In Memoriam

Judge Joseph Force Crater

Ever since the murder of my two colleagues on September 16, 2002 at work, and my placement of In Memoriam tributes to them in the New York Times on milestone anniversaries, I always look at the In Memoriams placed by others to read the sentiments If I'm still able, the next milestone to place is 25 years; I plan to place another listing. It's not closure. It's remembrance.

Last week there were two rather unusual In Memoriams, one for Vilmos Langfelder and the other for Raoul Wallenberg. They each got the same narrative "Disappeared in Soviet Captivity January 17, 1945. Gone but not forgotten" 

The 80th anniversary of that disappearance was being acknowledged. That set these In Memoriams far apart from others. Also unusual, the same pair of In Memoriams appeared the next day, almost as if someone was allowing for a time zone difference.

The Wallenberg name was familiar. A Swedish diplomat who helped Jews escape the Nazis was the extent of my knowledge without going to the usual Google/Wikipedia source to find out more. 

The disappearance of the two, Vilmos was Raoul's driver, became the stuff of legend and conspiracy theories.

Why did the Soviets detain and likely murder the two when at the time Sweden and Russia were part of the Allies fighting the Germans? Why didn't the Swedes get angrier at the affair? Many unanswered questions still remain.

Seeing an In Memoriam for some people who likely died in 1945 got me thinking. What if there was someone out there who was missing Judge Joseph Force Crater so much that they were willing to spend some bucks and alert the world to an anniversary of his disappearance? And who would that person be?

Most In Memoriams are either signed by someone not giving their full name, or there is nothing at all. In my case, I choose not to use an attribution.

Judge Crater might be the oldest missing person case on the New York Police Department's books. He was a municipal judge who was likely ethically compromised, and who was thought to be a stain on the Democratic party when FDR was New York State governor. Crater was due to give testimony in a corruption trial. 

On August 6, 1930 Crater had come back from a vacation home in Maine, and attended a show and had dinner with friends in a restaurant on West  45th Street in the theater district, and supposedly got into a cab and was never seen again.

The investigation didn't result in any explanation for the Judge's disappearance. The coroner's report came down on the side of every possibility, including that the judge might still be alive. Judge Crater was declared legally dead in August 1939.

As the case disappeared from the front pages, the memory of  his disappearance didn't. He was joked about by Johnny Carson, and others, on The Tonight Show. Numerous books were written and theories advanced.

In 2005 when Stella Ferruci-Good died, the authorities received notes she had written that alluded that her husband,  Robert Good, a NYPD detective, had learned that Crater was killed by another NYPD officer, Frank Burns, who did freelance killings for Murder Inc., Lucky Luciano's mob family. Frank Burns drove the cab that Crater is said to have gotten into leaving dinner.

The truthfulness of the notes was challenged by those who long studied Crater's disappearance. But then again, they might be true.

All theories aside, wouldn't it be a hoot if there was someone left who put an In Memoriam piece to acknowledge the centennial disappearance of Judge Crater in 2030? 

After all, someone is always missed.

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