Threatening letter with pencil drawings, exhibit in United States v. Salvatore Lo Bue (file page 23)
A handwritten Italian letter on lined paper, beginning 'Caro Mr Franch', with pencil drawings of one figure attacking another and of a cross over a tomb, and brown stains that the catalog says may be human blood.
- Date
- 1915
- Kind
- case-file
- Retrieved
- 2026-10-12
- NAID
- 355459444
- Rights
- A record of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division, held by the National Archives at Chicago in Record Group 21. A United States government work, public domain in the United States under 17 U.S.C. § 105. The National Archives catalog lists access and use as unrestricted.
This is file page 23 of the case file NAID 355459444, a letter mounted on a backing sheet marked “-3-” at the foot. It is written in capital letters in Italian on creased, lined paper and begins “Caro Mr Franch.” The text warns the recipient that he must pay if he wants to save his life, or pay with blood, for himself and his family. That English gloss is this archive’s approximate reading of the Italian; the court’s translation, which is in the file, was not read.
Below the text are pencil drawings of one figure aiming an object at another, and of a cross standing over a box. The catalog describes the drawings as “one individual attacking another” and “a tomb with a cross above it.” Brown stains are spread across the paper; the catalog note says, “The paper may contain human blood.” No record opened says the stains were tested.
The letter is an exhibit in a criminal prosecution; the catalog note does not state the outcome. The image is the National Archives’ scan, stored here as a reduced copy.
