscast and you could correct it, Okay, But in a weekly newspaper, if you get it wrong, it's going to be wrong until next Thursday. So Molly worked late proofing this edition of the paper that would go out
the next day. She worked until eleven thirty at night, the night of September twenty five, nineteen fifty seven. That's the Spectator. Her office was by the way, about thirty five miles southwest of Chicago. She always worked long hours. She held forty eight percent of the company stocks, so she was more than just a worker bee. She more than just the anointed publisher and the queen of the hive. Had skin in the game now, So she was there
until eleven thirty. Finally, about eleven thirty pm, the other employees are all in there, still putting the final touches on the paper. But she's satisfied that her work is done, and she goes out to her car, waves goodbye and says see you tomorrow, see you later.
What was the last editorial's focus? You write about targeting the pinball machine perpetrators. So tell us just what was going to be in the press and what was in the press just before we talk about this disappearance.
Yeah, she was after jukeboxes, she was after slot machines, but also after pinballs. Pinball machines they called them pinballs, and pinballs back in those days were seen as really scary technology. People were there. There were stories all over the country about newspaper boys who lost all of their nickels playing pinball machines. There were men fathers who lost the monthly mortgage payment playing pinball machines. It was just there was so many. This is a day of black
and a white TV if they had a TV. Okay, this was full of color, pinball machines, loud noise, music, no, no, no, no no. People were just fascinated by these pinball machines. And they were dropping nickels, nickels, nickels, over and over, and of course the nichols all went to the mob. The only thing you wanted one of these pinball machines was a free game. But it was just like so intoxicated, so addicting that people really wanted the pinball machines out.
And Molly and McKay were leading a political effort to ban pinball machines from will County. So there was that too. And after she looked now shortly after eleven pm, she left the office at eleven thirty. Shortly after eleven PM, a phone in McCabe's office, where Molly had set up shop, started ringing. Yes, she did not answer it. The staff member looks up and says, Molly, your phone is ringing. Molly says, I know it. I know who it is,
and I don't want to talk to him. Finally, thirty minutes later, she leaves, and the newspaper is ready to be put to bed, and she's ready to go to bed. That phone, by the way, is going to be very important later in this story. It is something on you. It has something unusual back in these days. It has an onlisted number, and Molly had it put in there. So that phone is going to be real interesting later on in this story. But the phone rings, Molly says, I know who it is. I don't want to talk
to him. She leaves, She gets into her car and drives off.
Now tell us what she is dressed like, and tell us the jewelry that she has on at that time.
Yeah. Now, Molly doesn't make much money at all, okay, and I don't have it right in front of you how much she made. But she does not make enough to afford all of this. I'm telling you what. Molly stands on the sidewalk and Broat's visible in the cool air. She carried an of a lob style purse and wore a small black hat on the back of her head, along with a gray a dark gray suit and a figured white blouse and patent leather pumps. But that's just
the beginning. Molly also wore a one thousand dollars diamond ring. This is one thousand dollars in nineteen fifty seven money, okay. She wore a one thousand dollar diamond ring and a bracelet set with thirty diamonds valued at five thousand dollars.
She got into her car and but she went for a drink. She went to a tavern. What did what was reported or what you write happened at that tavern? Other than that drink, we should say too.
It was a fifty five Chrysler chrome trim. I mean, there's no way she could afford all this, but somehow she had it. Yeah. She goes into this tavern neon beer sign outside. I mean, it was just typical nineteen fifty seven stuff. There's some music inside. She opens the door. Nobody pays much attention to her. She makes your way to a corner booth, has a drink, quick sip, walk
to the telephone, glances over her shoulder. To make no, make sure no one's watching, dials a number that she's obviously memorized, and speaks in a hushed whisper to whoever answers, and then finishes her drink, tips the bartender, and heads for the door. She looks down the empty street, slides back behind the wheel of that nineteen fifty five Chrysler, and pulls away, heading for home.
You write that sometime after midnight, Missus Paul Petropolis and missus John Green heard a woman's screaming.
Yeah. The two ladies lived in apartments on the first floor of a building at four point thirteen Buele Street. It's an avenue flanked by tall elm trees, large shrubs and bushes. It's the building that Molly lives in. Her home is on the second floor. Now, Missus Paul Petropolis and I loved the newspapers. They hardly ever put the first name of the woman in there. It's always the first name of the husband, right, which tells you a lot about life in nineteen fifty five through fifty seven.
But anyway, so Missus Petropolis and this is Green. They hear someone screaming, other neighbors hear it. They all go to the windows to listen. They hear a woman cry out, oh no no, then silence. A few more seconds tick by neighbors hear more screams in silence, and then more screams. Did they call police?
No? No?
Why? Because crying out in alarm for no good reason had become a game for all the teenagers running up and down Vuell Street. They did always around midnight, so they figured it was just kids playing around with them. Again, the neighbors go back to bed, They turn off their lights, and they all go to bed.
You take us next day. September twenty sixth, nineteen fifty seven, US District Attorney John B. Starter Junior calling for a crackdown on pinball machines used for gambling.
Yeah, this is where we're you know, this is an idea. This you know what I was leading up to with the pinball machine. Mean, this is how serious they saw it. A federal official. US District Attorney John B. Stoddard Junior on Leasha's a war, if you will against pinball machines. He finds nine gambling type pinball machines that were confiscated for failure to have a federal tax stamp. In Peoria, Bloomington,
and Collinsville, Illinois disagreeing with it. Now, there were Illinois Supreme Court ruling to judge that are decided the pinball machines were not gambling devices, but Stoddard said that by their very nature, pinball machines are nothing but gambling devices and as a result, are illegal. So he goes out after these games, saying that the free game that you win is actually subterfuge for the slot machine payoff. And it was not only him that wanted to go after
in the Chicago Crime Commission. Virgil Peterson, the director of the Chicago Crime Commission, wanted to go after them as well.
Let's use this as an opportunity to stop to hear these messages talk about the Spectator's fight against pinball machines as part of the paper's crusade against gambling. We mentioned that. But now it's September twenty seventh, nineteen fifty seven. Molly didn't show up for work on Thursday or Friday. So now what is the reaction from her friends at work or co workers? And what did the police do?
Now this is there's nothing on. You would think that this would send off alarms well, the first thing they do, obviously is called the police that Molly hasn't shown up for a couple of days. So they go to Molly's house, and outside of Molly's apartment of building, rather outside her apartment building, they discover that nineteen fifty five Chrysler parked at the curb. They find Molly's car, cheese under the vehicle's front seat, and a neighbor comes outside to tell
police that's where Molly always put her cheese. So nothing seems unusual. Now. The police officer that the neighbor is speaking to is the only police detective, Captain John Dylon. He is going to lead the investigation. He is leading the investigation, I should say. So, they find your car, they find your keys, nothing unusual. But then at the rear of the car something ominous. They spot signs of a struggle, like Molly had been fighting for her life. They also find and this is key, they find a
pair of Molly's shoes. One shoe is on the cars trunk, the other is on the ground. Now that shoes are important because a friend had said Molly told her once that if she was ever attacked like mcab had been attacked, she would kick off her shoes and run away barefoot. Could that be what happened? Is this her signal that you know her breadcrumbs if you will, her shoes? Is that her signal that she was being attacked and she had a run off. Did she get away? We don't
know yet. Another friend, though, tells Dylan that Molly can fight it in her several months ago that she was deathly afraid something might happen to her because of the truth eight against the pinball machines. So the police go up to the second floor Molly's apartment. They knock on the door, pay her hard, They call it to Molly. No response, so they break it down and go inside. There's no sign of molli, no indication that she'd swept in that bed or even been in the apartment since
leaving for work on Wednesday morning. There's nothing of Molly but her car outside and her shoes. Where could she be? We don't know. They don't know where she is. Then the next day, on Saturday, the phone rings inside her sister's home. Molly's sister on the line, a caller who sounds like an older man with a warning. He says, if you want to find Molly. You'd better be a good swimmer.
Molly's sister is offully obviously shocked at this phone call, and her and her husband called police and Joliet police, and you write, and two FBI agents assigned to the case start searching and taking that message for literally and start searching for water fill quarries and also tell us about the extent of the search for Molly afterwards.
Yeah, they searched for fifty water filled quarries, is what they do in the banks of the Displains River as well. They put everything they've got into it. They've got helicopters, they have everything. But they find nothing. But here's something you have to remember. They can't be sure that Molly was abducted. They don't know that she was abducted because years ago Molly vanished for two weeks before reappearing in Colorado. So she's not taking a surprise vacation. Is not out
of the ordinary. But McKay told her our told police rather that story was bumped. Well, it was true that Molly went to Colorado seven years ago. He said, there was nothing mysterious about it. McCabe says he went to Colorado with Molly and a female friend and it was nothing but a vacation. Now he is convinced that she did not go off alone this time. McCabe is convinced that Molly, and his words, has been the victim of hoodlums.
But you got to remember Molly was also seen as a dark, intense woman by her colleagues, And that's a quote. They say, she worked long hours and even went to a hospital to get a break from the spectator, and they wonder why would gangsters be after Molly. It's true McKay was beaten nearly to death and they got money out of his walling or anything. But no one people are saying, you can't really be sure that Molly was the target of gangsters. Maybe she was the victim of
a robbery. She had all that jewelry on her, and it was well known that she had even more jewelry locked up in a bent vault, including a seventeen and a half carrot yellow Brazilian diamond wren. So perhaps they were just after her jewelry.
Yeah, you say that Captain Dylan decides Molly's wages, just doing that up you had said about meager wages with six hundred dollars a month. You write, so seventy two hundred per year over ten years. But she had a closet full of fine clothes and expensive jewelry. And like you say, that thirty seven thousand dollars ring in a bank vault. Now, who said that they had sold that? Interestingly? Had sold that ring to her for five thousand dollars.
Yeah, that was a friend of her. Now, this diamond ring was said to be big as a doorknob in the papers back then. It was locked in a bank vault. She wore to Governor William Stratton's inauguration in Springfield, then put it in the bank vault. Her, a friend of her, says she sold it to her for five thousand dollars, but never really explained where she got it from or why she was able to sell that big rock for five thousand dollars.
Now, tell us about Molly's One of her brothers named Edward. He stopped in her office the first day she didn't show up for work. What did he tell the secretary?
Yeah? He goes through the secretary, Charlotte French. She says, look for a package of letters and documents wrapped in a pink ribbon. Well, Charlotte says, so far, nothing like that has come into the office, and he tells her the twenty seven year old secretary. He says, well, when it does come in, make sure you destroy it immediately, because that's what Molly would have wanted. And when Dylan hears this story, captain villain, he says, now that's interesting. Now.
So there are so many little subterfusions and links in this story. It's just an incredible story to tell.
Tell us about the search of the safe deposit box that McCabe says, and he's there to open it up. He says, it hasn't been opened by him for four years since they had rented it.
Yeah, nobody knows what's in this box. Molly and McCabe had rented this together in nineteen fifty three. This again shows you how a toure winked. And so this is kind of like tried to open Capone's vault on TV. You know, you have no idea what's going to be in there, but you want to open it up to see what's in there. So Dylan or McCabe's there, he turns the key, pops the top off the box. Dylan
pushes ahead of everyone. He gets into the box and he finds a trust agreement and interesting data that showed Ally's career trajectory. It's the newspaper how She rose. There's a trust agreement between McCabe and Molly and shows her pick taking over the paper eventually. But it also shows her income too, a dividend in from of twenty four hundred and seventy five dollars from the Spectator stock in nineteen forty seven. That was part of her six thousand
dollars income. The following year she had another sixteen hundred in dividends part of income of fifty two hundred. So you know, again there's not a whole lot of money coming in from normal venues or normal revenue streams. And it does also show that the Spectator is essentially worthless or it's losing money, but McCabe says, no, that isn't true either. So you know, there's all this question about money. Where's all this money coming from that Molly evidently had.
Let's talk about al Pohler. You talk about that he had some information he gave to McCabe but denied it to Captain Dillon. Tell us about this information.
Yeah, Pohlar. McCabe says, Polar came al. Pohler is one of the interesting characters in this story too, local businessman and Joliet. He goes into McCabe. He goes to McCabe and Polls says, Pohler's knows something about Molly's disappearance. But Pohler's told McCabe that Molly's okay. He knows that she's all right. But at the same time he asked McCabe not to tell a soul about that conversation. Polers denies it.
He says, I only went to the paper to console McCabe, and he refutes the story the publisher had anything that he told Molly. So I told the publisher anything about Mollie, but nobody. Somebody's not telling the truth here.
You also write about hers calling this Auto Weber and what she has to say to him regarding him running for political office.
Yeah, she calls Auto Weber. Now again, she's really getting involved in politics here, and this is such an intricate web of politics and Julia Illinois back in these days are according to Otto, she called well, she called Otto Weber at the Weber Dairy Company and told him to get out of the race, not to run for office. She didn't talk to him. She spoke to his brother John, So we're getting this second hand from John. He wanted to know what Otto was doing in the race. I
have no background for the job. She didn't think I should be running, Otto says. She wanted to scare me so I wouldn't run. And she told him he couldn't afford the banned publicity that would be generated by this, but the Spectator would generate. So again she's really getting intricately involved in politics. More twist turns and puzzle pieces and the disappearance of Malizelco and Captain Dylan is finding out about all of this and trying to put it all together.
He also she believes that he has some connection to gangster Francis Curry. And again Francis Curry has been associated with the three thugs that got away with beating McCabe.
Yeah, the thin Man, right, And now she really ticked him off because she Francis had the thin Man had a party at his house, a very respectable party, and Molly though blasted it in the Spectator, and so he was upset with her because of that. As well, so, yeah, there's a whole lot going on to the story.
Now you talk. Take us to October fourth, nineteen fifty seven, and Henry C. Peterson doesn't believe that Molly was alive. He's the chairman of the will County Republican Party, and he went right to the press. Tell us what he says.
Yeah, he found a reporter and he told him that Molly told him that she feared for her life back in June, and she was very specific. Molly was deathly afraid. Peterson said that someone was going to attach a bomb to her tire starter and blow her the kingdom. Come now. Peterson couldn't imagine why anyone would want to do that, and he doubted that it would happen. But one of Molly's dearest friends of missus, Alice Bergan of Chicago, came
up at that point and backed up Molly's fears. And Alice told the story of two men following her and Molly to the newspaper woman's office and parking close enough to the newspaper's building to watch the front door. Now she and Molly, Alice and Molly are in the office. They're crouching below an office window only their eyes are above the window sill. They're watching that car on these guys. And while they're being watched, the two women watch the
men who followed them. So, staying below the windows, Molly and Alice sneak out of the building's back door and scramble off to Molly's car. They drive quickly to Peterson's home. Molly watched the road at the same time Alice kept the eye out the car's rear window, ensuring that nobody was tailing them. So that was really I mean, it's
like out of a movie what they were doing. Can you imagine these women like, you know, crab walking their way or duck walking their way out of this building in their high heels and dresses, and that's how they were dressed at the time. And they go to Peterson's house and they tell him about this, you know, the Molly's convinced that she is going to be told by these guys. He tells her that maybe you ought to get stop working in the office late at night and get yourself some protection.
This Captain Dillan, you write, he has three theories on the case. But at the same time you take us to October ninth, nineteen fifty seven, McCabe goes over the heads of Captain Dylan and other local cops when he sent a special request to who J.
Edgar Hoover at the FBI. He sends him a letter via airmail special delivery saying that he should get the FBI involved in this case due to the underlying gangster and criminal background in this county. I am fearful that she has been kidnapped. That's what McCabe wrote in the letter to Lodge A.
Edgar. Now, the FBI get involved if there is evidence of kidnapping. So he's hoping that he can convey them that there is sufficient evidence of kidnapping, but so far that there is none from law enforcement any evidence of that.
Right, And remember this is back in Jay Edgar's day when he was really trying to downplay the idea that there was a mob or a syndicator, any kind of coordinated criminals in America. So he obviously did not want He was all about communists back in those days, so he obviously did not want to get involved in this, and he refused to get involved in this. As a matter of fact, the FBI sent some people out back when we had the rumor that Molly would be in
one of the quarries or the river. They did send some FBI agents out then, but they did nothing more than function as observers. They really didn't get involved.
That sessus has an opportunity to stop to hear these messages. Now they discover police discovered that there was some specific investigation by Molly at the Spectator government paving contracts involving Alfred Shuck and Edward Walsh. Tell us the significance of this.
These paving contracts she got into. This is an example of how a weekly newspaper back in that day really got into being an investigative newspaper. She was really she got into some paving contracts here and totally three point four million dollars for the plant, another one point four
million for a sledge digestion and sewage disposal plant. The bonds were sold to a Chicago brokerage from an April fifty five and because of Molly's work on this investigation, Joliet really responded in outrage and said that those bonds should have been sold locally and not to Chicago. So again Molly is really upsetting some connected business people who
are connected to the mob. This is another reason that he thinks that Dylan and his team think that Molly might have gotten herself into a lot of trouble.
Here, you said that Captain Dillon's team makes it discovery that opens new doors in Molly's investigation. Finally, and we go back to when you mentioned the phone that police find, but you call it a sea Molly's secret phone with his own private phone in her office that you shared with McCabe, unlisted installed July second, nineteen fifty seven. Tell us about the discovery of the two calls that she made.
Yeah, this was a private unlisted she had it put in. And so what they do. They discover that Molly had used the phone to make two intriguing toll calls on July twenty second and July thirtieth, nineteen fifty seven. The first call on July twenty second was made of three fifty seven in the afternoon to an unlisted number the Draanga phone in a construction field office of the S. N. Nielsen in Company. It was located in the yard of the Interlake Iron Corporation on South Burley Avenue, where the
Nielsen Company was doing some work. The call only lasted a minute. Now, who could Molly have been talking to you for sixty seconds? And how did she get that on listed number? Well, Julius Brand, who's the construction superintendent for Nielsen and Company, said he was as mystified as the investigators. He maintained he didn't pick up the phone if it rang, and he's been unable to find anyone
who answered Molly's call. Even without knowing who answered the phone and spoke with Molly for a minute, this phone call opens up a new window into the underbelly of Jolliet politics and the unsavory characters involved in the city's government. Now, this is where it gets really interesting. And I don't know if we have time to go into all of this, but there a lot of bells are ringing and lights are flashing at the end with Dylan's team because everything
is so connected now. The second call who went out from Molly's phone was even more perplexing. It went to a number Dearborn two ninety six fourteen. That's another on listed phone, and it's in a booth inside the Black Hawk restaurant and one thirty nine North Wabash Avenue in Chicago.
This call lasts eleven minutes, much longer than the call of the construction company field office, and even more mysterious because nobody knows who was in that restaurant booth at precisely that time talking to Molly for precisely eleven minutes. But Molly must have known who would answer. That means she knew who was going to be in the booth at that time. How would she know that? And that number is unlisted, so someone using that booth must have
called her first and gave her the number. It's possible, even likely, that someone sitting in that booth called the newspaper switchboard and got Molly on a regular office phone. She could have told the unknown caller to hang up, and she'd called back from her unlisted number. At least that's what the cops are thinking. Dylan's people are thinking now, But they still have no idea why Molly called the construction site. They have no idea why or who she
called at the restaurant. New puzzle pieces in this mystery. It's like puzzle pieces scattered all around your kitchen tables and you're still trying to figure out how to put them together. And we still at this point don't know if Molly is dead or alive. She could be alive. We don't know.
You're right though, that after Molly's disappearance, gangsters, all of them were in a real good mood. But the rumor was that she was killed the knight of her disappearance and the body dumped and abandoned coal mines near Coal City, Illinois. So there was a search. He was a search. Then you say, of fifty of these mines and there was planes involved and volunteers on the ground. Then you take
us to again Frank Curry, king pin of gambling. You right, what happens in Joliet regarding pinball machines in nineteen fifty five.
Yeah, the Jolie of City council legalized pinballs in nineteen fifty five, but mcab and Molly supported a guy by the name of William H. Wilson for city council and he was against pinballs. His vote on the seven member handel in May shot down the ordinance permitting pinballs. As a result, will County officials were inspired to promise to follow suit and shut down pinballs, a major revenue stream for the underworld and Juliet and Chicago.
So you talk about some of the people, the up and comers, the John Provenzano and others that came up after Capone's death, and what Molly Zelco represented to those people as well.
Yeah, now, yeah, she Molly was a real threat to them. And these were the new food chain. Now, Sam Mooney g and Connor we all know who he is now, but he was just an up and comer at that point. We also had John Provenzano, Frank Murro, Frank Laporte, William Willie Potatoes to Donno, and of course Al Capone, the founder of all of this. Now, after Capone died, these new young guys took over. They were ambitious. They were the young bloods, you know, they were not the old gangsters.
They were the young bloods, and they were breaking Dylan found all the old mob rules and writing new ways of doing business. And one of the old rules was you didn't kill reporters. Okay, reporters could be as much on your side as against you. You did not kill reporters. But these new young guys, they didn't see it that way at all. They went after reporters. As one gangster said, Zelko, Molli Zelko went into the pit so may others If Zelko went into the pit, so may others if they
get in our way. So, in other words, if Molly was killed, that her death, her murder might have been as a warning to other reporters to stay out of the mob's way.
You're right that a former undercover investigator, Angus Jost, traveled from his home in Toronto to show Joliette Police Chief Trisna a note from Molly. What'd that note say?
Yeah, she wrote the note in nineteen fifty three. Everything since that night, the night of mccave's beating, Everything since that night seems terrifying, And not one day since can I say it's been a happy one. Everything in life seems to center around that night, and each day brings more sorrow and grief because of that night. Then, in the following paragraph, she writes it being close to identifying the Aide's attackers, who he claimed were all hired by
the thin man Francis Curry. So the letter supplied by Jose gave police one more piece to the puzzle of her disappearance. But again, it's not proof positive that the mobsteries were responsible for Molli's disappearance, or even that she was kidnapped. We still have no idea what happened.
You're right that October seventeenth, nineteen fifty seven, police give a have a suspect, Clifford Swearringer, and they give him a polygraph. What's the result, and as well, what's the result of him being considered a suspect in a.
Word, inconclusive. We don't know that he's innocent, we don't know that he's guilty. But it's just one more disappointment. I tell you what. Captain Dylon is one of the most after these people, like a pitbull. I mean, he just doesn't give up. But it's just one more disappointment for him. It comes out he's an next con Clifford Sweaeringer. It comes out as inconclusive.
Circumstantially, he did live next door to Mali for ten months. He was paroled in nineteen forty seven. Low level thug.
But other than that, yeah, other than that, there's nothing that would lead you to believe that he was involved. They were just hoping, you know, pushing a prayer.
What happens. August fourteenth, nineteen fifty eight. Regarding William McCabe.
Well, I'm sorry he died August fourteenth, nineteen fifty eight. William McCabe is dead. He passes away. He passed away yesterday the thirteenth at Saint Joseph's Hospital. It was listed as natural causes, but really it was the beating he suffered more than ten years ago, the guys that got him in his car. He never really full of from that. He never went back to the office full time or even part time. So he was you know, he's dead.
The cave is gone. Molly is still listed, is missing, and she's believed dead for the most part.
And it take us to November nineteen fifty eight. There's absolutely no evidence, but now a confession.
Yeah, here we go. Now this involves the Senate Select Committee on Improper Activities in the Labor or Management Field, better known as the Senate Rackets Committee. And guess you there, General Counsel dates none other than Robert Kennedy, who of course would be senator, would be a Senator and then would become a presidential candidate tragically gunned down. This is when Kennedy is going after James Hoffe back in those days.
He's going after the mob one of the mobsters. He's going after is a low level dog by the name of James Rennie who has one of the best nicknames in mob history, James the Green Hornet Rennie. Right, and
ask me why he was called the green Hornet. Okay, I'll tell you because James Rennie was a second story man and a witness sees him coming out of a second story apartment window and said he was as smooth and athletic as the green hornet that I hear about on the radio, so they called him the Green Hornet. So now he's behind bared at Stateonville Prison in Illinois doing ten to fourteen for burglary robbery and using terrorist activities to support his superiors like Giancanna and Capone and
Rennie who was he says. He goes to Kennedy and he says, look, I know who got Molly Zelto. He killed her. James Rennie confesses to kidnapping and killing Molly Zelto. He tells the whole story.
You say that the couple FBI agents that spoke to him asked him some specific questions and they noticed some discrepancies, you know.
He said that he was given the job by William Willie Potatoes to Donno and at that time. The donna was a tough guy's tough guy, and he offers him three thousand dollars, he said, for the job. But then there are other things that you know, for instance, the shoes on the ground. Renney says that Molly was wearing her shoes when they threw her into the car that they took her a land. Rindy says, yeah, of course they wouldn't leave obvious evidence behind she had her shoes
on her feet. But no, of course, the shoes were found near the scene of her abduction, one on the trunk of her Cadillac, on the other nearby. They also warn the cops, you know, Riddy warned Robert Kennedy that he's a two bit hood, nothing but a two bit hood, and he cannot be trusted.
Now, he talks about the meetings with these gangsters to solidify his story to people like Kennedy and this machine. So what does he tell him about these meetings and why is he assigned to kill Mollie?
Yeah, I said he was. Willie Potatoes gave him the job. He offers it on three thousand dollar contract for the kid. He says he didn't know yet who the target was, he told her return to the hotel at seven pm to learn more. When he goes back, he meets two other men, Sam Speary and one of Sam g and Connor's relatives, who Rennie refused to name. The third man. Now, they get into a Ford Sedan drive to juliet with Rinnie at the wheel. They park outside of the apartment
building at four thirteen. They see Molly drive up. They grab her, they take her away. She fights, and they drive her off somewhere north of Juliette.
And you say that, they shoot her in the head and bury her in a already dug grave and cover it with quicklimee.
Yeah, they throw her in the grave. They go to a farm. They find the grave already dug. The hole was waiting for them. It's a farm. They go to the farm, they throw the body in, they cover it up quicklimee on top to of course, you know, to grade the body. And they take off. And that's that. You know, it's as simple as that. It was not any big, not any big conspiracy, not any you know, it was a very simple murderer. You kill her, you grab her, you killer, you thrower in the hole that's
waiting for you. You bury her and you drive off, as simple as that.
You write that the Senate investigators can't believe they're good luck with this confession, with people like the FBI noting discrepancies. Robert Kennedy and McShane are eager to go with Reenie and find this body that he's said he's testified that he has buried himself.
Yeah, Kennedy. Robert Kennedy and Jim McShane, one of the committee's top investigators on the Racket Committee. They go to Chicago. They pick up Rennie before dawn at Stateville Prison, put him into a car, and they go out to a farm where he says the burial site is so Then Kennedy and McShane and several guards, I mean Kennedy had a pickaxe, Shane McShane had a shovel, and they start digging in the frosty ground. Well guests. Who shows up The guy who owns the farm, Mike Covid. He comes
outside and says, hey, what are you guys doing? Who are you guys, and what are you doing well. Kennedy did not want to say that he was with the federal government and the General Counsel of the Rockets Committee. So he and McShane tell Covid that they work with the state of Illinois and they're searching for precious medals. Of course, why wouldn't they be doing that early in the morning in November, So Covid he can't believe it. He goes back into his house, sits down with another
cup of coffee, and they keep digging outside. Finally, around lunchtime, they give up. There's nothing there. They're deep, They're six seven feet deep, nobody not even the signs of a grade. They admit defeat. They've got nothing but dirt under their fingernails and blisters on their hands. And Rennie smiling his return to prison. We just picked the wrong spot, he tells Kennedy Momley Bill goes out there somewhere. I'll help you find her. Now, doesn't read. He sound like he's
having a great time. He gets out of prison, he gets to you know, watch these guys did and they can't find anything.
Now to Leep lend credence to the story being false completely, he has to explain how he did it and why he went to this extraordinary efforts to tell this lie.
Because he had to tell them something, you know, he was being drilled on a lot of things, and this is like in the Godfather. This is just like a Godfather too. When they bring the gangster up before the Senate panel, he sees his brother come in, so he doesn't want you to declare that Michael Corleone is the gangster. He says, I had to tell the FBI something. And then basically is what James rennies is. He said, I
had to tell the FBI something. They wanted something. They kept asking me a lot of foolish questions, so I gave them a bunch of foolish answers. That's what he says. He's a small gangster. It looks like he could be a horse racing jockey more than a gangster. I finally told them, he said what I figured. I finally told Kennedy what I figured he wanted to hear, and so there you go. So he pulled a scam on Robert Kennedy.
I brought up the Zellko thing. He says. I figured, if McShane and Kennedy got three to got me three to five off of this. So he figures they'll do him a favorite too. He figures if he leaves them to me makes them believe the Zell Coo thing, he can shave like three to five years off his sentence. So I figured if McShane and Kennedy got me three to five years off, I'd be ahead before they found out my confession was alive.
Very interesting. When he was asked how he was not afraid of repercussions by dropping all of these fearful mafia names.
Oh yeah, he said. Yeah. I figured I threw a lot of big names at him, they'd eat it up even more. Hell, I never bring them saw Willi Potatoes in my life. They were counting me. I was counting them. And was he Should he be afraid of Willie Potatoes and these other guys and really lasts, he says, Nah, they all know I'm crazy.
Yeah, absolutely, Now you write that. September twenty eighth, nineteen sixty four. Finally, Molly Zelko is declared dead Circuit Court judge.
Yeah, Molly's Elko is declared dead. September twenty eighth, nineteen sixty four. No, her body has not been found. You know, nobody has come forth with an explanation of what happened to her. It's likely that nobody ever will. But Molly's Elko is declared dead. It's been seven years now, and that's it. The mystery's over. Well, the mystery continues, but you know, she's declared dead.
Investigation over what happens to the Spectator newspaper.
The Spectator newspaper is taken over by McCabe's daughters. They don't do well with it, They sell it and the company that bought it they go broke, and it's just closed down. It's just shut down. It goes in journalism history. I guess you could say.
Now officially, what did law enforcement say likely has happened to Molly?
Well, they hadn't had a solid lead in five years, they've been exhausted. Everything. Nobody really knows. But Joey at Police Sargeant Archie Kerr, who we kind of took over this investigation, says, all I can say is that now she's legally dead. They do believe that, you know, in their heart of hearts, they believe she was kidnapped and murdered, but beyond that they can't prove it. They have no idea. All they can say is that she's now legally dead. Now.
I was very curious after I read this, what did they make of all the fine clothes and this budget that she couldn't have couldn't have possibly had with the money she earned at the spectator? What could explain all this jewelry? What could explain all of this money? And also is there a possibility I think, is there a possibility that she was involved in some chicanery herself to explain these funds that mysteriously she had. But also, of course I believe that the crusade against Francis Curry and
people specifically involved in pinball machine operations were responsible. But is there a possibility that she was also involved in some chicanery herself?
I don't think you can doubt that. I mean, how else would she come up with this? And I mean her friend Alice, the one that she drove away with, you know, being chased by the bad guys. Alice is the one who gave her that thirty seven thousand dollars diamond for five thousand dollars, And she won't explain except she just said personal reasons. So she had to be connected. I don't see how you could live in Joliet back in those days without being connected in some way or another.
And how do you explain the relationship with McCabe and Molly. Would McCabe be not immune to some sort of chicanery as well? And then could you see the murders or the attempted murder of McCabe certainly would have been a murder, you right, and Molly herself the murder certainly that was part of the ultimate insult in terms of targeting Francis Curry. But also that they were hypocrites.
Maybe, yeah, you know, that could be. That could be. I have no idea. I didn't think about it like that. You know, there's a lot of stuff going on there. You just know there is, I mean, and then there's McCabe and Molly's relationship too. He signs her on at
the age of seventeen when he's forty two. Now we didn't cover this, but there was a time too when he was hospitalized for an illness and she got a hospital room right across the hall, right across the hall from him, and she was there every night, and they said that she had the flu.
Interesting, So what does your take on why she was killed? What is your conclusion?
Agree with what her brother said, doctor Zelke, her brother, the dentist. He said she was a courageous newspaper woman. We tried to warn her to take it easy, but she had so much nerve. And with a sigh, he added, I think she stuck her neck out too much. I guess in the end it was just too far. And I think that, you know, when you talk about the diamond jewelries and jewelry and whatnot, maybe she accepted those as gifts. You could call them bribes, but maybe she
accepted those as gifts. You know, she was an attractive woman, She was very attractive. She was like a special person. Maybe they were gifts. I don't know. I don't know, but I think in the end, she was just a newspaper woman who stuck her neck out too far and misjudged the quality of the people that she was attacking.
Now we haven't mentioned this, but other than the Spectator itself, how was her story treated in other press?
Oh? Yeah, now, you know, when I looked at the Chicago Tribune, for instance, the Daily Tribune, it was known as at that point she was all over the front pages. And you know, you didn't write Molly Zelko in the headline. All they did was mal All they wrote was Mollie. If they put Molly in the headline. People were reading it and this was news all over northern Illinois and it really became national news too.
I want to thank you very much, Rod for coming on and talking about your latest true crime book, Murder Molly and the Mob. Shocking true crime story for those that might want to take a look at the other works and this book, Murder Molly and the Mob. Can you tell us about a website?
Yeah, Rodcackley dot com is a great way to go. Or simply go to Amazon dot com and my author page. You'll find it there. Yeah, either way you can read more.
Thank you so much, Rod Cackley or Murder Molly and the Mob. You have a great evening and good night.