On the morning of June 17, 1933, 29-year-old Detective William J. 'Red' Grooms, a male officer with the Kansas City Police Department, was killed in a violent ambush that would become infamous in American history. Detective Grooms had been assigned to a detail at Union Station in Kansas City, Missouri, tasked with transporting a federal prisoner, Frank 'Jelly' Nash.
Nash, a convicted bank robber, had been arrested the previous day in Hot Springs, Arkansas, and was being escorted back to the U.S. Penitentiary in Leavenworth, Kansas, by a team of law enforcement officers including FBI agents and local police.
As the officers exited the train station and approached a Chevrolet sedan parked outside to load the prisoner, they were suddenly fired upon by multiple assailants armed with submachine guns. The gunmen, who had been lying in wait to liberate Nash, unleashed a barrage of bullets upon the group. Detective Grooms was struck and killed instantly in the initial volley, falling to the pavement alongside his partner, Detective Frank Hermanson. The attack also claimed the lives of McAlester, Oklahoma Police Chief Otto Reed and FBI Agent Raymond Caffrey. In the chaos, the prisoner Frank Nash was also shot and killed, thwarting the rescue attempt.
The investigation into the massacre, which resulted in the deaths of four law enforcement officers and their prisoner, sparked a massive nationwide manhunt. Authorities identified the primary suspects as notorious gangsters Vernon Miller, Charles 'Pretty Boy' Floyd, and Adam Richetti. The gunmen fled the scene immediately after the shooting. Vernon Miller was later found beaten and strangled to death in Detroit, Michigan, in November 1933, likely killed by criminal associates who viewed him as a liability due to the intense heat the massacre brought upon the underworld.
The pursuit of the remaining suspects continued for over a year. Charles 'Pretty Boy' Floyd was eventually tracked down and killed by FBI agents in an Ohio cornfield in October 1934, maintaining his innocence in the Kansas City killings until his death. Adam Richetti was arrested in Wellsville, Ohio, following a gunfight with police. He was subsequently extradited to Missouri, where he stood trial for the murders. Richetti was convicted of the crime and sentenced to death; he was executed in the gas chamber at the Missouri State Penitentiary on October 7, 1938.
