Manhunt
Cudahy posted a $25,000 reward and hired the famed Pinkerton Detective Agency to lead a manhunt, which the World-Herald called "the nation's leading thrill." After a statement from Eddie Jr., reporters found the kidnapper's hideout at 3604 Grover Street in South Omaha. Pat Crowe, a small butcher shop operator in South Omaha, was identified as a suspect early in the investigation. However, nobody could find Crowe. During January 1901, Crowe sightings were from Central America to Nantucket Island, with one report placing him on a steamship in Honduras, and another at the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota. Thousands of "Crowe wanted" posters were shipped the United States.
In March 1901 the Omaha City Council matched Cudahy's reward, and later in the month a man named James Callahan was arrested for public drunkenness, for which he paid for his fine with a shiny $20 gold coin just like Cudahy paid ransom with. Callahan was also known to associate with Crowe. Police observed Callahan paying with the coins at taverns along "Q" Street in Omaha, and on March 21 they arrested him for robbing Cudahy Sr. of $25,000. When he went to trial he did not face kidnapping charges; Nebraska had none that applied to the kidnapping of a 16-year-old within city limits. While that soon changed, it did not change Callahan's trial, and on April 28 the jury found him not guilty of robbery. Another trial in November found him equally innocent.
Crowe disappeared, communicating with the Omaha Police Department through mail. Despite agreeing to turn himself in after negotiating the drop of the ransom in late 1901, Crowe never showed up. In the spring of 1905 he turned up in Omaha and gave an interview to a World-Herald reporter; however, he disappeared again. On September 5, 1905, he was spotted at a tavern near 16th and Hickory in Little Bohemia; the ensuing gun fight left one police officer wounded, and Crowe vanished again.
Read more about this topic: Edward Cudahy, Jr.