# Evening Star, 23 December 1929, page 1: Burke gun held used in massacre

Canonical: https://mobfiles.org/clippings/clip-evening-star-1929-12-23-p1/

Associated Press front-page report of 23 December 1929 that Maj. Calvin H. Goddard testified before the reconvened coroner's jury that bullets from the seven victims matched test bullets fired from machine guns found in Fred Burke's home.

Front page of the Evening Star, 23 December 1929. The story is credited "By the Associated Press," datelined Chicago, December 23, with the deck "Ballistic Expert Finds Test Bullets Marked Like Those in Moran Death." It opens: "Maj. Calvin H. Goddard, ballistic expert, asserted today that markings found on bullets taken from the bodies of the seven victims of the Moran gang massacre last February were identical with markings on bullets fired from the" machine guns found in Fred Burke's home at St. Joseph, Michigan.

The report says Goddard gave this testimony "before the coroner’s jury reconvened today," that he "fired 35 bullets from the weapons," and that he "pronounced the peculiar riflings on the lead noses of the bullets and the ejector block markings on the shells identical." It adds that Coroner Bundesen had made a tentative identification and submitted the case to Goddard, "now a member of the faculty of Northwestern University’s Crime Detection School," and that Bert A. Massee sat on the reconvened jury.

The page reports the expert's testimony to the inquest. The United Press report of the same session in the Indianapolis Times uses "very similar" where this report has "identical." This archive records both wordings and does not take an inquest verdict from either page.

## Sources

- Library of Congress, Chronicling America: https://www.loc.gov/resource/sn83045462/1929-12-23/ed-1/?sp=1
- Library of Congress OCR text of this page: https://tile.loc.gov/text-services/word-coordinates-service?segment=/service/ndnp/dlc/batch_dlc_noone_ver01/data/sn83045462/00280600234/1929122301/0122.xml&format=alto_xml&full_text=1