Interesting, although I don’t agree with some of the implications and I don’t love that it refuses to draw any conclusions.   I think it’s generally agreed at this point that Hauptmann didn’t act alone, but an entire book about that fact is not per se worthwhile reading if the author doesn’t offer alternative ideas (and, frankly, if the author seems too interested in setting Hauptmann up as a victim, which is not really accurate either).   Sure, accuse Jafsie of having more to do with the extortion plot directly than most people think — but you have to draw an explicit conclusion on that point, and on the ladder evidence, and on whatever else you’re going to question about conventional case wisdom, and stand by it.   I think Scaduto’s full of shit with his “Hauptmann was framed” theory but at least he put it out there straight up.   This case is enormously frustrating to read about in some ways, because after seventy years, we’re probably not going to learn anything else useful to our understanding; the principals have all been dead for years, not commuting Hauptmann’s sentence probably sealed that vault regardless of what might have gotten dug up later re: Isidor Fisch and the Sharps.   And yet, I can never resist these books.   Maybe this one will teach me.   (2/13/06)

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