Corpun file 20889

Chicago Daily Tribune, 24 July 1936

Use Rubber Hose to Whip Youths for $10 Robbery

Get Five Lashes Apiece with Court's O.K.

Three youths convicted of a $10 robbery were given five lashes each with a doubled 5 foot length of three-quarter inch rubber hose in the chambers of Boys' court yesterday. The whippings were administered with the approval of Judge J.M. Braude in lieu of three month sentences in jail.

Each young man complied with a request to strip to the waist before the lashes were laid on by elder brothers of two of the defendants and an uncle of the third. Meanwhile Judge Braude remained on the bench. Joseph McGuire, the judge's bailif, who supplied the hose, witnessed the lashings, as did several other court attachés.

The youths whipped are Frank Buccieri, 17 years old, 810 South Paulina street; Gino Antonelli, 19 years old, 928 South Hermitage avenue, and Joseph Rossi, 19 years old, 818 South Hermitage avenue.

Older Brothers Intervene.

Last Monday, after hearing the case against the youths, Judge Braude declared: "I think I'll have to hold you to the grand jury." At that point Buccieri's brother, Fiore, 19 years old, and Rossi's brother, Nick, stepped before the bench. They pleaded that they be allowed to "take care" of their brothers.

"What do you mean?" asked Judge Braude.

"Just this, your honor," said Fiore, and held up a doubled fist, which he struck resoundingly into his other palm.

"O, you mean to beat him up," said Judge Braude. "Maybe it's not a bad idea. You two come back here Thursday and I'll see that you have a hose to do it with."

He then reduced the robbery charge to petty larceny and continued the case until yesterday.

Utters No Sound.

When the young defendants and their relatives appeared in court yesterday the hose was ready. Fiore was the first to administer the lashes, and he did so with apparent pleasure and vigor on his brother Frank, it was reported by court attachés. After each lash, a red welt appeared on Frank's back and he gritted his teeth. His eyes watered, but he uttered no sound.

Nick Rossi, who is 24 years old, then wielded the lash on his younger brother, Joseph, according to the court's instruction, and Dan Depaolis, 38 years old, of 818 South Hermitage avenue, Gino's uncle, with whom he lives, swung the lash on Gino.

When the whippings were finished Judge Braude ordered that the three defendants be kept under court supervision until Dec. 21 and remain apart. Afterwards he said:

"For a certain type of boy I think whipping is a very good form of punishment. These boys were trying to be tough. They needed a beating."

Court Is Criticized.

Helen Cirese, chairman of the committee for the defense of prisoners of the Chicago Bar association, said she "could not believe it."

"It is cruel and inhuman punishment, and according to our laws, it is absolutely unlawful," said Miss Cirese. "We have enough laws to punish crime if they are properly invoked. If the brothers had taken the boys out to the wood shed and spanked them, that might have been all right. But to beat them under the guise of legal pronouncement is wrong."

"It is entirely outside the scope of a judge's powers to order a beating administered in his chambers," said C.P. Denning, executive secretary of the bar association.

Judge Braude, reached at his home last night, said: "I didn't order the whipping. It was suggested by the brothers, and I let them use the court chambers to administer it. The constitution prohibits any unusual punishment, but when they suggested the whipping I thought it a good thing from the point of view of social therapeutics."

The youths were charged with robbing David Liewski of Oil City, Pa., of $10 at Madison and Halsted streets July 19. Liewski at first declined to identify the trio in court, then did so, saying: "They promised to give me my money back if I didn't testify against them."