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At dawn Morley’s wife, Elizabeth, who an FBI report dryly noted “does not appear to be gifted with a pretentious amount of intelligence,” stirred from her bed. She came downstairs to see her husband, discussed the situation privately with him and decided to try to defuse the matter. Without telling the detectives, she walked up to Room 403 and tapped softly. Karpis came to the door, wearing only long underwear. She asked him to follow her. The two walked ten feet down to Room 404, a vacant room, and slipped inside.

“The law is downstairs,” Mrs. Morley whispered, “looking for someone from Florida who has gotten a girl in trouble.” If he was guilty, Mrs. Morley went on, he should give himself up. Karpis’s eyes widened. He went to hide under the bed, but Mrs. Morley objected. He opened a closet and found a suit he tried to put on, but Mrs. Morley again objected. She pushed him toward the door, which was ajar.

Just then the door opened. In stepped an Atlantic City cop. Karpis, caught unaware, allowed himself to be pulled into the hallway. “All right, put up your hands,” the officer ordered. Karpis saw two more cops outside his room, where Campbell was sleeping. The cop pointed a pistol at Karpis and demanded to know his name.

Karpis, shivering in his long underwear, mumbled something inaudible. It took a moment to gather his thoughts. “What is all this?” he asked. He raised his voice, hoping Campbell would overhear. “Don’t point those guns at me. I haven’t done anything.”

Mrs. Morley pointedly didn’t tell the policemen Karpis was one of the men they wanted. Instead she stepped between them and announced she would be able to persuade “the men in 403” to surrender quietly. She stepped to the door of Room 403 and knocked. There was no answer. One of the policemen took out a key and began fiddling with the lock. “Come out of there,” he ordered. “Come out with your hands up.”

There was no answer. Karpis stepped forward and volunteered to try. “He’s probably a little hung over,” he said. “We had a party last night and he drank too much. Is that why you’re here? Did we make too much noise?” The policemen said nothing. “Look, I’ll go in there and get the guy out,” Karpis continued. “He’s probably still drunk. He doesn’t realize that you guys are policemen. I’ll get him.”

Karpis stepped to the door. Just then it opened and he ducked inside, closing the door behind him. The detectives began pounding on and kicking the door, demanding that the men inside surrender. Mrs. Morley jumped forward to stop them, saying she didn’t want the door broken. She took out a passkey and inserted it into the lock.

Just then the door was yanked open from inside. Campbell opened up with a .45. The first bullet sawed off the key in Mrs. Morley’s hands, sending the ring of keys jangling to the floor. She dived for cover, as did the detectives. More bullets erupted from the doorway; one pierced the wall of Room 400 and struck Delores Delaney in the right leg. She screamed. The officers later claimed they emptied their guns in the resulting firefight, but only one policeman’s bullet was subsequently found. In fact, the officers ran for their lives.

Karpis took Campbell and grabbed the women, quickly tied a strip of bedsheet around Delaney’s bleeding leg, and raced down the rear staircase to a back alley. Delaney did her best to keep up. In the vestibule Karpis told the girls to wait while they retrieved the car. Barefoot and shivering, they did as they were told.

Karpis and Campbell circled around the side of the hotel, emerging across from the garage. They glanced to their right and saw policemen milling around the hotel entrance. The two men had just stepped off the sidewalk toward the garage when an attendant began shouting, “Hey! Hey! Here they are! Down here!”

Karpis and Campbell ran for the garage. Campbell stopped at the entrance, raised his pistol, and began firing toward the policemen, who scattered. Inside, Karpis searched in