On this day in 1921, the Minneapolis Morning Tribune reported that Fred Rabinowsky, a box car robbery suspect arrested by Detective Joseph Berry (pictured above), was charged with grand larceny for the theft of five cases of shoes from a Great Northern Railroad freight car.
The man was taken in custody in the Gateway District and when searched was carrying a skeleton key, a file, and a private detective’s badge. He admitted the theft of the five cases of shoes to Detective Berry and led him to a place on the Mississippi River bank where the shoes were hidden.
When the hiding place was searched the discovery was made, according to the arrest report, that three of the five cases of shoes had already been stolen by a man in whom Rabinowsky had confided details of the robbery.
Photograph of Detective Joseph Berry taken in 1922 and shown courtesy of Hennepin County Library