Robert Emmett Crowe (January 22, 1879 - January 18, 1958) was a Chicago lawyer and politician, who is best known as the prosecutor in the 1924

Leopold and Loeb Nathan Freudenthal Leopold Jr. (November 19, 1904 – August 29, 1971) and Richard Albert Loeb (; June 11, 1905 – January 28, 1936), usually referred to collectively as Leopold and Loeb, were two American students at the University of Chicago ...

murder case. He was 45 at the time and it would shape his career."Robert Crowe Services Set for Tomorrow", ''Chicago Daily Tribune'', Jan 20, 1958, p. 14. A product of Chicago public schools, Crowe graduated from Yale with a law degree in 1901. One of Crowe's early legal associates was

Leo Koretz Leopold Koretz (1879–1925) was an American lawyer who ran an elaborate Ponzi scheme in Chicago, called the "Bayano oil fraud," which garnered an estimated $30 million (about $450 million today) from dozens of investors in Chicago. The scheme us ...

, against whom Crowe would later file charges for running a massive

Ponzi scheme A Ponzi scheme (, ) is a form of fraud that lures investors and pays Profit (accounting), profits to earlier investors with Funding, funds from more recent investors. Named after Italians, Italian confidence artist Charles Ponzi, this type of s ...

. With the help of Chicago Mayor

William Hale Thompson William Hale Thompson (May 14, 1869 – March 19, 1944) was an American politician who served as mayor of Chicago from 1915 to 1923 and again from 1927 to 1931. Known as "Big Bill",Paul Reynolds (BBC journalist), Reynolds, Paul (November 29, 200 ...

, popularly known as "Big Bill" Thompson, Crowe was elected a

Cook County Circuit Court The Circuit Court of Cook County is the largest of the 25 Illinois circuit courts, circuit courts (trial courts of original jurisdiction, original and general jurisdiction) in the judiciary of Illinois as well as one of the largest unified cour ...

judge in 1916. Three years later, Crowe achieved a level of fame and notoriety by imposing the death penalty on Thomas Fitzgerald, who had pleaded guilty to the murder of his neighbor, 6-year-old Janet Dolly Wilkinson. The following year, with Thompson's continued backing, he was elected

Cook County state's attorney The Cook County State's Attorney is the District attorney, chief prosecutor for Cook County, Illinois. The State's Attorney oversees the second-largest prosecutor's office in the United States, with over 600 attorneys and 1,200 employees. The off ...

. In 1924, he prosecuted Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb for the premeditated murder of Bobby Franks, squaring off against defender

Clarence Darrow Clarence Seward Darrow (; April 18, 1857 – March 13, 1938) was an American lawyer who became famous in the 19th century for high-profile representations of trade union causes, and in the 20th century for several criminal matters, including the ...

References

Bibliography

* Baatz, Simon. ''For the Thrill of It: Leopold, Loeb and the Murder that Shocked Chicago'' (HarperCollins, 2008) {{DEFAULTSORT:Crowe, Robert E. 1879 births 1958 deaths Cook County state's attorneys Illinois Republicans Illinois state court judges Lawyers from Chicago Politicians from Chicago