By Reason of Insanity Read online

  Harry was so mad he sat down and cursed his lungs out, vowing to remain there forever if necessary. Staring with grim determination at the court, Harry’s mind eventually saw Chessman walk out alone, whereupon he ran over him with a tank, stuck a grenade in his mouth, chopped him to pieces with a machine gun and killed him eighteen times with one clip of his trusty .45, after which he shot him ten times in the groin just to make sure. Satisfied, Harry did it all over again.

  After a while the rain started and Harry left the park. When he got home he found the loaded clip in his other pocket. He had indeed learned to load the bullets, but he forgot to insert the clip in the .45. The gun was empty.

  That same night Harry sold the gun and made back the fifty he had paid for it. The buyer told Harry that he already knew how to load it. “Don’t everybody?” he said.

  The very next month Harry Owens got the break he had been waiting for all his life, a shot at a big score, the big money. The bankroll he needed to get away. He was twenty-eight years old and had never really had much of anything. A drifter since his teens, he had come out of the west Texas slums working whatever jobs he could find. Always moving on down the line, he hit Los Angeles at twenty-one and stayed a while. Then he met Sara Bishop and got in over his head. Now was his chance to get out with something, maybe the only one he’d ever get.

  Hany was good with cars, driving them, fixing them. His aptitude was quickly noted by a few acquaintances at one of his hangouts, a bar on the city’s north side that catered to a rough-and-ready sort. Like him, these men were drifters of little education and limited job potential. They were not criminals in the usual sense of the word; rather, they were blue-collar opportunists who worked at whatever was available while they sought a big killing that would put them on easy street. Dreamers all, they were yet realistic enough to know that such a venture would require a certain risk. War veterans mostly, they had lived with violence and had seen death and destruction, and they were just alienated enough to be willing to gamble their futures on a quick throw of the dice. None had records beyond the misdemeanor stage, and only one was married. When Harry joined the group he made them six. Complete now, they plotted and planned and waited for their turn at the dice.

  They did not have long to wait.

  February is a bad month in Los Angeles and gets worse toward the end. On this dark February morning the rain had been falling steadily since midnight. The sky was an angry gray and even the sun had trouble finding the city. In the business areas people stumbled into offices and stores soaked to the skin. Everywhere houses leaked, lawns drowned and new foundations settled. It was February 22, 1952, the day six men had picked to rob Overland Pacific, the country’s biggest armored-car company, of a million dollars.

  While mothers all over the city hurried their children off to school and policemen on the day shift lined up for inspection, a massive black-and-white fortress on wheels lumbered out of Overland’s main terminal, eased past the barbed wire-topped steel fence and slowly turned right into traffic. Built short and stubby, its riveted 12-gauge steel-plated body sprouting concealed air vents and gunports on all four sides, the ten-ton monster gradually picked up speed.

  Inside, behind tinted bulletproof windows, the driver and his partner cursed the weather, the world, and the work they were doing. Friday was a “dog day,” a day of heavy cash flow and many stops. Their schedule called for seventy-five such stops in the eight hours they would be on duty. The grumbling continued in good-natured fashion until the first stop, a Los Angeles branch of a statewide loan company. From his seat the driver locked the steel door separating the cab from the truck’s main compartment. In the back the guard opened the rear door and peered out cautiously. Seeing nothing suspicious, he quickly hopped out with a bag of currency and entered the squat building, his gun in hand, barrel pointed down. In a moment he returned and, after a look from the driver, the electrically operated rear door opened and he reentered the truck.

  In the next hour the driver-guard team made nine more stops, mostly to banks and stores. The cash flow was heavy, as expected, and several times required the assistance of a dolly. At some stops money was delivered, at others it was picked up. But always the procedure was the same. The driver would park, with the motor running, in such a way that he could see his partner enter and leave the building. He would then lock the compartment door, which was usually left open for conversation when both men were in the truck. While his partner used the rear door for money handling, the driver would sit safely in the cab, encased in steel and bulletproof glass. If anything went wrong he could set off a siren and quickly radio for help. When a stop was completed the guard would show himself to the driver before the rear door was again opened for him. At no time would the team leave the truck together.

  By ten o’clock they had made twenty-one stops and were beginning to feel bored and irritable. Rain still beat rhythmically on the steel roof. Roy Druski, the driver, wished that he were home in bed. Or better yet, with his girlfriend home in her bed. A lewd thought crossed his mind and he laughed.

  Druski had never encountered trouble on the job; he didn’t really believe that anyone would be dumb enough to try a hijack on his truck. After five years with Overland he didn’t think about the money anymore; it could as easily have been toilet tissue. His partner, Fred Stubb, younger and with the company only a year, liked the job and liked the guns. He just wished somebody would try something.

  Their twenty-second stop was a shopping center a mile away. Pulling into the lot, the armored car handling ponderously as a Sherman tank, Druski braked it to a squealing halt in front of a long low building. With exaggerated thoroughness he inched it backward and forward until the vehicle was up against the entrance. Satisfied, he shut off the motor. Stubb, unmindful of the breach of regulations, stepped out of the rear and checked both ways for signs of trouble. Finding none, he scurried into the building and disappeared.

  In the black sedan that had been waiting for the Overland truck to show, two men peered intently through the rain. The driver, a big man wearing a brown jacket over a service revolver, noted the sudden lack of exhaust fumes from the truck. He shook his head in disgust. The man beside him kept his eyes on the vast parking lot and on each car that splashed by. Without words, they sat there tense and watchful. They were an Overland security team on backup surveillance.

  Stubb soon emerged with the store’s deposit, two full bags, which he carried past the cab to the rear. Nothing happened. Cursing, he banged on the door until it finally opened. His cursing continued inside. Another moment and the engine roared to life. With heavy gears meshing noisily, Druski pulled away from the entrance, turned left into an exit lane and continued to the roadway, where he turned right. The black sedan followed. It was 10:15 Pacific Coast time.

  Eight minutes later, after a frustrating string of red lights, Druski pulled around the rear of a huge supermarket in Highland Park, a suburb of Los Angeles. Again he shut the motor, because he wanted to continue reading the newspaper while Stubb went in for the money—still another breach of company regulations. He was going to take his girl to the movies that evening and he wished to see if a good cops-and-robbers picture was playing anywhere. If not, he told himself, he could always show her his own gun. He laughed again.

  Twenty yards away three silent men sat in a stolen Buick watching Stubb enter the hallway behind the market. Business was good even on this rainy day, and the car was lost among hundreds of others in the sprawling shopping center. Inside, the men waited impatiently, knowing that very soon they would be rich. The plan, remarkably simple, was for two members of the group to overpower the guard in the building and hold him while a third put on his jacket, tie and cap and walked out with the money. In the rain the driver wouldn’t notice the difference. When the rear door opened, the other two would quickly bring out the guard and jump in the truck. Threatening to kill the guard, they would force the driver to open the compartment door, and Harry Owens would then leap in th
e cab and drive away. The men in the car would cover the hijack in case of trouble, following it to a barn a mile away, where they would quickly divide the money and disappear in two waiting cars. They had the plan and they had the rain; now all they needed was a little luck.

  Carl Hansun, age thirtysix, nervously gripped the steering wheel. He was tall, with iron-gray hair already thinning. A native of Washington, he had worked as a lumberjack until the war took him to a dozen Pacific islands. With one lung all shot up and a steel plate in his head, Hansun figured he didn’t have too long, and he wanted to go out in style. Next to him sat Harry Owens, waiting to race over to the armored car. Harry had awakened with a premonition of disaster, which he didn’t mention to the others when they met at eight o’clock. Before he left home he had glanced at his wife Sara, asleep in the other room. He didn’t expect to see her again.

  In the back seat Johnny Messick stared out the window. A drifter with no permanent base or allegiance, Messick was pushing thirty and worked occasionally as a short-order cook. On this day he carried a gun that he hoped would not be needed.

  Carl Hansun lit a Camel and immediately coughed. He took a second deep drag and broke into a coughing fit. “Goddam,” he muttered hoarsely, “can’t even smoke no more.” His pack was empty. He crushed the burning end on the window and snapped the cigarette in half and put the good halfback in the empty pack.

  Across twenty yards of driving rain the armored car stood motionless. Johnny Messick looked at his watch. “What’s keeping them?” he asked. No one answered him.

  Inside the building, in the darkened hallway, three men wearing butcher’s aprons had just seized the guard by surprise. In a matter of seconds one of them, Hank Green, age twenty-eight, was walking toward the exit with the guard’s keys and pistol, and the deposit bag in his hand. The other two, Don Solis, thirty-four, and his brother Lester, thirty, covered the guard at the exit door.

  When Green walked out the door the three men in the Buick held their breath. In a few moments they would know all about their future. The time was 10:27 and counting.

  Carl Hansun had planned the robbery after weeks of careful scrutiny. He had studied the routes of the armored cars, learned the routines of the guards, their timing and techniques. A steal in the central city was quickly ruled out because of traffic and tight security. What was needed was an open spot with minimum protection: a supermarket rather than a bank, a supermarket in a large shopping center. Highland Park seemed the best bet. The inside men could do their job with little chance of interference, while those in the car would go unnoticed unless needed, Everything depended on getting the driver to open the rear door for the phony guard, and Hansun planned on natural carelessness and a heavy rain to take care of that.

  In numerous run-throughs while waiting for the right day, Hansun and the others clocked the operation at ninety seconds from the time Hank Green left the building to Harry Owens driving the truck away. One minute thirty seconds.

  Roy Druski looked at his watch. What the hell was keeping Stubb? Flicking an eye at the doorway, unable to see anything clearly through the rain, he spotted Stubb coming out with the deposit bag. “About time,” he mumbled to himself. He put down the paper and waved his arm to let Stubb know he had been seen this time. Then he pressed the button to open the rear door and went back to his paper.

  As Hank Green pulled the door wide he motioned to his companions in the hall. They quickly came out, Stubb between them, each wearing a butcher’s apron. To the two men in the black sedan parked nearby, they looked like three supermarket butchers going out for a smoke. Except nobody smokes in the rain. The two men tensed, watched in amazement as the butchers jumped into the truck behind the guard. A hand quickly reached for the two-way radio.

  Inside the truck Don Solis shoved Stubb against the compartment door separating them from the driver. “Open it up,” he rasped. “Open it or I’ll kill him.” He forced his gun into Stubb’s mouth. Behind the bulletproof glass Roy Druski heard him, saw the three men, Stubb, the gun. He hesitated. Instead of his whole life flashing before him, he thought only of his being safe in the cab, with the currency bags, the big money, on the jump seat beside him. Then he heard Solis’ voice again. “I’ll kill him, so help me,” Solis screamed. “Open it!” Druski knew the man would pull the trigger. Moving swiftly now, he did as he was told.

  Unseen by the two men in the black sedan, their attention riveted on the armored car in front of them, Harry Owens had already left the Buick and was sprinting toward the truck. They spotted him as he jumped in, the rear door slamming behind him. “Where the hell did he come from?” one said irritably and reached for the radio again.

  A moment later the Overland truck roared to life, Harry at the wheel. Jamming the gears, he slammed down on the accelerator, and the armored car shuddered—and stalled. Cursing, Harry frantically worked the gears and tried again, the rain muting the sound of the starter. No luck, the motor wouldn’t catch. Precious seconds were being lost as the whining continued.

  In the Buick Carl Hansun saw his future fall apart. The truck wasn’t moving, something was wrong. All he could think of was the driver, that he didn’t unlock the compartment door. Hansun started the car. He had hoped there would be no shooting, he had told the Solis brothers not to shoot unless absolutely necessary. He was so damn sure the driver would obey. The next moment he swerved into an open lane and roared the Buick down to the truck, slamming to a stop across the back. He banged on the door, shouting, until it opened. Inside he quickly saw the trouble—Harry Owens. The dumb son of a bitch couldn’t even make it move.

  “Get the bags,” Hansun shouted. “Get all you can in the car.” He grabbed one and flung it out of the truck. “Not the coin bags, just the money.” For the next few seconds three of them tossed bags of currency into the waiting hands of Johnny Messick while Don Solis covered the driver-guards. “Keep them away from the guns back here,” Hansun ordered, picking up a Mossberg pump-action riot gun and a shotgun. In the cab Harry was still kicking the starter.

  Nearby the Overland backup team watched anxiously, waiting for reinforcements. If necessary, they would follow the car. What they didn’t understand was why the gang didn’t just drive off with the truck. “It’s dumb,” said one. The other agreed. “I hope they’re not so dumb they kill the guys in there.” The driver’s eyes narrowed. “If they don’t take any hostages, we won’t either.”

  Up ahead Hansun jumped out of the truck. “There’s still bags up here,” Don Solis shouted. He was told to leave them. “C’mon, we got enough,” said his brother on the way out. Solis looked at all the money still in the cab, then he slowly turned to Harry Owens getting out of the driver’s seat. “It’s all your fault,” he said softly as he shot Harry twice. Racing past the two guards, he banged the rear door shut and followed the others into the car.

  “He shot them,” whispered the driver of the black sedan in disbelief. He turned the engine. “The bastard shot them,” he repeated, zooming out of the space and after the fleeing Buick. “The hell with waiting. We’ll take them now.”

  In and out of busy lanes the two cars weaved in a wet zigzag scramble for the road. Messick spotted the tail. “Cops,” he muttered savagely. At the next parking intersection Hansun sped across, braked a sharp left at the first lane and suddenly swerved into an empty double space. “The shotgun,” he yelled to Messick as the squealing of tires came closer. Throwing open the door on his side, Messick stepped out as the sedan flashed into view. “Now!” roared Hansun, and Messick let go with both barrels dead on the moving target in a heavy rain at fifteen feet.

  The sedan shuddered as the shotgun loaded with sabot blasted away much of the front end. That it kept going at all was due to sheer momentum. With the left front wheel collapsed, the car skidded madly for a moment before flipping over and crashing up against a panel truck. A hubcap sailed crazily in the air.

  While the Overland backup team scrambled out of the wreck Hansun gunned the Buick and s
hot forward through the front row of cars and into the next lane. Turning right on two wheels, he raced the lane all the way to the exit and out of the parking lot. “We done it,” Hank Green shouted, holding up one of the money bags from the floor. “We goddam done it.”

  By the time Overland security and the police arrived, the Buick was being traded for two other cars, which promptly fled into the noonday gloom and disappeared.

  In the shopping center lot the driver of the demolished sedan was cursing himself for trying to do the job alone. He was also thanking his gods for still being alive. His partner, equally shaken but unhurt, wondered if they would be fired.

  Elsewhere ambulance attendants were lifting the body of Harry Owens onto a stretcher. One bullet had entered his right side, the other his upper right arm. Seriously wounded, he was rushed to nearby Community Hospital. Roy Druski and Fred Stubb were taken to police headquarters to tell their story, and afterward driven to Overland’s central Los Angeles office. The armored car was checked for prints after the remaining money was transferred to another team to complete the route.

  While reporters were getting details of the robbery for their metropolitan dailies, company investigators were already setting up a file on the operation, a file that would eventually be sent through an industry clearing house to every bonded money carrier and security firm in the country. Included in the report would be each specific detail of the robbery. All that would be missing were the names of the participants.

  These too would shortly be known.

  Three days after the shooting Harry Owens died in the hospital without regaining consciousness. The more serious of the two entrance wounds had traveled downward, smashing his spleen and liver. His premonition of disaster had been accurate. So was his belief that he would never see his wife Sara again.