Morris Rudensky became a well-known writer for an inmate-run magazine called The Atlantian while incarcerated at United States Penitentiary, Atlanta.
12 Facts About Morris Rudensky
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Morris Rudensky escaped to make his way to Chicago where he cracked safes for the best price.
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Morris Rudensky claimed to work for Al Capone's Chicago Outfit, Bugs Moran's North Side Mob, and The Purple Gang, a group of Jewish mobsters based in Detroit.
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Morris Rudensky traveled, cracking safes in Kansas City, St Louis and San Francisco.
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Morris Rudensky later became known as an escape artist, successfully escaping from the Pontiac State Reformatory, where he was serving ten-years-to-life for the robbery of the Argo State Bank.
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Morris Rudensky claimed to be the mastermind behind the theft of $2.1 million in whiskey from a federal warehouse in Kansas City, Missouri, though no contemporaneous coverage confirms this claim.
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Morris Rudensky continued to operate a well-organized theft ring in the Midwest robbing various payroll deliveries, distilleries, banks, and trains, and did freelance work for Egan's Rats and Al Capone.
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At the age of twenty-one, Morris Rudensky was again in prison, where he was known as "King of the Cons" for frequently getting into fights, and made several escape attempts successfully escaping briefly, after packing himself in a box being taken out of the prison print shop, but was caught.
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Morris Rudensky became friends with communist Earl Browder, in prison, who taught him English and encouraged him to write.
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Morris Rudensky was later awarded a commendation by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt for his efforts along with Attorney General Francis Biddle.
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In 1955, Morris Rudensky was released from Illinois State Penitentiary, Menard on parole.
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In 1970, Morris Rudensky published his autobiography The Gonif, which is Yiddish for thief.