Ellen E. Peck

Ellen Eliza Knight Peck ( 1830s – after 1927) was an American criminal sometimes called "Confidence Queen." She was known for defrauding businessmen.

Career Before her first arrest, Peck aided the police in the capture of other criminals.

In 1878, she swindled a soap manufacturer out of $19,000 by pretending to be a female detective following up about a previous robbery. She was indicted for this, but every time the case came up for trial she pretended to take ill. Shortly after, she allegedly stole $2,700 from a patent medicine man by pretending to know insider information about stocks to procure a bribe from him.

When she was arrested in 1908 in New York City for grand larceny, the New York Times called her the "Confidence Queen" and claimed she was over 70 years of age. The grand larceny in question was the title to 225,000 acres of land in the state of Kentucky.

She was pardoned by New York Governor Dix and released from prison in 1911 at age 82 on account of being "too old" to be a menace to society, five years earlier than was dictated by her sentence. In 1925, she gave an interview to the New York Daily News, claiming that she would tell the full story of her life only when her daughter, Sarah, dies. In the interview, Peck said, "Every single person who ever did me any whong, except my daughter, has died – and I'll outlive her too." In 1927, at the age of 97, she claimed have left for California to live with her daughter.

Over the span of her lifetime, Peck spent more than 13 years incarcerated.