The Secret Six: The Rise and Fall of Chicago's Greatest Vigilantes

In winter 1930, an unprecedented force for good emerged from the chaos of crime-ridden Chicago: The Secret Six. Supported by the Windy City's richest and most powerful businesspeople, the vigilantes took on extortionists, bombers, bank robbers, kidnappers, and eventually Al Capone himself. Using the latest crime-fighting technologies of the era, the Secret Six caught dirty cops, won convictions in cases large and small, and helped launch Eliot Ness and the Untouchables. And when Capone went to prison, he credited the group for bringing him down. The Secret Six inspired a movie featuring Clark Gable, testified before Congress, and wrote authoritatively about crime for the national press. Quickly, cities throughout America began emulating the Secret Six with their own vigilante forces.

But there was a dark side to the heroics and international praise. Wealth, unchecked power, and the raw spirit of vigilantism corrupted the Secret Six from their inception. They victimized the innocent, tortured the guilty, and bragged about it, and after three years of lies, mistakes and misdeeds that were as laughable as they were tragic, the effort collapsed in disgrace.

Nearly forgotten, The Secret Six brings this group back to life for the first time with the full, true story about what happens when good men in a large, chaotic city take the law into their own hands.

Kevin E. Meredith first covered crime in 1985 as a general reporter for The News of Orange County in Hillsborough, NC, a historic town with its fair share of armed robbery, hostage taking, and theft. As an award-winning reporter at the Savannah News-Press, he covered the military, local education, and election corruption. Since earning his MBA in 1994, he has focused his professional life on the sale of computer technologies, but has continued to write on diverse topics, including evolutionary psychology, history, and crime.