As God’s Witness
As Father John Reynolds stepped off the train in downtown Chicago’s Randolph Street train station in the early afternoon of June 9, 1930, he witnessed the Al Capone-ordered mob hit of Tribune reporter Jake Lingle and kicked off a string of events over the next several months that would determine the fate of Knute Rockne...
Seeing the victim lying on the ground bleeding profusely from the head, Father Reynolds hurried to the mortally wounded man just in time to attempt to administer last rites. The man was barely able to whisper in the priest's ear before he took his final breath.
Only Father Reynolds knew the words the fallen victim had whispered. He got up, left the man dead in a pool of blood on the platform, and started to make his way out with the crowd when he bumped into a large man with a big stomach.
"Somebody has been killed, I'm getting upstairs to see what is going on," Father Reynolds said to Patrick Campbell.
The priest hurried up the stairway out to the street. Upon exiting the subway stairway onto Michigan Avenue, he peered around the street corner. He saw a frantic scene of people pouring out from the station. Father Reynolds was stunned to spot the light-haired accomplice standing on the corner.
The man appeared to be waiting for a pickup. Nobody stopped, so he ducked into a nearby store and asked to use the toilet. The suspect disappeared into the restroom, unwrapped a small piece of paper containing white powder, snorted the powder and left the paper behind in a stall for police to recover later. He walked hurriedly out of the store and disappeared down State Street.
Back inside the subway station, the dark-haired gunman had tossed the murder weapon on the cement and was now lost in a crowd of bedlam.
Father Reynolds bolted from the scene without stopping to talk to police. He skipped his doctor's appointment and, instead, decided to get out of Chicago as quickly as possible on the next train back to South Bend.
