Sanford Horwitt published the following story²⁰ (which I have abridged) of the last days of Mayor Cermak:

"It was from [Roger] Touhy that [Saul] Alinsky [1909--1972] claimed he got the material for one of his more memorable stories, about the assassination attempt on President-elect Franklin Roosevelt in Miami in February 1933."

"According to Alinsky, it all began with Chicago mayor Anton Cermak."

"…. the day that Cermak went to the Illinois Central Station to board the Seminole for his trip to Florida, the Chicago police picked up and removed from the same train one of Capone's boys, Machine Gun Jack McGurn, who was dressed as a golfer and carrying a golf bag containing three tommy guns. What Cermak and his police did not know, however, was that another Capone mobster was stalking the Mayor."

"So, on a fateful February day in Miami, Cermak stepped forward to shake hands with Roosevelt at a rally in a waterfront park. Suddenly, a political fanatic, Giuseppe Zangara, who was trying to kill Roosevelt, started shooting. As the shots rang out, Cermak was seriously wounded; he died three weeks later. The generally accepted explanation was that Zangara's bullets had killed Cermak. Not so, Touhy told Alinsky. What really happened was that Capone's mobster, who was in the crowd still stalking the mayor, took advantage of the confusion as Zangara started blasting away. He pulled his own gun and shot Cermak."

[Touhy was alleged to have said also that Cermak was killed with a .45 caliber bullet whereas Zangara used a .38 caliber pistol but that no bullet was shown at the trial of Zangara.]

I don't regard this story as credible. It has several flaws. It seems like the kind of story that a long-term prisoner would tell to a gullible prison sociologist who was collecting, retelling, and publishing such stories.

I recall reading the newspaper report when Roger Touhy was assassinated shortly after being released from prison on parole. The assassination occurred just a few blocks away from where my mother [DS.4.5.7] and my sister Veronica were living in the Austin section of Chicago.