Basil Banghart

Basil Hugh "The Owl" Banghart Jr. (September 11, 1901– April 5, 1982) was an American criminal, burglar, and prison escape artist. Although a successful "stickup artist" during the 1920s and early 1930s, he is best remembered for his involvement in the hoax kidnapping of Chicago mobster Jake "the Barber" Factor, a crime for which Roger Touhy and he were eventually proven innocent after nearly 20 years in prison.

Biography

Early life and criminal career Basil Hugh Banghart was born in Berville, Michigan, in 1901. He dropped out of college after one year to become a professional car thief, stealing over 100 cars in the Detroit area before his arrest in 1926. Around this time, Banghart acquired his criminal nickname "The Owl" because of his abnormally large eyes.

Banghart escaped from Leavenworth Federal Penitentiary months into his sentence. Escaping from a window-washing detail, he leapt 25 feet from a window he was washing and over the prison's wall, escaping through the marsh on the other side. He got as far as Montana, but was recaptured and returned to prison. He made a second escape a year later, but was caught trying to steal a car in Pittsburgh in October 1928.

The members of the British consulate refused to believe the story, and won a judgment for Factor's extradition from the U.S. Supreme Court. In desperation, Factor and the Chicago mob sought to make the kidnapping more legitimate by arranging a pickup with the supposed kidnappers. Banghart and his partner Charles "Ice Wagon" Connors were brought into the plan at this point. Hired to be the "bagmen", they were told all they needed was to pick up the money, make it "look real", and they could keep the ransom money. The FBI immediately joined the manhunt, justifying its involvement charging that the convicts had violated the federal draft law by not informing Selective Service of their change of address. Soon after their escape, Banghart and Touhy were suspected of taking part in a robbery at Melrose Park, Illinois, on December 19, which netted $20,000, although no charges were brought against them. McInerney and O'Connor were killed in a gun battle with federal agents less than two weeks after their escape, and the rest were captured at a nearby address on December 29, 1942. J. Edgar Hoover observed the raid and took part in what would be his last "personal arrest".

Release and later years The convicts were given even longer jail sentences for their escape, and on January 2, 1943, Banghart was returned to Stateville, where he was placed in solitary confinement. He was then transferred, with an escort of 18 federal marshals, to Alcatraz. He spent the rest of his time in the prison kitchen working with former public enemy Alvin Karpis in the bakery. Jokingly referred to by inmates as the "Karpis kitchen crew", Banghart and Karpis allegedly learned to produce wine and other alcoholic beverages from cherry pie juices and other material in the kitchen. "The challenge was to avoid becoming an alcoholic," Karpis later wrote in his memoirs.

In 1954, a federal judge declared the Factor kidnapping a fraud and that Banghart and Touhy had most likely been wrongly convicted involving the Chicago Outfit and corrupt Chicago officials. Banghart was transferred back to Stateville in 1959, and eventually his kidnapping conviction was overturned and the mail robbery charges were dropped for time served. He was released the following year, when at age 60, he was reunited with his longtime girlfriend Mae Blacock. He had also received a small inheritance from his aunt 15 years before. Banghart retired to a small island in Puget Sound.