Marcus Cicero Stanley, the mysterious, has gone to the world of mystery, leavin’ behind him as many enemies and as few friends as any man who ever lived and died in New York. Stanley was one of those men who are always seen walkin’ and sittin’ alone. He had no company–needed none, apparently–but his own “crooked” thoughts. He had connections in all walks of life. He was the near relative of a United States Senator and an equally near relative of two convicts in State’s prison. He had been friendly and unfriendly at different times, or even at the same time, with George Wilkes, Matsell, Ben Wood, Eph. Simmons and John Chamberlain, and had been directly or indirectly “mixed up” with every crooked man, woman or transaction in New York for the last twenty years.
One of the most characteristic of his “operations” illustratin’ the colossal cheek, duplicity and ingenuity of the man, was indirectly shown as a sort of side-light in the Drury trial, which agitated New York criminal circles years ago.
Drury was a darin’ counterfeiter who cut a swell on Long Island, where he had a splendid country seat. He “shoved the queer” with great success for a while, but was brought to grief at last. He was indicted here in New York, and the indictment was duly filed in the office of Hon. John McKeon, who was District Attorney at the time.
An old, efficient police officer, Robert W. Bowyer, still livin’ in the city, had, by his efficiency in this case, incurred the special hatred of the “crooks” of New York, and Stanley especially disliked him. This Bowyer had charge of the Drury case, and was very active in collectin’ all the points he could against the accused, and it is to be supposed that one important motive for Stanley’s course in the job about to be described was his desire to get even with this Bowyer by gettin’ him into trouble with his superiors on the police force, and in the District Attorney’s office.
At that time Stanley lived in Grand street, and a man named Cole and his wife, a mutual friend and associate of Drury and Stanley, lived in the same house with Stanley. Between ‘em Stanley and Cole put up the job to get the indictment against Drury from the District Attorney’s office by stealin’ it, so as to let the blame for carelessness fall upon Bowyer. Stanley knew all the ins and outs of the District Attorney’s office thoroughly, and concocted a scheme so clever and full in all its minute details that it was bound to succeed, by which the indictment against Drury could be made to “mysteriously disappear” and the blame be laid on the carelessness of Bowyer.
Cole, of course, was to take part in this job, and Drury was to be made to pay $2,000 cash down for the stolen indictment. So far, so good, or so bad; but Stanley’s job went one step further, and here is just where his peculiar “cleverness” came in.
Stanley proposed to make money not only out of Drury, but out of the police; for he intended to notify the detectives that, for certain favors he wanted from the Police Department, he would be willin’ to betray Drury to ‘em, with the stolen indictment in his possession. In other words, Drury was to pay $2,000 to Stanley and Cole for stealin’ the indictment, and then, just as he held the precious paper in his hand, the police, let in by Stanley, were to rush in and arrest him for stealin’ the indictment.
It was a two-headed job, yet comparatively simple, and might have succeeded had Cole had Stanley’s faculty for holdin’ his tongue. But in his cups he told his wife, who despised Stanley, so that, to spite him, she told Drury, who, not a bit surprised at this duplicity on Stanley’s part, quietly thought out his best way to come out ahead, and defeat his false friends.
One way to do this that suggested itself to Drury was to pay Stanley and Cole the $2,000 for the stolen indictment in counterfeit money, but finally Drury determined to let ‘em have the trouble and risk of stealin’ the indictment first, and then refuse to take or pay for the the indictment when stolen.
So Stanley and Cole got in their fine work, and Stanley gettin’ access to the District Attorney’s rooms, seized a whole lot of papers–knowin’ where, but not exactly in what particular pigeon-hole, the indictment was, and so grabbin’ a lot to make sure–and then brought all the papers to his rooms in Grand street, where Drury was waiting for ‘em, with Mrs. Cole hidin’ behind a big French bedstead as a witness.
Stanley handed Drury the indictment found among the purloined MSS., while Cole gleefully remarked, “How ‘Slung-shot Bowyer’ (the old officer’s nickname) will stare when he comes down in the mornin’ and finds the office has been robbed.” But neither Cole nor Stanley felt at all gleeful when Drury point blank refused to receive the indictment or to pay over the money, and, throwin’ off his mask, reproached his associates with their proposed treachery.
So Stanley’s double-headed job came to grief. Still, as the papers had been stolen, they had to at all events be hidden or destroyed. So some were burned and most of ‘em were buried along the New Haven Railroad track. Stanley’s only gleam of comfort in the whole transaction was that Bowyer might get into trouble. But even this slender compensation was denied him, for a few weeks later on one of the gang turned State’s evidence and confessed just where the stolen papers were buried and handed ‘em over to Bowyer, who thus made reputation and capital out of the very scheme designed to crush him.
[Editor’s notes: Marcus Cicero Stanley (1824-1885) made his mark in New York as a muckraking crime reporter for the National Police Gazette, and later, for the New York Herald. Though he often crusaded against gamblers, he was instrumental in setting up the nationally popular Louisiana State Lottery. His enemies once published a pamphlet indicating that he had once been imprisoned in England for larceny.]
