DILLINGER DIG?
Kin: Open grave to prove crook died in ’34
Notorious bank robber John Dillinger may have pulled off the ultimate caper — living a life of peace after everyone thought he was dead.
At least that’s what two of his relatives believe, according to affidavits released by the Indiana State Department of Health.
The relatives are seeking to have Dillinger’s alleged remains exhumed from the Crown Hill Cemetery in Indianapolis for a forensic analysis and possible DNA testing — all fodder for a documentary for the History Channel.
The doubting descendants claim “evidence” suggests the body buried under the gravestone bearing Dillinger’s name may have belonged to another man shot and killed by FBI agents at the Biograph Theater in Chicago on July 22, 1934.
In their affidavits, the relatives, identified as Mike Thompson and Carol Thompson Griffith, claim the eye color of the man buried in the plot didn’t match Dillinger’s. They also claim Dillinger, whom they described as their uncle, had ears and fingerprints that didn’t match those of the corpse buried in his plot.
The FBI has disputed the notion that agents got the wrong man, calling it a “myth” that someone else died but was identified as Dillinger more than 85 years ago.
In a statement, the agency said a “wealth of information supports Dillinger’s demise,” including a fingerprint match. It said agents most certainly killed Dillinger “as he reached for a pistol from his trouser pocket” outside the theater.
The famed felon, once proclaimed public enemy No. 1 by the FBI, had been hiding in Chicago for months when a tipster alerted police to his whereabouts.
The relatives said they want to settle their suspicions once and for all.
“It is critical to learn whether Dillinger lived beyond his reported date of death of July 22, 1934. If he was not killed on that date, I am interested in discovering what happened to him, where he lived, whether he had children, and whether any such children or grandchildren are living today,” each relative says in the documents.
Meanwhile, another Dillinger relative said he doesn’t support the effort to dig up the Depression-era delinquent.
Jeff Scalf told WTHR-TV in Indianapolis he’s confident his great-uncle is buried in the concrete-encased grave.
“I don’t believe in desecrating the dead. I think it’s been 85 years. It doesn’t matter,” Scalf told the station.
“Unless somebody was successful in robbing the grave, that’s John. I know that that’s John,” he said.
The Indianapolis-born Dillinger, who was portrayed by Johnny Depp in the 2009 movie “Public Enemies,” robbed at least two dozen banks with a gang that killed at least 10 people in the early 1930s, according to the FBI.
Thousands of people reportedly lined up to view his body in a Chicago morgue after he was killed.