That's Where the Money Is

Poker players go to casinos and bank robbers go to banks for the same reason: that's where the money is.

Willie Sutton, a bank robber I met around Christmas 1969 when he was freed from prison, was probably one of the most notorious gamblers in U.S. history. Willie didn't gamble with dice or cards. He gambled with his freedom.

He served over half of his 80 years in prison. A native of Brookly, Willie dropped out of school at the age of eight. He toughed it out on the streets of New York and then he decided to become a bank robber.

He was good at what he did.

Willie didn't believe in violence. Although he carried a gun when he robbed a bank, usually a .45 or a Tommy Gun, it was never loaded. Once he fired an accomplice because the man insisted on loading his gun before a bank robbery.

'You can't do that,' Willie said. 'Somebody might get hurt.'

The FBI said Sutton had a similar MO -- method of operation -- when he robbed a bank. He was a master of disguise and would make himself look like a guard, a postal worker, or a repairman.

He would always arrive at the bank before it opened and devise a way to get into the vault.

Willie loved robbing banks. During an interview with Reader's Digest, he confessed that robbing banks made him feel alive and that after a robbery, he found himself thinking about the next job.

He also claimed he never uttered the phrase 'I rob banks because that's where the money is.' He said some newspaperman made it up to fill his story.

Willie spent a lot of time in prison and he was always a model prisoner. Although he was a slight man, nobody ever assaulted him behind bars. The other convicts held him in high respect and came to him for advice, which Sutton was always happy to impart.

He broke out of prison on three different occasions. Prison guards admired him for his style and nicknamed him 'Willie the Actor' and 'Slick Willie.'

He had another rule that he lived by: he would never rob a bank if a woman was inside or a child was crying.

Prison officials described him as a gentleman who didn't have a violent bone in his body.

He was serving a prison term of 30 years to 120 years when his daughter, a para-legal secretary, decided to try to free him. Willie was in poor health from emphysema and doctors had given him only a short time to live. He had served 19 years of the sentence at Attica State Prison in New York.

I was working as a reporter for the Los Angeles Herald-Examiner when my editor assigned me to travel to Terminal Island and interview Sutton. When I arrived there with the other reporters, Willie was dressed in a turtleneck sweater and smiling. He shook everyone's hand, while his daughter hugged him.

One of the reporters asked Willie what he said when the judge ruled to free him.

Sutton said, 'I said, 'Thank you, Your Honor, and God bless you.'

He lived another 10 years and spent the rest of his life giving lectures on prison reform. He also consulted with bank officials on how they could do a better job of preventing bank robberies.

Famed newspaper reporter Quentin Reynolds helped him write a book about his life, 'I, Willie Sutton, the personal story of the most daring bank robber and jail breaker of our time.'

Willie Sutton, the ultimate gambler. He died on Nov. 2, 1980, at the age of 79. R.I.P., Willie.