Joseph Force Crater

Joseph Force Crater


Born: January 5, 1889; Easton, Pennsylvania, U.S.
Disappeared: August 6, 1930 (aged 41); New York, New York, U.S.
Status: Declared dead in absentia; June 6, 1939
Alma mater:
Lafayette College
Columbia University
Occupation: Justice of New York Supreme Court for New York County
Known for: Unexplained disappearance

Joseph Force Crater (January 5, 1889 – disappeared August 6, 1930; declared legally dead June 6, 1939) was an American lawyer who served as a New York State Supreme Court Justice and mysteriously vanished shortly after the state began an investigation into corruption in New York City. Despite massive publicity, the missing persons case was never solved and was officially closed forty years after Crater was declared dead.

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Disappearance

Crater and his wife were vacationing at their summer cabin in Belgrade, Maine in the summer of 1930, shortly after the anti-corruption inquiry began. In late July, Crater received a telephone call. He told his wife nothing about the call other than to say that he had to return to New York City "to straighten those fellows out". The next day, he arrived at his apartment at 40 Fifth Avenue in Greenwich Village but, instead of dealing with business, he went to Atlantic City, New Jersey with showgirl Sally Lou Ritz.

Crater returned to Maine on August 1, then traveled back to New York City on August 3, promising his wife that he would return by her birthday on August 9. She stated that he was in good spirits and behaving normally when he left. On the morning of August 6, Crater spent two hours going through his files in his chambers, reportedly destroying several documents. He then had law clerk Joseph Mara cash two checks for him that amounted to US $5,150 (equivalent to about $93,930 in 2023). At noon, Crater and Mara carried two locked briefcases to Crater's apartment, where Crater told Mara to take the rest of the day off.

That evening, Crater went to a Broadway ticket agency run by friend Joseph Gransky and reserved one seat for a comedy called Dancing Partner at the Belasco Theatre; Gransky was surprised because he and Crater had already seen a preview of the show. Crater then ate dinner at Billy Haas's Chophouse at 332 West 45th Street with Ritz and William Klein, a lawyer friend. Crater's dinner companions gave differing accounts of his departure from the restaurant. Klein initially testified that "the judge got into a taxicab outside the restaurant about 9:30 p.m. and drove west on Forty-fifth Street." This account was initially confirmed by Ritz: "At the sidewalk Judge Crater took a taxicab." Klein and Ritz later changed their story and said that they had entered a taxi outside the restaurant, but Crater had walked down the street.

Crater's disappearance did not elicit any immediate reaction. When he did not return to Maine after ten days, his wife began making calls to their friends in New York, asking whether anyone had seen him. His fellow justices became alarmed when Crater failed to appear for the opening of the courts on August 25; they started a private investigation but failed to find any trace of him. The police were notified on September 3, and after that the missing judge was front-page news.

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