In this episode, retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Detective Gary jenkins welcomes John Oller, a former lawyer turned nonfiction author focusing on American history, biography, and true crime. John has authored a compelling true-crime book titled Gangster Hunters, shedding light on the often-overlooked FBI agents who pursued infamous criminals such as John Dillinger, Pretty Boy Floyd, and Bonnie and Clyde. While these gangsters are well-known in pop culture, the agents who risked their lives to bring them down—aside from figures like J. Edgar Hoover and Melvin Purvis—remain largely unsung.

John takes us through his meticulous research process, which involved interviewing descendants of these agents and combing through FBI files. He paints a vivid picture of the early days of the FBI, where many agents, expecting desk jobs, found themselves facing off against heavily armed gangsters. We explore pivotal historical events, including the capture of Alvin Karpis, Hoover’s drive to portray himself as a hands-on lawman, and notorious shootouts involving Babyface Nelson and Ma Barker.

The conversation also delves into the reality of the gangster era, revealing how criminals often had superior firepower compared to law enforcement and how the FBI eventually adapted by recruiting sharpshooters, including ex-Texas Rangers, to handle these dangerous adversaries.

Please tune in for a deep dive into the world of early FBI agents and the harrowing challenges they faced in the fight against America's most dangerous criminals.

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Transcript

[0:00]Well, Hey, welcome all you wiretappers out there back here in the studio of gangland wire. This is retired Kansas city police intelligence unit, Sergeant Gary Jenkins with another show. We're going back into the thirties today. You know, you leave deal with these seventies gangsters a lot and, and, uh, sixties gangsters, uh, mafia, but this is going to go back to the thirties and the days of the bank robbers, the Midwest bank robbers. I mean, they, they caught out at got a wide swath across this country and we have a book by john aller gangster hunters and here it is and you'll you'll find links in the show notes to where you can find that book he does a great job of telling many of the unknown stories and the known stories in great detail of the famous bank robbers dillinger and uh pretty boy floyd and and uh the ma barker gang and and machine gun Kelly and all those great nicknames. So welcome, John. I really appreciate you coming on the show. Thanks for having me.

[1:02]John, how did you get into this? Tell us a little bit about your history. I was a lawyer for many years, and then I retired from active practice to pursue a writing career or writing avocation, I would call it. And I've concentrated on nonfiction, American history, biography and true crime I've done, this is my third true crime book which I find a genre that interests me what I found out is that while all the bank robbers Dillinger and Pretty Boy Floyd and Babyface Nelson, etc Bonnie and Clyde in particular have been written about many times over and movies made of them and everybody's heard of them very few people have heard know anything about the um kind of anonymous fbi agents who chased and captured and in some cases kil...