Homer Van Meter

Van Meter in Indiana State Prison (1926)

Homer Vigil Van Meter (born December 3, 1905 in Fort Wayne , Indiana , † August 23, 1934 in Saint Paul , Minnesota ) was an American bank robber in the 1930s. He became known as a member of the gang around John Dillinger .

Life

Homer Van Meter was born in 1905 (1906 according to other sources) to Cary B. and Julia Van Meter. He also had a brother and a sister. In sixth grade he left home and made his way in Chicago as a hotel servant and waiter. In 1923 he was sentenced to a short prison term after a theft. In 1924 he was sentenced to an extended prison term after another theft and released from prison after a year. He was sentenced to 10 to 21 years in prison for two more robberies in 1925.

In prison, Van Meter met John Dillinger and Harry Pierpont . On May 19, 1933, Van Meter was released after several attempts to escape. In the months that followed, Van Meter and Babyface Nelson , Tommy Carroll, John Paul Chase and Charles Fisher committed several bank robberies. After Dillinger was able to break out of prison in 1934, he joined the gang with John Hamilton. Van Meter and Dillinger later raided a police station in Warsaw, Indiana.

Dillinger was eventually declared Public Enemy No. 1 by the FBI and wanted by the Chicago bureau chief Melvin Purvis . Van Meter and Dillinger managed to escape the police after several shootings. Van Meter shot and killed Frank Culp in a bank robbery on May 3, 1934 in Fostoria, Ohio. On May 24th, the gang shot dead police officers Martin O'Brien and Lloyd Mulvihill at a police checkpoint in East Chicago. Police officer Howard Wagner was killed in another bank robbery in South Bend, Indiana on June 30th.

After Dillinger was killed in Chicago on July 22nd by FBI agents Charles Winstead , Clarence O. Hurt and Herman E. Hollis, Van Meter fled to Saint Paul, Minnesota with his girlfriend Marie Comforti. On August 23, he was allegedly ambushed by other gangsters and caught by four police officers at the intersection of Marion Street and University Avenue. After a brief firefight, Van Meter was killed. Over 50 bullets were removed from his body. According to various statements, he was carrying around $ 7,000 to $ 8,000 when he died, of which the FBI only found $ 450 when they examined the body. The FBI suspected that the police officers involved had split the money among themselves.

Homer Van Meter was buried in Lindenwood Cemetery in Fort Wayne, Indiana.

In popular culture

The popular radio show Gang Busters dedicated an episode to him in 1936. The material was worked up again in 1952 for the television series of the same name. In this Van Meter was portrayed by actor Richard Crane .

He was played by Elisha Cook in This is how they all end from 1957 . In the 1973 film Hunt for Dillinger by John Milius , Van Meter was played by Harry Dean Stanton . Brion James took on his role in the 1975 television movie The Gangster Battle of Kansas City . In 2009 Stephen Dorff took on his role in Michael Mann's feature film Public Enemies .

In Stephen King's short story The Death of Jack Hamilton , published in 2002 as part of the In the Cabinet of Death collection , Homer Van Meter is the first-person narrator. He tells of a shootout in which he, Jack Hamilton, "Johnnie" Dillinger and he were involved and in which Jack Hamilton is seriously injured.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c} Homer Van Meter at vanmetre.com, accessed August 12, 2013
2. ↑ ^{a b c} Homer Van Meter - Wanted Poster at vanmetre.com, accessed August 12, 2013
3. ↑ ^{a b c} Paul Maccabee: John Dillinger Slept Here: A Crooks' Tour of Crime and Corruption in St Paul, 1920-1936 (Minnesota). Minnesota Historical Society, 1995, ISBN 978-0873513166 , pages 240-247
4. ↑ Homer Van Meter at findagrave.com, accessed August 12, 2013