#478 The Disappearance of Judge Crater

On August 6, 1930, Supreme Court Justice Joseph Force Crater stepped into a taxi on West 45th Street and vanished without a trace.

For 27 days, nobody reported him missing—not his wife waiting in Maine, not his Tammany Hall cronies, not the courts. When the story finally broke, it became the most famous missing persons case in New York history.

Judge Crater was a rising star in the city’s legal world—a Tammany Hall insider who’d just landed a prestigious judgeship paying $23,000 a year (about $450,000 today). But he was also tangled up in corruption, office-buying schemes, and shady real estate deals. He had a taste for Broadway chorus girls, speakeasies run by gangsters, and envelopes stuffed with cash.

His disappearance rocked the city and captivated the nation for decades. The phrase “to pull a Crater” entered the popular lexicon. Psychics came forward with tips. Grand juries investigated. Deathbed confessions emerged decades later.

This week, Tom takes you through one of the city’s greatest unsolved mysteries—a story of Tammany corruption, Broadway nightlife, and Depression-era New York. What happened on that hot August night? Was it murder? Blackmail? A carefully planned escape?

96 years later, the mystery endures.

This episode was produced and edited by Kieran Gannon.

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