Racket Squad in Action #8

When shrewd racketeers offer free oil-and-lube service to unsuspecting businessmen, they're really casing their cars for theft—luring victims in with kindness before stealing their automobiles and running them through an underground chop shop. Inspector J.J. O'Malley catches wind of a string of mysterious disappearances and follows an oil leak to a suspicious garage, but the real work of dismantling this lucrative stolen-car ring is just beginning.

Clint Bernard runs a slick con targeting grieving families: he scans obituaries, phones the bereaved claiming a deceased relative ordered personalized gifts, and collects payment for cheap merchandise the dead person never ordered. When one widow's suspicion reaches Inspector O'Malley, the lawman sets a trap using an undercover operative to trace Bernard's operation and shut down his callous scheme.

A card sharp bets he can cut the ace of spades on his first try during a friendly poker game—but his confident scheme runs into an opponent who's paying closer attention than he bargained for. In this tense one-pager from *Racket Squad in Action*, skill alone won't be enough when the odds are stacked against a hustler.

Sam Lear runs a shakedown operation in the city's train and bus terminals, posing as a cop to shake down travelers for "hush money"—exploiting a fake no-smoking ordinance and intimidating lone passengers into paying bribes to avoid arrest. When a tough customer resists his con, Lear sees an opportunity to rob him and ditch the wallet, but his success only emboldens him to push the racket harder across the terminals. The walls are closing in on a con man who's gotten too comfortable with his prey.

In "The Misery Chiselers," a desperate man is blackmailed by a gang preying on the fears of displaced Middle European emigres, forcing him to pay ransoms for relatives they claim are imprisoned behind the Iron Curtain—except he knows his own mother died days before the call came. Written by a sharp, suspense-driven hand and illustrated with gritty, period-accurate flair, the story unfolds as a tense game of wits where truth is the most dangerous weapon.

Sid Radner exposes a smooth-talking roulette operator who courts confidence with a rigged portable wheel that appears legitimate to onlookers. When a gambler positions himself to inspect the setup and take bets, he's actually engineering every spin—tilting the wheel and using hidden methods to ensure the ball lands in slots nobody wagered on, turning the odds entirely in his favor.