Trials and Other Tribulations

Damon Runyon was first and foremost a great reporter. This book tells some of his better stories of trials and other tribulations including all essential information concerning the crime, the accused, the witnesses, the cat-and-mouse lawyer duels, at the same time managing to provide in each one a sardonic commentary on an American state of mind that craved sensationalism and excitement, however lurid. The inexorable closing-in of the law, the terror of the accused, the dirty linen, and the essential nature of these hunter vs. hunted sporting events are conveyed to the reader with humor, sentiment, and immediacy. Included in this book is the Hall-Mills murder trial, the matrimonial comedy of "Daddy" and "Peaches" Browning, the harrowing murder trial of Ruth Snyder and Henry Judd Gray, the trial of a suspected murderer of legendary gambler Arnold Rothstein, the ironic income-tax evasion trial of Al Capone, which started that gentleman on his way to oblivion and ends with the unprecedented examination of the world banking affairs of J. Pierpont Morgan before a sub-committee of the US Senate, complete with circus midget.


Genre: Mystery