It was 9: 30 o'clock before the judge finished his charge and everybody went out to dinner. It was going to be a strenuous night. The jury had to get itself something to eat and then settle down to its deliberations before the passage of midnight had made it Sunday.
As midnight came and went, the crowd, which for a month had strained about the courtroom, had dwindled away almost to nothing. It would be a long time before the verdict came in. The jury might be out all night.
The evening newspaper men had long since finished their night’s work and had gone. The morning newspaper men had written their stories and knocked off for the night. District reporters from police headquarters had come down to take over the vigil in case the verdict were brought in before the last edition of the papers.
There were a few who gathered in little knots around the courtroom: the defense lawyers and their friends who gathered around keeping up a great show of confidence; a few men of Dewey’s office; a few reporters; trial fans, tensely talking about the case, hashing it over and over again. A lot of them were betting that Luciano would be acquitted.
Out in the corridor were wives of some defendants. They had been kept out of the courtroom during the trial. Now they stood there in little groups, just waiting. No one waited more tensely than they.
There is a weak, helpless feeling that comes at a time like this. Suspense is there, and tension, but the whole thing is out of the hands of everybody except the jury. For weeks there had been a struggle, a clash of words and wits, fierce bludgeoning of facts. But now there was nothing to do but wait.
The defendants were under guard in their room behind the trial chamber. Judge McCook had gone to his chambers. Dave Siegel, Little Abie’s lawyer, was entertaining a group of friends at the restaurant across the square. They were all congratulating him on the acquittal which was sure to come.
Waiting in the courtroom, Dewey suddenly felt let down. For a month he had been keyed-up, on edge, battling night and day. On four hours’ sleep he had talked all day, and for two hours more he had followed the judge’s charge and the haggling of counsel over it. Now his whole year’s work, the whole success of his job, hung in the balance. But there was nothing more he could do. He went upstairs alone to the top of the courthouse. There, in a little private room, he lay down on a couch and went to sleep.
A man waiting for the verdict made a lot of trips across the square. The restaurant there stayed open all night. At a time like this a man can drink a lot of brandy or a lot of Scotch and somehow not feel it at all.
A crowd gathered in the little park adjoining Foley Square facing the courthouse. They were Italian people, men, women, and small children. At three o'clock a squad of policemen came along, frisked the men for guns, told the women to take their babies home to bed. Still the crowd remained, waiting for the fate of the big shots.
The austere dignity of the court had vanished now. There were newspapers here and there scattered about the chamber. Three men sat at the corner of a big table playing pinochle. Somebody’s office boy climbed into the witness chair, pretending he was Mildred Harris, while another youngster threw cross-examiners’ questions at him. There were roars of laughter in the court. It was undignified, but it was harmless. People can stand just so much tension and suspense and then they have to be a little bit silly.
Up and down out on the courthouse steps by the colonnade of great pillars paced Lorenzo C. Carlino, Ralph Liguori’s lawyer, the man who had most flamboyantly denounced the iniquities of the prosecution. He was standing there and walking back and forth talking to anybody who would listen, about how certain the jury was to bring in an acquittal. His voice boomed with assertive confidence. Then, in a pause between his words, could be heard a twittering of birds high in the courthouse portico.
It grew harder and harder to keep awake. A bit of sleep—any kind of uncomfortable, impromptu sleep—was the only thing a man wanted. A man could lie down upon a press table in the courtroom and get forty winks maybe. But hardly had he dozed before there came a rustle and a scurrying in the chamber. The court attendant was fussing around on the judge’s bench, straightening it out. Another court attendant went around picking up newspapers. Vaguely it was realized that the judge was coming in and that the jury was coming in.
It was after five o'clock. The gray light of dawn was creeping through the windows. Somebody went hunting for Dewey. He had to be there.
A little after five o'clock Dewey woke up. He arose, rubbed the sleep from his eyes, straightened his necktie and started downstairs.
At the elevator he met a court attendant coming for him.
“The jury is coming in,” the officer said.
From somewhere a crowd had appeared, nearly filling the courtroom benches. Judge McCook came to the bench. Somberly the jury filed into its box. From the door at the back of the courtroom, flanked by detectives, filed in the prisoners, led by Charlie Lucky in gray flannel suit, black necktie, and pasty gray-granite face.
The defendants were all present. The lawyers were all present. The tall, gray Court Clerk MeN amara rose and polled the names of the jury. All were present.
“Gentlemen of the jury, have you agreed upon a verdict?” intoned the clerk.
“We have,” said Edwin Aderer, the foreman.
“How say you, gentlemen of the jury,” asked the clerk, “do you find the defendant Luciano guilty or not guilty on Count No. 1?”
“Guilty,” said the foreman.
“How say you as to the defendant Luciano? Is he guilty or not guilty on Count No.2?”
“Guilty.”
“Third Count?”
“Guilty.”
“Fourth?”
“Guilty.”
“Fifth?”
“Guilty.”
“Sixth?”
“Guilty.”
“Seventh?”
“Guilty.”
Luciano stood there facing the jury with his somber mask as the words beat down upon him like a whip. Guilty! Guilty! Guilty! Guilty! Guilty!
Something was happening which never had happened in New York courts before. The verdict of guilty was being pronounced over one man sixty-one separate times; each time a felony; good for years in prison.
“The next defendant, Thomas Pennochio. Gentlemen of the jury, have you agreed upon a verdict? How say you, gentlemen of the jury, do you find the defendant guilty or not guilty on Count No. 1?”
“Guilty.”
“Guilty.”
“Guilty.”
“Guilty.”
“Guilty.”
The clock at the back of the room was turning. The gray light grew stronger through the windows by the minute. But still the beating refrain went on. Guilty! Guilty! Guilty!
There outside the courtroom came a strange unearthly sound, muffled by the closed doors. The wives of the defendants were still there. Now they were moaning, screaming in the echoing rotunda of the courthouse.
A church around the corner was calling its people to early mass. The bell tolled, Guilty! Guilty! Guilty!
Guilty! Guilty! Guilty! Guilty! Guilty! In thirty minutes, upon nine defendants, the word guilty was pronounced 549 times.
As Dewey sat there in somber triumph, detectives noticed not far behind him a small, dark, sharp-faced man straining forward in his chair. His eyes bulged with a glaze almost of madness. His right hand was held tensely inside his coat. A detective motioned to his partner. Silently and swiftly they moved toward him. They calmly pinned his arms to his body and with quiet compulsion removed him quickly from the room. The man moved without resistance and spoke no word as they stopped outside the courtroom. There a policeman reached firmly inside the man’s coat, grabbed his right hand and drew it forth.
In his white-knuckled fist was clenched a silver crucifix.