Unsolved Murders & Disappearances in Northeast Ohio

by Jane Ann Turzillo

  The Plain Dealer had been reporting on the battle and agreed with the league. In October, it was finally decided to eliminate all council members from the building board. Finkle offered an ordinance that named the city manager, the law director and the parks director as the new building code board of appeals. That November, the Citizens’ League called for the defeat of seven councilmen. William E. Potter was one of them, but he handily won his council seat again.

  In November 1926, Rarin’ Bill became involved in a land deal with building contractors Abram and Jake Winer. At the time, it looked like the simple sale of a lot on Gray Avenue Northeast and 113th Street, but it would come back to haunt Potter a few months later.

  The Winer brothers wanted the lot to build a thirteen-suite apartment building. Potter’s mother-in-law, Mrs. Anna S. Hoffman, owned the land, so Potter handled the sale. He and the Winers settled on $2,250 as a fair price, and everyone seemed happy for the time being.

  Jake Winer made out a check for $150 as a down payment. He went to apply for a building permit but got the run-around at city hall. He went to Rarin’ Bill, who wound up clearing the way for all the stamps and paperwork.

  The permit in hand, Winer hired workman to do the excavation for the basement. Three days into the digging, a policeman came by the site and ordered the work to stop and informed them the permit had been revoked. The Winer brothers went to the building commissioner but got no answers. Jake Winer again went to Rarin’ Bill and told him that the job was stalled and that he had a construction loan and workmen to pay.

  Potter wanted money to help him. “I don’t like to work for nothing, you know. I want $200,” Rarin’ Bill said. The builder had only $100 in cash. Potter took it and said he would take a check for the other $100.

  When the two met again a month later, Potter wanted more money. Winer balked at the request, and Potter said, “All right. You’ll remember me.” Winer did not want trouble, so he relented and gave Potter $300.

  The Winers finally learned that the city had had its eye on that piece of land. Rarin’ Bill told the Winer brothers to total up all their expenses, including the price for the property. They gave him a figure of $4,000. He drafted an ordinance that provided them with $5,000. The Winers came out of the deal with $800 in cash, but they had lost a building project that could have turned thousands in profit.

  The case landed in the hands of Prosecutor Ray T. Miller, who took it before the grand jury. When Winer cried foul, Potter’s attorney, James C. Connell, accused him of offering Potter a bribe. Connell pressed further to find out that Miller offered Winer immunity from bribery charges to testify against the councilman.

  William Potter testified in his own defense under questioning by his attorney, James C. Connell. Courtesy of the Cleveland Public Library.

  Potter was indicted and tried on graft charges involving the Gray Avenue case but was acquitted.

  Another murky real estate deal landed Potter in front of a jury again in 1928. He and Councilman Liston G. Schooley Sr., chairman of the city council finance committee, had their eyes on a lot at the corner of Coit and St. Clair Streets for a community playground. Owned by Michael Froelich, it had been up for sale for some time. Harmon Atwater, Potter’s former real estate partner, helped them. Three or four different options were put on the table during the negotiations, and Atwater was able to talk the owners into selling for $50,000. Atwater’s intention was to turn around and sell it to the city for $83,250, making a $33,000 profit for himself. He was wrong. It was not going to work that way.

  Cleveland councilman Liston G. Schooley pleaded guilty in the Cleveland land scandal. Courtesy of the Cleveland Public Library.

  Potter, Schooley and Schooley’s son, Liston Jr., hatched a plan to have Schooley’s law and business partners, Charles L. Biggs and George McEachren, buy the land, then turn around and sell it to the city for $83,250. Atwater got $4,000 out of the deal. What became of the other $29,000 was never known.

  The Schooleys were both indicted, the father for having a direct interest in a city contract and the son for aiding and abetting his father.

  Potter and city clerk Fred W. Thomas, who was privy to the deal, were now concerned that they could be indicted, and Schooley was afraid of jail time. They wanted Atwater to go to Florida, where Froelich was vacationing, and get him to sign receipts for $83,250. Another councilman was supposed to be at that meeting, but he did not show up. Atwater either never said or never found out who the other councilman was.

  He claimed Potter gave him traveling money for the trip to Florida. Thomas said to him, “Goodbye. Good luck. And I hope you bring home the bacon.” Atwater made the trip but failed to get Froelich to sign the receipts.

  Potter and Thomas then gave him $225 to go to Chicago and stay out of sight until after the Schooleys’ trial. On his way from Florida to Chicago, he stopped in Cleveland and was hidden by one of his former associates, Robert Bunowitz.

  Harmon G. Atwater was a key witness in the Cleveland City Hall land scandal. Courtesy of the Cleveland Public Library.

  The Schooleys refused to tell what they knew. Instead, they pleaded guilty. Senior received a five-year sentence. Junior was given a year in prison. Atwater, although missing, was indicted.

  From March to September, Atwater lived in rooming houses and hotels in Chicago and received money from Cleveland for living expenses. Miller claimed Bunowitz visited him at least three times. The Cleveland Press offered a reward of $2,500 for his return in the beginning of September to face charges of aiding and abetting Schooley. Ten days later, the paper upped the amount to $10,000. Finally, on September 29, 1929, Atwater was apprehended and brought back to Cleveland.

  That same month, Republican Collinwood ward leader Frank Blitz yanked party support from Potter. Lack of support had less to do with Potter’s legal entanglements than with infighting in the ward, especially between Blitz and Potter. Determined, Rarin’ Bill decided to go it alone and run anyway. It was a mistake because he found himself on a losing ticket.

  Prosecutor Ray T. Miller cut Atwater a deal to testify against Potter, Taylor and Bunowitz. Atwater admitted to being part of the land deal and fingered Potter and Taylor for plotting to cover up the scheme by having him get Froelich to sign off on the enlarged receipts.

  Potter and Bunowitz were both indicted for harboring a fugitive and went on trial. Potter was found innocent on the same evidence that convicted Bunowitz. Bunowitz admitted to putting up Atwater at the Parkhill Apartments when he returned from Florida but only because the latter was suffering from ptomaine poisoning. There was no evidence that he knew Atwater was wanted. He flatly denied ever giving Atwater money or going to see him in Chicago and provided an alibi using his family. The only direct evidence against Potter or Bunowitz was Atwater’s testimony, and Atwater had testified in hopes of gaining immunity.

  When the jury found Bunowitz guilty, defense attorney James C. Connell moved for a new trial, insisting that the evidence did not support a guilty verdict. He also charged that two members of the jury began talking about Potter’s innocence during his trial as soon as they were sworn. “The jury erred,” he declared.

  Judge Charles R. Sergent dismissed Connell’s motion for a new trial, saying, “The mere fact that the jury might have erred in finding Bunowitz guilty and Potter not guilty and that they might have traded Bunowitz for Potter is no ground for granting a new trial.”

  The jurors said the verdicts were the result of compromise—those who wanted to convict Potter would switch their guilty votes to innocent if those who wanted to let Bunowitz walk would switch their votes to guilty. Bunowitz was sentenced to from one to ten years.

  Robert Bunowitz was convicted of harboring a fugitive. Courtesy of the Cleveland Public Library.

  A week later, Potter and Taylor faced charges of profiting from a city contract. Prosecutor Miller used Atwater again in this trial. This time, his testimony failed to move the jury. And Miller could not get the Schooleys to talk. Potter and T
aylor were found innocent.

  In January 1931, Bunowitz—the only person convicted in the Coit and St. Clair land scandal and dubbed by the Plain Dealer as the “goat” in the deal—decided to talk to the grand jury. He repudiated his testimony from his own trial and named Potter as a co-conspirator in the Atwater harboring.

  The grand jury did exactly what Miller had hoped. It returned a true bill against Rarin’ Bill for perjury. It was a two-count indictment, one for each previous trial.

  “I haven’t got a lawyer yet. It costs money to hire lawyers, and this last year has been a pretty tough one,” Potter said at his arraignment. “But I’m ready to go to trial tomorrow if necessary.” Judge Walter McMahon wanted to set bond at $5,000, but lowered it to $3,500 when Potter assured the court, “I’ll be here anytime I’m wanted.” The bond was never needed.

  Up to this point, Potter always seemed to have money even if no one else did, but after three court trials, his funds were running low. He was forty-five years old and growing weary of legal battles. It was whispered that he wanted payment to keep his mouth shut about others who were involved in the land deal.

  On Tuesday morning, February 3, 1931, Potter left his house on Rudwick Road in a good mood, his wife, Beatrice, said. That same afternoon at 4:20 p.m., he called her and said, “I have a business engagement and I won’t be home for dinner. Don’t wait for me.” She never saw or heard from her husband again.

  The following Friday, a woman named Margaret Laub called to tell Beatrice her husband’s small coupe had been sitting on Parkwood Drive for several days. Laub’s husband managed the Parkwood Apartments at 880 Parkwood Drive Northeast, a less-than-desirable neighborhood. She was a nosey woman who had peered through the windows of the car and saw the name W.E. Potter on a bundle of papers. Beatrice had the car towed and, over the next two days, called the police twice to report her husband missing, both times asking that it not be made public.

  Margaret Laub had also noticed a light burning for several days in apartment 4. She went to investigate on Sunday and found the door unlocked. To her horror, Rarin’ Bill Potter’s bloody, lifeless body was sprawled on the couch.

  Inspector Cornelius Cody and deputy inspector Charles O. Nevel worked the death scene. It looked as though Potter had been ambushed as he walked in the door, or perhaps he had been sitting on the sofa when he was attacked from behind. He had been bashed in the head and shot three times, once in the head, once in the chest and once in the arm.

  Detectives retrieved a badly distorted slug from the wall. Circled in pencil on the wallpaper above the fireplace was the number and letters “1 S.R.” An ordinary shirt button was found next to Potter’s body, perhaps torn from the murderer’s cuff during a struggle. It was a worthless clue unless they could find the shirt it was ripped from.

  They tried to piece together whether Potter was beaten over the head and then shot, the bullet from the wall was fired first to maybe frighten Potter or there was a struggle and the gun went off. No one in the immediate vicinity heard anything, so police believed the slayer used a silencer. The coroner believed it happened on Tuesday, February 3.

  They found a poem in Potter’s pocket but had no idea whether it meant anything to the case. It was a simple verse torn from the newspaper that read:

  A Little Poem

  Member of Bricklayers No. 5

  Real songs of love I cannot sing

  Sweet things I’ve always missed;

  I do not know why lovers cling,

  So far I’ve never kissed.

  While walking by I wonder why

  Few pretty maidens care

  To smile on me, the few I see

  Are very, very rare.

  But once a little maiden fair

  Made eyes and smiled on me.

  I whispered with a soft accent

  “Your charms are good to see.”

  She said: “I like you too:

  If you don’t care, we’ll make a pair.

  I give myself to you.”

  A letter from a former assistant prosecutor was also found on his body. It asked Potter to pay toward a bill for stenographer fees during the land deal trial, further evidence that Potter was short on money.

  The evening Rarin’ Bill’s body was found, the phone rang at the Potter house. One of his daughters answered. On the other end was a loud, screeching laugh.

  Fred Thomas, who viewed the body at the morgue, later told a fellow city worker that he had never seen anything like it. “I couldn’t have taken an oath that it was Potter. His…it was awful.”

  Thomas was a longtime friend of Potter’s and felt that he knew him well. He told authorities his friend would not have gone to that apartment unless he knew the person he was meeting. Thomas also reported seeing two men from Detroit around city hall. They asked for Potter on the Monday before he disappeared and lingered for several hours. When Potter did not show, they left a business card.

  “Yeah, I saw those two fellows,” Potter said when he showed up on Tuesday. He tore up the card and threw it away.

  Potter was scheduled to go on trial for perjury the day after he was found. Prosecutor Miller and the detectives started thinking that Potter was going to come clean during the perjury trial, maybe even cut a deal and name names of everyone who was involved in the Coit and St. Clair scandal. Whoever was waiting for him in that apartment had different ideas.

  Detectives canvassed the Parkwood Apartments and found Mrs. Joseph Berger, whose back door looked directly into apartment no. 4’s kitchen. She claimed to have seen a small dark man and a blond woman in a black dress looking out the kitchen window of the “death apartment” on Tuesday at about 6:30 p.m.

  Fred Laub told detectives he rented the apartment on January 28 to a well-dressed, dark-complexioned man who gave his name as M.J. Markus. Police assumed the blond woman was his wife.

  Police had little to go on, but they kept going back to the blond woman and wondered if she had been used to lure Potter to the apartment. Neighbors said they had seen the blond woman going in and out of the apartment building, as well as in a car of “distinctive color.”

  Rumors floated around city hall and throughout the police department that the body found at 880 Parkwood Drive Northeast was not Potter, but the coroner had matched dental records. And further, from interviews with friends and family, authorities were now fairly certain that he died on Tuesday, February 3, after 7:00 p.m.

  Talk at city hall centered on the idea that the murderer was a professional from New York or Chicago. One of the detectives countered the idea by saying professionals do not bash people’s heads in and leave stray bullets in the walls. Furthermore, they do not let people get a look at them by renting apartments.

  Inspector Cody started to think the slaying could have been a “racketeer murder,” and he followed up on a lead that he thought connected Markus to the two men from Detroit. A few days later, he learned that the real M.J. Markus, a racketeer from Cincinnati, had been dead for a month.

  Cody and Chief George J. Matowitz then started looking at the political hookup with the East 105th Street gangsters who were often called in to help during an election. Neither officer would elaborate on where they got that information. “Potter had his finger in everything that would bring him money,” Matowitz said.

  A taxi driver who picked up a fare on East 105th Street and Morrison Avenue on Tuesday at 6:30 p.m. was questioned. The fare’s description fit Markus. The man went into the building and came right back out with a stylishly dressed young blond woman. The taxi took them back to East 105th Street.

  Inspector Cody figured Potter’s financial situation must have been dire because Beatrice asked tenants who rented their former home for an advance on rent. She and her husband had moved out of their spacious home to a remodeled bungalow directly behind their former home.

  Cody and two other detectives went to Potter’s home to speak with his wife and to look at his personal papers. Beatrice refused to let them go through h
is desk. Her attorney, William J. Corrigan, told the detectives that he had looked through the papers and there was nothing in them that could help solve his murder.

  They did learn from neighbors that there had been break-ins as well as beggars in the neighborhood.

  While authorities looked toward Detroit for Potter’s murderer, Cleveland city law director Harold Burton looked to see if the city could offer a reward. City council drafted a resolution authorizing a $5,000 reward for information leading to an arrest.

  The murder weapon turned up in the possession of a police officer named Harry O. Mizer. On the morning of February 4, a citizen found the .38-caliber gun not far from the Parkwood apartment where Potter was murdered and turned it in to Mizer, who had thought nothing of it and failed to turn it over as evidence.

  The butt of the gun contained blood and hair. The hair was similar in texture to the hair found on the sofa where Potter had died. The ballistics expert could not match the bullets to the gun because they were too distorted.

  After some investigation into Mizer’s background, it was found that a Cleveland bootlegger had helped him get on the force. Mizer was immediately fired.

  Finally, police got a name. It came from the lips of a pretty bobbed-haired blonde, Betty Gray, who lived with a gangster, J.J. Redlick, in the apartment downstairs. It turned out she had spent some time in Pittsburgh as a hooker. Under questioning, she admitted knowing the man she had seen in the building hallway as “Hymie from Pittsburgh.”

  Pittsburgh police were well acquainted with twenty-eight-year-old Hyman Martin. To them, he was no more than an expensively dressed ladies’ man, a two-bit hood and bootlegger. They did have photos and provided them to Cleveland officers.

  When Detective Bernard Wolf showed Martin’s pictures to witnesses at the Parkwood Apartments, they all recognized him. Laub positively identified Martin as the man who rented the apartment. Sixteen-year-old Queen Esther Morgan, also a resident of Parkwood Apartments, was sure she had seen him in the building. A beat cop identified Martin as one of two men he saw talking to Potter on the afternoon of February 3.