Unisciti a noi in un viaggio nel mondo dei libri!
Aggiungi questo libro allo scaffale
Grey
Scrivi un nuovo commento Default profile 50px
Grey
Iscriviti per leggere l'intero libro o leggi le prime pagine gratuitamente!
All characters reduced
Scoundrels in Law - The Trials of Howe & Hummel Lawyers to the Gangsters Cops Starlets and Rakes Who Made the Gilded Age - cover

Scoundrels in Law - The Trials of Howe & Hummel Lawyers to the Gangsters Cops Starlets and Rakes Who Made the Gilded Age

Cait N. Murphy

Casa editrice: HarperCollins e-books

  • 0
  • 0
  • 0

Sinossi

From the critically acclaimed author of Crazy '08 comes the thrilling true story of the most colorful and notorious law firm in American history. Scoundrels in Law offers an inside look at crime and punishment in the nineteenth century, and a whirlwind tour of the Gilded Age.Gangsters and con men. Spurned mistresses and wandering husbands. Strippers and Broadway royalty. Cat killers and spiritualists. These were the friends and clients of Howe & Hummel, the most famous (and famously rotten) law firm in nineteenth-century America.The partners gloried in their reputation and made a rich living from it. William Howe left London a step ahead of the law to find his destiny defending the perpetrators of murder and mayhem in post-Civil War New York, in an age of really good murders. A dramatic, diamond-encrusted presence, Howe was one of the great courtroom orators of his era, winning improbable acquittals time after time.Abraham Hummel enjoyed a quieter but perhaps more fearsome notoriety, shaking down high society so well and so often that receiving an envelope with the law firm's name on it became almost a rite of passage.The partners bestrode Gilded Age New York with wit and brio, and everyone from Theodore Roosevelt to Lola Montez had a part in their story. In Howe & Hummel's prime, it would not have been unusual to see a leading politician, a pickpocket, a Broadway star, a bank robber, and a socialite all crowded together into the waiting room of their offices, located conveniently across the street from the city jail. Howe and Hummel were not particularly good men. They were perfectly ready—even eager—to lie, cheat, and bribe on behalf of their clients. They did stop short of murder, though, a principle that played a critical role when the famous firm imploded in a truly spectacular web of deceit gone wrong.Through the windows of the dingy premises of Howe & Hummel, readers can glimpse the Gilded Age in all its grime and grandeur. Cait Murphy restores this once-famous duo to their rightful place in the pantheon of great American characters.
Disponibile da: 03/06/2010.
Lunghezza di stampa: 364 pagine.

Altri libri che potrebbero interessarti

  • History of Billy the Kid - cover

    History of Billy the Kid

    Charles A. Siringo

    • 0
    • 0
    • 0
    A fascinating piece of work containing stories from eye witnesses, written by someone who actually knew "Billy the Kid", the famous gunslinger outlaw. The listener gets an earful of intriguing and riveting historical information about the short and vicious life of Henry McCarty (Billy's real name) as well as a whiff of another legendary Western figure - the Sheriff that captured and killed the Kid, Pat Garrett.
    Mostra libro
  • Chronicles of a Rochester Major Crimes Detect - Confronting Evil & Pursuing Truth - cover

    Chronicles of a Rochester Major...

    Patrick Crough

    • 0
    • 0
    • 0
    A longtime Rochester, New York, police detective tells the behind-the-scenes stories of four of his most memorable cases.   Patrick Crough served more than twenty years as a Monroe County Major Crimes detective, where he investigated some of the region’s most tragic crimes. They include horrifying acts, like that of a Valentine’s Day killing rampage that left four people dead, as well as the case against Ed Laraby, the serial rapist who terrorized women in Rochester and Monroe County. But there are also stories of heroism and bravery: strangers coming to the aid of those in peril, parents who laid down their lives to save their children, and the team of people who put violent criminals behind bars.   In these pages, Crough details four of his most memorable cases—in which he was forced to confront evil and chose to pursue truth.
    Mostra libro
  • Richie - A Father His Son and the Ultimate American Tragedy - cover

    Richie - A Father His Son and...

    Thomas Thompson

    • 0
    • 0
    • 0
    George Diener, World War II veteran and traveling salesman, and his wife, Carol, had old-fashioned values and ordinary aspirations: a home, a family, the pleasure of watching their two sons grow up. But in February 1972, an unthinkable tragedy occurred in the basement of their Nassau County residence, shattering their hopes and dreams forever. George and Carol doted on their shy eldest son, Richie. But at fifteen, the boy fell into a devastating downward spiral. He started smoking marijuana, shoplifting, and hanging out with drug dealers, and was soon arrested for assault and expelled from school. By the time his parents sought psychiatric counseling for their son, Richie was addicted to barbiturates and given to violent outbursts and threats. The boy George and Carol knew was long gone. Then, one winter evening, Richie came at his father with a steak knife and a suicidal cry of "Shoot!" Edgar Award–winning author Thomas Thompson delivers a "scary, harrowing" account of a turbulent era in American history when the gulf between young and old, bohemian and conservative, felt wider and more dangerous than ever before (the New York Times Book Review).
    Mostra libro
  • Deep Deception - The relentless investigation to bring George Gibney Derry O'Rourke Ger Doyle and other abusers to justice - cover

    Deep Deception - The relentless...

    Justin McCarthy

    • 0
    • 0
    • 0
    In November 2009 former national and Olympic swimming coach Ger Doyle was convicted of thirty-five sexual offences against children. This is just the most recent of an appalling series of child sexual abuse scandals in Irish swimming. Long before Ger Doyle was charged, renowned swimming coaches George Gibney, Derry O'Rourke and Frank McCann had become synonymous with some of the worst crimes against children ever to come before the Irish courts; Fr Ronald Bennett, founder of the Schools Swimming Association, was also charged with sexual assaults against his pupils. All these coaches, the most respected in the sport, preyed on young swimmers. They exploited their dreams of greatness and betrayed the trust of their parents. Between them, they are believed to have left hundreds of victims in their wake. And the failure of the sport's authorities to respond adequately to complaints paved the way for the abuse of many more young victims.
    In candid interviews, survivors outline the effects of the abuse - psychiatric illnesses, broken marriages, financial hardship, and alcohol and drug addiction. Deep Deception examines the structures of Irish swimming, looks at the reasons these men escaped justice for so long and assesses the measures that have been taken to protect children in the aftermath of the scandals. This updated edition includes new chapters and previously unpublished material.
    Mostra libro
  • The Case of the Vanishing Blonde - And Other True Crime Stories - cover

    The Case of the Vanishing Blonde...

    Mark Bowden

    • 0
    • 0
    • 0
    The #1 New York Times bestselling “master of narrative journalism” and author of Black Hawk Down presents a compelling collection of true crime stories (New York Times).Acclaimed investigative reporter Mark Bowden has ferreted out unbelievable-yet-true stories of wrongdoing, murder and mayhem for decades. His illustrious body of work has won him a lifetime achievement award from the International Thriller Writers organization, and a reputation as “a Woodward that outdoes even Woodward” (Malcom Gladwell, New Yorker).The Case of the Vanishing Blonde collects six of Bowden’s most riveting stories—accounts spanning four decades of fascinating characters and unsettling tales to illustrate all manner of crimes and the ways technology has progressively altered criminal investigation. From a 1983 story of a University of Pennsylvania campus rape that sparked a national debate over the nature of consent, to three cold cases featuring the inimitable Long Island private detective Ken Brennan and a startling investigation into a murderer deep within the LAPD’s ranks—shielded for twenty six years by officers keen to protect one of their own—these stories are the work of a masterful narrative journalist.
    Mostra libro
  • Flames after Midnight - Murder Vengeance and the Desolation of a Texas Community - cover

    Flames after Midnight - Murder...

    Monte Akers

    • 0
    • 0
    • 0
    The “well-written and compelling history” of a 1922 racist reign of terror in a small Texas town—now updated with a shocking deathbed confession (USA Today).What happened in Kirven, Texas, in May 1922, has been forgotten by the outside world. But in Flames After Midnight, historian Monte Akers uncovers the true story behind a young white woman's brutal murder and the burning alive of three black men who were almost certainly innocent of it. This was followed by a month-long reign of terror as white men killed blacks while local authorities concealed the identity of the white murder suspects and allowed them to go free. Akers paints a vivid portrait of a community desolated by race hatred and its own refusal to face hard truths. He sets this tragedy within the story of a region prospering from an oil boom but plagued by lawlessness, and traces the lynching's repercussions down the decades to the present day. In an epilogue, Akers reveals new information that came to light as a result of this book's publication, including an eyewitness account of the burnings from an elderly man who claimed to have castrated two of the men before they were lynched.  
    Mostra libro