Infamous America

A leak inside law enforcement keeps kingpin Cliff Park’s bootleggers, car thieves and cop killers a step ahead of prosecutor Floyd Hoard and the GBI. Outrun but not outsmarted, Hoard employs aggressive new tactics to clean up Jackson County. Tactics that ignite Park’s short and volatile fuse. Join Black Barrel+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons: blackbarrel.supportingcast.fm/join   Apple...

Albert Patterson’s assassination brings the Phenix City syndicate crumbling down, but up the road in North Georgia crime is starting to explode. Fast new cars, dirt roads, and moonshine give birth to Nascar while the Dixie Mafia gives birth to a bloodsport. A shocking triple homicide helps spark a need for change, and in Jackson County north of Atlanta, the crusade for justice pits prosecutor Floy...

When buried secrets start to surface, kingpin “Head” Revel gets an unwanted blast from the past: his former defense attorney Albert Patterson. Now a high-profile prosecutor and powerful crusader against crime, Patterson delivers a crushing blow to Revel’s mafia. A blow which incites revenge and puts Revel on the run.   Join Black Barrel+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons: blackbarrel.supp...

Unforgiving and unremorseful, bootlegger Clarence “Head” Revel’s taste for money and power leads to murder. A series of increasingly ruthless crimes catapult him to Dixie Mafia kingpin. Shielded by corrupt cops and a killer instinct, Revel is seemingly untouchable until a long-forgotten mistake returns to haunt him. Join Black Barrel+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons: blackbarrel.support...

New York police pick up Willie Sutton, but at first, they’re not sure of his identity. As realization dawns, Willie must make a choice about his future. He has a chance to escape custody, but he thinks he might be too old to take it. Eventually, the lifelong felon returns to prison. He survives a long stretch at Attica State Prison before he reinvents himself as a consultant for banks and lawmen w...

Willie Sutton and a small group of inmates execute an improbable escape from Holmesburg Prison. In the process, Willie cements his legacy as an escape artist. But his notoriety lands him a spot on the FBI’s new Ten Most Wanted list. Willie hides in various places in New York and plans his next big robbery, but his time is running out. A young man named Arnold Schuster recognizes the most wanted fu...

Willie Sutton and his crew execute their most dramatic robbery, but the success proves to be short-lived. Willie finds himself a guest of the Pennsylvania prison system and promptly starts scheming ways to break out of Eastern State Penitentiary. He and a group of inmates use a classic escape idea, but it backfires in comical fashion. After Willie is transferred to Holmesburg Prison, he dreams up...

Willie Sutton is back in Sing Sing prison and it doesn’t take him long to develop a plan to escape. But when the plan hits an unexpected snag, Willie teams up with a fellow inmate for a new idea that is even more audacious. The second plan works, and Willie restarts his career as a bank robber. Willie targets branches of a bank in Philadelphia and New York and pulls off his most lucrative heist to...

Willie Sutton survives his first stint in prison and tries to go straight after his release. But before long, he’s back in the bank robbing business. This time, he discovers the perfect strategy to rob a bank with ease and without violence. Willie and his new partner, Marcus Bassett, go on a spree, but all good things come to an end. Bassett’s lifestyle leads Willie into a police trap. Bring the A...

Willie Sutton grows up in a tough Irish neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York where he idolizes the gangsters who run the local docks. At the age of 10, he commits his first serious theft. Future crimes and false accusations force him to go on the run before he joins a gang of professional thieves. When he’s 24, he makes his debut as a bank robber. But his first attempt produces less than stellar res...

More than a year and a half after Patty Hearst was kidnapped, her legal saga plays out in court and in the media. In court, she portrays herself as an innocent victim who was forced to participate in criminal activities. In early media encounters, she sounds like she genuinely joined the revolutionary group and was a willing participant in all its illegal exploits. No one knows the truth, and the...

Patty Hearst and the other two surviving members of the SLA connect with new recruits and flee to Pennsylvania to hide from the police. Before long, the group returns to northern California and conducts a bank robbery that has fatal consequences. The FBI picks up the trail of the elusive fugitives and finally arrests Patty Hearst. Join Black Barrel+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons:  bla...

The SLA feels heat from the FBI and law enforcement in northern California, so the group moves south to Los Angeles. Patty Hearst and two other members drive to a sporting goods store to buy supplies, but the simple errand takes a dramatic turn for the worse. The trio ends up on the run through L.A., and their error leads the police to the location of the SLA hideout. The revolutionaries engage th...

After more than two months in captivity, Patty Hearst emerges from the shadows and helps the SLA rob a bank in northern California. The public is shocked to see images of the former college student who now looks like an armed revolutionary. A radio station receives a recording in which Patty proclaims her transformation is complete: she is an avowed soldier in the SLA. Join Black Barrel+ for ad-fr...

The kidnappers contact Patty Hearst’s family and make a strange and unprecedented demand. The SLA wants the wealthy Hearst family to set up a food distribution program throughout California. The Hearsts quickly organize a program, but it debuts with disastrous results. And the world hears the first communique from Patty Hearst since her abduction. Join Black Barrel+ for ad-free episodes and bingea...

On February 4, 1974, strangers burst into the college apartment of Patty Hearst and kidnap her at gunpoint. While she begins her stay in captivity, she learns about her kidnappers. They are a ragtag collection of hopeful revolutionaries who call themselves the Symbionese Liberation Army. They are led by charismatic Donald DeFreeze, an escaped convict who helped the group execute a high-profile mur...

Join us for two upcoming events in 2024 about Chris’s book, “The Summer of 1876” February 2, 2024 – 2:00-3:00pm Presentation 3:00pm Book Signing Scottsdale, Arizona Western Spirit: Scottsdale’s Museum of the West Presentation and Book Signing **FREE to the public March 9-10, 2024 Tucson, Arizona Tucson Festival of Books March 9, 4:00pm - 5:00pm “Into The Sunset” panel discussion *Book signing afte...

Shortly after the Little Bohemia shootout, the celebrity criminals of the 1930s start to experience a reckoning. They fall one by one: Bonnie and Clyde, then John Dillinger, then Pretty Boy Floyd. In the autumn of 1934, Lester Gillis, aka George “Baby Face” Nelson, becomes the third man to carry the title of Public Enemy No. 1. But his reign at the top of the criminal underworld is brief and ends...

After two robberies that featured gun battles, the Nelson-Dillinger gang needs some time to cool off. Baby Face Nelson heads out west to do a little business, and then reunites with the gang at the Little Bohemia Lodge in Wisconsin. Unbeknownst to the gang, FBI Agent Melvin Purvis has organized an ambush at the lodge. The gang shoots it out with the agents, and Nelson commits the crime that will s...

After the messy Grand Haven job, Baby Face Nelson looks for a new crew. It’s the fall of 1933 and newspaper headlines are dominated by the most infamous criminals of the era: Bonnie and Clyde, George “Machine Gun” Kelly, Charles “Pretty Boy” Floyd, Alvin “Creepy” Karpis and the Barker Family, John Dillinger, and Baby Face Nelson. Dillinger stages an improbable escape from a jail in Crown Point, In...

Baby Face Nelson flees to the West Coast to avoid a manhunt in the Midwest. He works for prominent gamblers in Reno, Nevada and a bootlegger in California, but he misses his family in Chicago. He meets famous robber Alvin “Creepy” Karpis and takes Karpis’s advice to form a new crew in St. Paul, Minnesota. The crew robs a bank in Grand Haven, Michigan, but the meticulous plan falls apart almost imm...

 Lester Gillis – known as George Nelson, nicknamed Baby Face Nelson – wants to graduate from home invasion to bank robbery. His crew targets small-town banks with varying degrees of success, and their streak doesn’t last long. Nelson gets arrested and sent to prison, but he proves he’s resourceful and has no intention of staying behind bars. Join Black Barrel+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable se...

Lester Gillis shows a restless spirit at a young age and soon begins his criminal career with a gang that specializes in home invasions. His crew makes a name for itself during Chicago’s crime wave of 1930, and he receives the nickname that sticks with him for the rest of his short life. Join Black Barrel+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons: blackbarrel.supportingcast.fm/join Apple users j...

 Investigators and prosecutors build a case against Dr. George Hodel for the murder of Elizabeth Short. But for an unknown reason, it doesn’t lead to an arrest or an indictment. Dr. Hodel moves on with his life, even as he is suspected of multiple crimes, including multiple murders. Decades after the Black Dahlia murder, Hodel’s son Steve investigates the case and concludes that his father was, wi...

Investigators struggle to find clues which will lead them to the killer. Suspects are interviewed and cleared. And then, the presumed Black Dahlia killer contacts a Los Angeles newspaper and provides chilling information about the crime and the victim, Elizabeth Short. But the investigation stalls until the police become aware of a new suspect, Dr. George Hodel, who seems to fit all the criteria o...