Birmingham letter on the postponed Capone habeas corpus hearing (21 October 1932)
The Bureau's Birmingham Special Agent in Charge reports that the hearing on Capone's petition for a writ of habeas corpus at Atlanta was postponed to 11 November 1932 and that the U.S. Attorney at Chicago asked for no Bureau action.
- Date
- 1932-10-21
- Kind
- case-file
- Source
- FBI Records: The Vault
- Retrieved
- 2026-10-12
- Rights
- A record of the Federal Bureau of Investigation released under FOIA. A work of the United States government, public domain under 17 U.S.C. § 105. Newspaper text reproduced inside the file is described, not reproduced.
Part 30 of the FBI Vault’s Capone file, scan 71, with the enclosed newspaper items on scans 72 to 74. A one-page letter on U.S. Bureau of Investigation letterhead, 201 Liberty National Life Building, Birmingham, Alabama, dated October 21, 1932, from M. H. Purvis, Special Agent in Charge, to the Director. It is stamped 69-180-132.
Purvis writes that, following a telephone call from Mr. Egan on Tuesday, October 18, 1932, he saw Dwight Green, United States Attorney at Chicago, and Mr. Youngquist, Assistant Attorney General, on October 19, 1932. “The hearing on the writ of habeas corpus on the part of Alphonse Capone was not held on that date, and has been postponed until November 11, 1932. Therefore, no action was requested by Mr. Green, and he stated that he did not believe any would be necessary.” He attaches items from the Atlanta newspapers.
The research index for Part 30 describes the enclosures as Atlanta Georgian and Atlanta Constitution items reporting that Federal Judge Underwood had postponed the hearing and that Capone’s new attorneys relied on the contention that the statute of limitations in income-tax cases is three years. Those articles are described here, not reproduced. Capone was then held at the U.S. Penitentiary at Atlanta on the 1931 tax conviction. The letter text was read from the page image stored here.
