From the Statesman's Window

Red-headed William E. ("Rarin' Bill") Potter, Cleveland councilman until ousted in connection with that city's land-grant scandals in 1928-29, dropped into the City Hall within the fortnight for a chat with some of his old friends. They stood in an alcove long known ironically as "The Statesman's Window," from the highly political railleries exchanged there when voluble Mr. Potter was on the Council. Perhaps they discussed some of the 13 suits which have been started against him since 1924, or the perjury trial against him then pending, or the fact that he was broke. At any rate, he interrupted the conversation to telephone his wife that he would be "a little late for dinner." Then he marched from "The Statesman's Window" to obscurity. Shortly before 6 o'clock that night he was seen at a Euclid Village tourist restaurant and was not seen again. Three days later his wife reported his disappearance to the police.

They found him last week in a bad district of Cleveland, sprawling on an apartment-house sofa, his skull bashed in and a bullet in his head. He was dead.

Investigation proved that the room had been rented by a nattily dressed, swarthy man about 5 ft. 8 in. in height, who gave his name as "M. J. Marcus." Pittsburgh police quickly arrested a notorious gangster. Hyman ("Hymie") Martin, who tallied with the description except that he stands over 6 ft. Martin admitted he had been in Cleveland on the evening of the murder. But he loudly protested that he knew nothing of the "bumping-off," crying: "I'm a gentleman, a rum-runner!"

Theories as to the motive for killing Potter were varied. One said he had been "put on the spot" by racketeers. Another called attention to the fact that one Liston Schooley, like Potter a city official ousted by the land-scandal investigations in 1929 (and like him, an old gossiper in "The Statesman's Window"), was about to give further testimony concerning those scandals before a grand jury. Observers wondered if Potter, in order to obtain funds for attorneys' fees in his forthcoming trial, had offered to supplement what was known in the land-grant case. It was said that many an official crook would have wished his death in that event. The Cleveland Plain Dealer went so far in its news columns as to remark: "Is it possible that whoever killed Bill Potter considered . . . that in the ensuing hubbub . . . there would be a not too gentle warning to Listen Schooley to keep his mouth shut?"

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