In the nine years that William J. Fallon, “The Great Mouthpiece,” practiced law in Manhattan, he lost none of the more than 120 headline homicide cases he tried. Coldly intelligent, blessed with a phenomenal memory, his charm, good looks, and ready wit made him a media favorite. Born on West 47th Street on January 23, 1886, and a graduate of Fordham College of Law, he served as a Westchester prosecutor before opening a Manhattan law office with Fordham classmate Eugene McGee in 1918.

Fallon biographer Gene Fowler claimed that his subject could memorize an entire book, nearly word for word, within two hours. Thus he saved Ernest Fritz, who had mortally injured his mistress during intercourse, from the electric chair. Fallon’s mastery of medical texts on gynecology, including four textbooks memorized during the trial, enabled him to elicit a fatal admission from the prosecution’s expert witness during cross-examination: Given the young woman’s delicacy, the fatal hemorrhage might have been caused by a mere coughing fit. The witness asked, “Mr. Fallon, I did not know you were an M.D. When did you get your degree?” Fallon replied, “I received my degree last night. I began practice this morning.”

His most notorious client was underworld boss Arnold Rothstein, who allegedly fixed the 1919 World Series. Rothstein denied it, saying that he couldn’t trust ballplayers to keep their mouths shut. Yet former featherweight boxing champion Abe Attell, who made the payoffs, had said he worked for Rothstein. He was indicted in Cook County; yet Rothstein, whom Fallon represented him before the same grand jury, was not. When Attell was arrested in Manhattan, Fallon put Sam Paas, who had testified against Attell in Chicago, on the stand. Paas looked at Attell. Then he said, “I never saw this man before.” Thus Fallon persuaded the judge to deny extradition: Obviously, the Abe Attell indicted in Cook County was not the Abe Attell arrested in New York City, and he walked.

Evidence in a series of securities thefts led to patsy Nicky Arnstein, a Rothstein associate now remembered as a sometime husband of entertainer Fanny Brice. No one believed Arnstein had planned the robberies: Brice said, “Nicky couldn’t mastermind an electric bulb into a socket.” But he might be pressured to talk about Rothstein. Fallon negotiated Arnstein’s surrender after arranging bail.

On Fallon’s advice, Arnstein declined to answer certain questions because the answers might incriminate him. He was among the first defendants to take the Fifth in a state trial. Arnstein was jailed for contempt. When none of the Manhattan federal judges would sign Fallon’s writ of habeas corpus, Fallon appealed directly to the Supreme Court, which directed the writ issue and reversed the contempt order. The feds then asserted jurisdiction over Arnstein’s crimes to prosecute him in Washington, D.C., where his first trial ended in a hung jury. Fallon, as usual, spent his free time during the first trial drinking and wenching (Fowler, a self-described battered polygamist, wrote that Fallon’s “blanket covered all women”). When Fallon appeared at a hearing somewhat the worse for wear, the judge had asked him to approach the bench.

“Is it possible,” the judge said, “that the court smells liquor on counsel?”

Fallon bowed. “If Your Honor’s sense of justice is as keen as your sense of smell,” he said, “then my client need have no fear in this court.”

But a terrified Arnstein exploded at Fallon, so grossly insulting the lawyer that he withdrew from the trial. Fallon’s partner McGee replaced him and Arnstein landed in prison.

It only takes one dissenter to hang a jury, and hung juries satisfied most of Fallon’s clients until reporters for William Randolph Hearst’s newspapers investigated Fallon’s knack for hanging juries in white-collar criminal cases. Fallon claimed his arguments were addressed to the one wise man on a panel. In fact, his clients bribed jurors as needed. Reporter Nat J. Ferber observed holdout juror Charles Rendigs defeat a prosecution of 23 defendants for mail fraud and then suddenly come into money. The feds indicted Rendigs, who told all.

Thus the Great Mouthpiece was tried for jury tampering in 1924. He defended himself, delivering opening remarks, cross-examining witnesses, testifying on his own behalf and withstanding cross-examination, and concluding with a summation that was, from all accounts, a triumph of heaven-storming oratory. He argued that the prosecution was a Hearst frame-up because Fallon had found the birth certificates for twins the publisher had fathered on movie actress Marion Davies. The jury returned after five hours and two minutes to find him not guilty. Shaking hands with Ferber, Fallon quipped, “Nat, I promise you, I’ll never bribe another juror.”

Fallon was only 41 when, on April 29, 1927, his excessive love of white nights, booze, and dames brought him before that Higher Court from which there is no appeal.