Baby Face Nelson Biography

Quick Facts

NAME: Baby Face Nelson
OCCUPATION: Criminal
BIRTH DATE: December 06, 1908
DEATH DATE: November 27, 1934
PLACE OF BIRTH: Chicago, Illinois

PLACE OF DEATH: Barrington, Illinois

more about Baby Face

Best Known For

"Baby Face" Nelson was a gangster, bank robber and triggerman who work for Al Capone and John Dillinger.

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Baby Face Nelson

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Synopsis

Lester J. Gillis (aka: "Baby Face" Nelson) was born in Chicago, Illinois on December 6, 1908. He started in crime at the age of 13, and worked for Al Capone. He was arrested in 1931 but escaped and began a series of bank robberies, two with John Dillinger. After Dillinger's death,

J. Edgar Hoover announced that Nelson was now "Public Enemy No. 1." He was killed in a shootout with the FBI in 1934.

Profile

Bank robber. Born Lester J. Gillis in Chicago, Illinois, to Belgian immigrants. Nelson, who was nicknamed after his youthful appearance, started in pettycrime in his native Chicago at the age of 13, and moved on to labor racketeering for Al Capone in 1929. He was dismissed by Capone and other crimebosses in because of the excessive violence of his vicious killings.

In 1931, Nelson was arrested and given a sentence of one year to life in the state prison. That sentence would be short-lived however; in early 1932, Baby Face overpowered a guard during transport and escaped. It was then that he began robbing banks, a career that gained him nationwide notoriety.

Nelson and legendary criminal John Dillinger joined up for two robberies in 1934, shortly after Dillinger's original gang dissolved. On July 22, 1934, Dillinger was ambushed and killed by F.B.I. agents outside the Biograph Theater in Lincoln Park, Chicago. The next day, F.B.I. director J. Edgar Hoover announced that Nelson was the new "Public Enemy No. 1."

After Nelson and Dillinger's partner in crime, Homer Van Meter, was ambushed and killed by police in St. Paul, Minnesota, that August, Nelson became the sole survivor of the second Dillinger Gang. The F.B.I. caught up with Nelson in November of that year. During the confrontation he was shot and killed. He was 26 years old.