Arthur Simon Flegenheimer aka Dutch Schultz was born on 6 August 1901, to German Jewish immigrants Herman and Emma (Neu) Flegenheimer, who had married in Manhattan on 10 November 1900. He had a younger sister, Helen, born in 1904. Herman Flegenheimer apparently abandoned his family, and Emma is listed as divorced in the 1910 census.
Flegenheimer dropped out of school in the 8th grade to help support himself and his mother. He worked as a feeder and pressman for the Clark Loose Leaf Company, Caxton Press, American Express, and the Schultz Trucking in the Bronx between 1916 and 1919.
Flegenheimer was released on parole on 8 December 1920, and went back to work at Schultz Trucking. With the enactment of Volstead Act and the start of Prohibition in the United States the shipping company began smuggling liquor and beer into New York City from Canada.
This led Flegenheimer to start associating with known criminals. It was also during this time that Flegenheimer became better known as "Dutch" Schultz (Dutch is a corruption of "Deutsch"). Following a disagreement, he left Schultz Trucking and went to work for their Italian competitors. He made his fortune in organized crime-related activities, including bootlegging and the numbers racket.
With the end of Prohibition, Dutch Schultz needed to find new sources of income. His answer came with Otto "Abbadabba" Berman and the Harlem numbers racket.
The numbers racket, the forerunner of "Pick 3" lotteries, required players to choose three numbers, which were then derived from the last number before the decimal in the handle (total amount bet) taken daily at Belmont Park.
Berman was a middle-aged accountant and math whiz who helped Schultz fix this racket. In a matter of seconds, Berman could mentally calculate the minimum amount of money Schultz needed to bet at the track in order to alter the odds at the last minute.
This strategy ensured that Schultz always controlled which numbers won, guaranteeing a larger number of losers in Harlem and a multimillion-dollar-a-month tax-free income for Schultz. Berman was reportedly paid $10,000 a week (the equivalent of $143,000 in 2016) for his valued insight.
Weakened by two tax evasion trials led by prosecutor Thomas Dewey, Schultz's rackets were also threatened by fellow mobster Lucky Luciano. In an attempt to avert his conviction, Schultz asked the Commission for permission to kill Dewey, which they refused. When Schultz disobeyed them and made an attempt to kill Dewey, the Commission ordered his murder in 1935.
New York Times, 24 October 1935.
After Dutch Schultz disobeyed the 'Commission' and attempted to carry out the hit himself, they ordered his murder in 1935. He was shot once, below the heart in the bathroom of the Palace Chop House restaurant but staggered out and sat a a table (not wanting to die in the bathroom). The hit was carried out by Murder Inc members (Charles Workman and Mendy Weiss, acting on orders from Lepke Bucchalter).
Schultz was shot at 10:15 p.m. on 23rd October 1935 while he was at the Palace Chop House restaurant at 12 East Park Street in Newark, New Jersey with Otto Berman, his accountant; Abe Landau, his new chief lieutenant; and his personal bodyguard, Bernard "Lulu" Rosenkrantz.
While he was in the men's room, two Murder, Inc. hitmen named Charles "The Bug" Workman and Emanuel "Mendy" Weiss, entered the establishment. Workman would be sentenced to 23 years in Trenton State Prison for the crime. In 1944, Weiss would be electrocuted for an unrelated killing at Sing Sing Correctional Facility on the same night as Louis Capone and Louis "Lepke" Buchalter.
Workman managed to enter the bathroom unnoticed to find Schultz either urinating or washing his hands. He fired at Schultz twice. A bullet struck him slightly below his heart, and ricocheted through his abdomen before exiting the small of his back.
Schultz collapsed onto the floor, and Workman joined Weiss in the back room of the restaurant where they fired several times at Schultz's gang members. Berman collapsed immediately after being shot. Landau's carotid artery was severed by a bullet passing through his neck, while Rosencrantz was hit repeatedly at point blank range with 00 lead buckshot.
Nevertheless, despite their injuries, both gangsters rose to their feet and returned fire driving the assassins out of the restaurant. Weiss jumped into the getaway car and ordered the driver to abandon Workman. Landau chased Workman out of the bar and emptied his pistol at him, though he missed. After Workman had fled on foot, Landau finally collapsed onto a nearby trash can.
Witnesses say Schultz staggered out of the bathroom, clutching his side, and sat at his table. He called for anyone who could hear him to get an ambulance. Rosencrantz rose to his feet and demanded the barman (who had hidden during the shootout) give him five nickels in exchange for his quarter. Rosencrantz called for an ambulance before he too lost consciousness.
When the first ambulance arrived, medics determined Landau and Rosencrantz were the most seriously wounded and needed to be taken immediately to Newark City Hospital. A second ambulance was called to take Schultz and Berman. Berman was unconscious, but Schultz was drifting in and out of lucidity, as police attempted to comfort him and get information. Because the medics had no pain relievers, Schultz was given brandy to relieve his suffering. Landau and Rosencrantz refused to say anything to the police until Schultz had given them permission after arriving in the second ambulance. Even then, they provided the police with only minimal information.
At 2:20 that morning, Otto Berman, the oldest and least physically fit of the four men, was the first to die. Abe Landau died of exsanguination at 6am. When Rosencrantz was taken into surgery, the surgeons were so incredulous that Rosencrantz was still alive despite his blood loss and ballistic trauma, they were unsure of how to treat him. He eventually died from his injuries 29 hours after the shooting.
Schultz received the last rites from a Catholic priest at his request just before he went into surgery; he was convinced that Jesus had spared him prison time. Doctors performed surgery but were unaware of the extent of damage done to his abdominal organs by the ricocheting bullet.
They were also unaware that Workman had intentionally used rust-coated bullets in an attempt to give Schultz a fatal bloodstream infection (sepsis) should he survive the gunshot. Schultz lingered for 22 hours, speaking in various states of lucidity with his wife, mother, a priest, police, and hospital staff, before dying of peritonitis.
By receiving last rites, Schultz was permitted interment in the Roman Catholic Gate of Heaven Cemetery in Hawthorne, Westchester County, New York, although, at the request of his Orthodox Jewish mother, Schultz's body was draped with a talit, a traditional Jewish prayer shawl.
23rd October 1935, New York, USA, The bloodied bullet ridden body of American gangster Arthur Flengheimer, known as Dutch Schultz, lies slumped over a table in the Newark Palace Chop House Restaurant after being fatally wounded in a shooting, He died two days later in hospital (Photo by Popperfoto/Getty Images)
Palace Chop House (24 October 1935), an obscure restaurant on 12 East Park Place in Newark, N.J. where enemies trapped Dutch Schultz, far from security of old strongholds in NYC. (Photo by NY Daily News Archive.)
Robert Treat Hotel in Newark, where Dutch Schultz was staying on 23rd October 1935.
12 E Park Street, Newark, N.J. some time in 2008; soon after it was demolished.
12 E Park St turned into a parking lot... gone forever... 2019.
Schultz a few hours before his death by blood poisoning...
Detective Michael Beachman reenacts the scene in the Palace; 23rd October 1935; Detective Michael Beachman reenacts the scene in the Palace Chop House where gangster Dutch Schultz and three of his aides were shot to death. (Photo by Leonard Detrick/NY Daily News Archive).
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