Harry Madigan, the Mobster?

Bill Sullivan found a contemporary video of 5615 W. Roosevelt Road, Cicero, the building where Harry Madigan ran his saloon in 1926 and the site where Assistant States Attorney William McSwiggin was assassinated.  Although the building looks a little different from the newspaper photo of it in 1926, the Cook County Assessor's website notes the building at 5615 W. Roosevelt Road is 96 years old.  So, it must be the same.  Thanks Bill for finding this.



Included on the You Tube webpage below the above video, the following comment was included:

"Assistant States Attorney William McSwiggin had two sides to him and it ended up costing him his life. By day he was known as a hanging prosecutor who tried to bring Al Capone to justice. By night he was a card player, drinker and all around bon vivant who traveled in the same social settings as the men he prosecuted. It was late spring in 1926 when he was out for a night of carousing in Cicero with some friends. Along the way the hooked up with the O'Donnell brothers who were well known north side gangsters who were at odds with Al Capone. Al Capone got word that his enemies were out and about in his town he dispatched gunmen to take them out. They caught up with the group at the Pony Inn on Roosevelt Rd. just west of Central. The Pony was a Capone controlled speakeasy that was run by an Irish mobster named Harry Madigan. Madigan was a member of the renowned Irish gang Reagan's Colt's. He would later go to jail for kidnapping and extortion. Anyway the gunmen raked the group with machine gun fire as they left the club. Three were killed including McSwiggin the O'Donnell brothers escaped unscathed. Here we present the Pony as it looks today a nondescript place called Sarno's. Maybe it's just a coincidence or perhaps things haven't changed much. Last year Cicero crime boss Michael Sarno was sentenced to prison in a case that involved extortion, illegal gambling, police corruption and a bombing. The more things change?"

Source:  ChiTownView's Channel, YouTube

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However, in The Illinois Crime Survey published by the Illinois Association for Criminal Justice in cooperation with The Chicago Crime Commission, 1929 (Blakely Printing Company, Chicago) Chapter XXIV, "The Gangster and the Politician," Section 9, "Same: Election Violence," page 1005 it reads:

"Ragen members could be secured to do "stong arm" work in the elections in other districts as well as the stockyards area.  Hugh McGovern with John and Harry Madigan and John O'Brien kidnapped a Cicero clerk of election by the name of Joseph Rice and held him prisoner in a West Harrison Street saloon.  The plaintiff charged kidnapping and assault to kill.  The history of the trial of these four men is an interesting sidelight on the administration of the law.  True bills were voted by the April grand jury in 1924.  The case did not come up for trial until June, 1926.  Critics of State's Attorney Crowe, who was elected in the primaries of 1924 when so much violence was used in the elections, accused him of purposely shelving this case along with others that grew out of the 1924 elections.  Just before the case was due to come to trial a new assistant prosecutor was assigned to it, in place of the one who had been familiar with the case from its inception.  The men were acquitted of the charge although the defense had offered no closing argument and the assistant prosecuting attorney in charge had made only a brief summary of the case for the state.  The prosecuting witness, who had positively identified his assailants as McGovern, the Madigan Brothers, and O'Brien two years before, refused in 1926 to say that these four were the kidnappers, and it was generally understood that it was for fear of his life."

So, although there seems pretty good evidence the Madigan brothers might have been guilty of kidnapping and extortion, the record of The Illinois Crime Survey indicates the men were acquitted.  Also, to my knowledge, Harry Madigan was never "convicted" and sentenced to jail.

A little earlier in The Illinois Crime Survey, Chapter XVII, "The McSwiggin Assasination as a Typical Incident," Section 6, "The Federal Grand Jury Indicts Capone and the O'Donnells," page 836-837, it reads:

"While State's Attorney Crowe's grand jury was in session, primarily to consider the solution of the McSwiggin mystery, a Federal Grand Jury was busy investigating prohibition violations, with possible bearing on the murders of Duffy, Doherty and McSwiggin.  United States District Attorney Edwin A. Olson, in charge of this Federal Grand Jury, was of the Deneen faction.  Chief Svoboda, of the Cicero police, and Joseph Klenha, president of the village board, were summoned to appear.

"Federal agents had seized a stock of beer samples stored in the basement of the Cicero City Hall.  It had been reported that immediately after the triple slaying, Cicero policemen had visited every saloon in the village and collected beer samples.  According to the information given the Government on May 22, the police had told the saloon owners:

   " 'There is going to be a big investigation.  Don't tell anybody anything.  If you open your faces these samples go to the prohibition office and your prosecution under federal statues is certain.'

"The Federal Grand Jury, on May 27, returned two indictments, naming the leaders of the two rival beer gangs, the Capone gang and the O'Donnells, charging conspiracy to violate the prohibition law.  Those in the Capone gang who were indicted were Al Capone, Ralph, his brother, Frank Smith, Charles Fischetti and Peter Payette. The O'Donnell gangsters named were: William (Klondike), Myles, and Barnard O'Donnell, and Harry Madigan, the owner of the saloon where McSwiggin and his companions were killed."

Harry Madigan was indeed indicted due to violation of the prohibition law, However, in searching other documents, I have yet to find that Harry Madigan was convicted of any federal charges associated with these prohibition violations.  But I'm still looking.