Angie is riding her Paddy Mane trip for the second week. This week, she covered Paddy Mane’s tumultuous start to military service and how he met the founders of the SAS.
Theresa takes us in a wildly different direction as she circles back on a previous story. Before she’d covered William Riker, the cult-founder of Holy City in episode 132. Today she covers William Riker’s lawyer, Melvin Belli. This man fired a cannon from the roof of his office and flew the Jolly Roger flag when he won cases.
This episode pairs well with:
Paddy Mane’s Early Years
Melvin Belli’s Cult-Founding Client
Transcript
Theresa: Hi, and welcome to the Unhinged History Podcast, the podcast where two friends come together and tell history stories while adding chock-full of conversation and really just deride anybody who’s here for a straight story because we’re going to chat about it. Why? Because we’re friends and I’ve never heard the story that Angie’s about to tell me and she has no idea what I’m about to tell her. So there will be some conversation back and forth.
Angie: That was your warning. That’s all yet.
Theresa: Yeah. So when we check the episode notes on Spotify or the reviews that we hear, it would be great, but there’s a lot of chatter. That’s what we signed up for. Literally why we did this. So listener beware. You had your chance. Yeah.
Angie: I’m Angie. I’m Teresa. I think I said that already.
Theresa: Did you? Oh, yeah. I mean, what? We’re 137 episodes in and we’ve nailed the introduction. Every single time.
Angie: I get to go first today.
Theresa: Hell yeah. Now last week you started telling me about this bro-ski named Patty Maine, who really sounds like a soap opera character. With a name like that. Yeah.
Angie: Now that you say that, yeah, we’re still talking about Patty Maine, where we got Patty Maine for like a few more episodes on my part because his life was just amazing. So my sources are the same sources they were last week.
Theresa: Do you want to repeat them just in case we have new listeners or sure? People like me who can’t remember if they ate breakfast and had their medicine.
Angie: So I haven’t eaten breakfast yet. There are three books all by Damien Lewis. One is Brothers in Arms, Church Hills Special Forces during World War Two’s darkest hour. SAS Forged in Hell and SAS Dagger’s Drawn, that like I said, all by Damien Lewis. The, of the three books, the book that I am most referred, that I most refer to in this episode is Brothers in Arms, Church Hills Special Forces.
There is a really great biography by Hamish Ross called Patty Maine. Super. I could not recommend that enough.
And then this week I have a couple of other sources. Brave, brutal and misunderstood Patty Maine, the daring Irishman who pioneered the modern SAS. This is an article in the Irish Post by a guy named Michael Murphy in November of 22. And then there is Commando Patty Maine, Ireland’s Wolf of the Desert, werewolf history, werewolf warfare history network.
Theresa: Well, this tone of the story changed dramatically. I kind of wanted some alcantipy.
Angie: I’m so sorry. But you know what? Honestly, he’s big enough. So if you just want to imagine that, go for it. What I do find to be particularly interesting is that the warfare history network refers to him as Ireland’s wolf of the desert. He refers to himself as the desert rat, but the rest of the world refers to him as an Irish lion. And the reason that they do that is partially because of the just him in general, but also because when he went on the world tour in his rugby, he played for the British Lions. So last week, if you weren’t listening last week, I covered his youth and his time on the rugby pitch. I learned that he was capped for Ireland six times. I feel like that’s important to say, because I think I gave you a different number
Theresa: and capped is put on the national team just for those again, didn’t this last week and are just like capped like shot.
Angie: What does that mean? Yeah. He’s got a feather in his cap. Um, I feel like it’s important to say that it was six times because he was a proud Irishman and there are tons of other proud Irishman out there that I am not trying to offend.
So cats six times for Ireland confirmed. So I thought I would tell you this week a little bit about his early military career. So remember, just, just like a little, little rewind, he played rugby. He went to school to become a solicitor, which is a lawyer and it’s 1938, 1939.
The clouds of war are forming in the world, right? So in the early days of the war, after the colossal mess that was the appeasement, Maine and many others like him from all over the UK, kind of seeing these storm clouds forming in list in Maine’s case, he joins the fifth light anti-aircraft battery. But before that in 1938, Maine had volunteered to the officers training corps at Queens University, where he previously studied law. So he goes back to Queens University to join the officers training corps. Now, like I just mentioned, he had studied law there.
That’s where he became a solicitor. But to quote Damien Lewis, he says, he simply couldn’t abide drill and mindless square bashing. And in short order, the Queens training officer had concluded that he was unpromising material for a combat regiment, undisciplined, unruly and generally unreliable. Wait, he said that about himself. He said that about, so that’s the training officer saying it about Patty Maine. Oh, OK. That makes more sense.
Theresa: It’s supposed to be like, yeah, I have too much of a problem with authority.
Angie: So goodbye, which I’m so glad you said that. So I find that comment hilarious only because of comments from his subordinates later that totally like that’s the exact opposite of who he may like grows up to be. So anyway, that’s how he basically joins the fifth. Again, Maine, like many of his countrymen, joined up because of this strong sense of duty and like this idea of what is right. But also, Maine is looking for a little bit of adventure and he is super frustrated by this sort of stalemate that seems to plague the initial stages of the war. According to the Irish Post, there are those that dubbed the time between 39 and 40 as the phony war, because like things just weren’t happening.
Like there’s a lot of kind of hurry up and wait and then nothing would happen. So Maine, some of his friends and then one of his brothers, Douglas, they all transfer units. Douglas goes to the RAF and Maine goes to the Royal Ulster Rifles. And this is this is where things about the hurry up and wait start to change a little bit. First, a couple of things have to happen, though. There would be the invasion of Denmark and Norway by the Wehrmacht and then the blitzkrieg of the German panthers through the formerly impenetrable fortress at the French Ardines. That which was followed by the march through the streets of Paris in early 1940.
So war is definitely making its way into the forefront here, right? Secondly, and probably if I had to guess, most importantly, the new Prime Minister of England would take over Winston Churchill. And he alone would alter the way of the British Empire.
And by extension, everyone else looks at the war. This idea of appeasement from his predecessors was thrown right out the window with his belief that you quote cannot raise in with a tiger with your head in its mouth. So hello quote, right? So Churchill is for his part a big fan of this idea of elite forces. Commandos, if you will, who can get in, get out are mostly self-sufficient and not a big fan of sitting still and like just waiting for armies to march up and like knock on the front door. So Churchill kind of starts advocating for these smaller white groups that can kind of punch their way through things, right?
Theresa: And this is separate than the guerrilla warfare.
Angie: Yes, it is separate than the guerrilla warfare in what it does, but it also does engaging guerrilla warfare. Okay. So it’s kind of dual purpose. And you’ll find out later some of the other things that they’re involved in.
So here’s where we’re at. While Maine is with the Royal Ulster Rifles, or quite possibly a little bit earlier, he meets a man called Ian McGonagall. And I’m going to tell you right now, this is the only time that I’m going to be cool with the spelling of his name.
It is E-O-I-N. And for all of our listeners at home, I am married to an Ian and it is I-A-N. And this is a very big deal in our health. But to each their own. This relationship with McGonagall would pretty much define Maine for the rest of his life. Um, just want to point out it’s 1940. Maine is a Northern Irish Protestant.
While McGonagall is a Southern Irish Catholic. And that is kind of a big deal in the next 20 years. Kind of a big deal in 1940. Um, we could talk about that on a different story.
But I just wanted to, to bring that up to show that for these guys, your belief systems and where you’re from and who you are at the end of the day came down to at the very core, what kind of man you are and nothing else mattered. And that I think is really important to Maine and McGonagall’s relationship. These two are like peas in a pod.
Sick as thieves, if you will. Where Maine was considered a gentle giant in school and often shy or reserved. Not to say that he like didn’t stir the pot or raise hell, especially when, when he was drunk. McGonagall was exactly what you would expect when you think of a charming Irishman.
He would get them into trouble with those pretty eyes and we would get them out. And in my point, in my opinion, everybody needs a friend like that. And I think if I’m honest, a lot of my love for Maine comes down to his devotion to McGonagall and how you see it in every aspect of his later relationships. To clarify, they did not have a romantic relationship, nor is there any real evidence to suggest that Maine played both sides as some author state. I’m saying this because I don’t care one way or another how one chooses to live their love life, but I do care when things are exaggerated or lies, just flat out lies are told. And a lot of Maine’s story is both of those things. So when I started learning about him, some of my first encounters were with things that were exaggeration or just straight lie. And I wanted to I wanted to know the actual like person I wanted to understand like all of the things like these guys, not a single member of the essay, I needed any exaggeration on who they are, what their life was like, their stories are big enough without it. So sorry about my side quest then there. It just bugs the snot out of me when we have to lie to make a story
Theresa: bigger, you know, look at so many of the stories I tell, or I’m like, Hey, you know, this great thing isn’t this amazing all lies.
Angie: Pretty much. Yeah. And that’s for me. That was like, holy cow, everything they say is either a lie or an exaggeration. And it is so not necessary in this case. Like there’s another one coming up here in just a minute.
So I’ll get to it. Now it’s around June of 1940. Commando number 11 is formed. And so the boys, they leave the Royal Ulster rifles and both Maine and McGonagall volunteer and find themselves in Syria of all places, because this is a world war after all.
Yes. Under the command of a one Colonel Petter. Now, for the sake of time here, I’m going to give you a really short, really broken down version of their time with Commando 11, but basically they are, they train on Isle of Arran. So they train in Scotland for action in Syria.
So it’s like, let that sit in your pocket for a minute, which, OK, here we are. They do all they do this extensive, extensive training and all sorts of things, all sorts of landing, all sorts of guerrilla warfare, all sorts of with the word I want to use, we’ll say decommission of things. And then they’re sent to the Latani River, which is situated in VT Run, French, Syria. So their goal on the Latani River is to take and hold a bridge. This bridge is crucial for the advancement of the 22nd Australian Infantry Brigade.
Like this whole idea is that if we can, if this small group of men can take and hold this bridge long enough for the Australian infantry to get there, there can be this larger force of like an invasion, a full invasion army that can come through this direction. Does that make sense? Yeah, I’m hearing you. So it’s like a multi country plan here.
Like we’re all working our part to get this invasion force there. However, they face a ton of issues from the get go. They’re being dropped off in these landing craft via the water in the worst possible conditions that you could face.
They lose a ton just in the landing. They’re fired on by those they consider friends because, let’s be honest, the VT Run French government was just a puppet government. And so main and his men are looking at this like these are guys, these are our allies, like these men that were that were firing against we shouldn’t be. Like they had a real moral issue with it, but also we want to live. So here we are. So they’re having just tons and tons of issues. And then the other big thing that is like this monumental loss for them is they lose their failure with Commander Colonel Petter, who by this point, after all this training and all this time, Maine has spent with him, has seen him as this remarkable leader and a friend.
And so he, Colonel Petter takes Maine and McGonagall into his unit because for him, Maine and McGonagall were exactly the type of man you needed for a commando unit. They are independent. They don’t really listen to rules like the high command can’t really stop them. They’re self-sufficient.
They have this like what they call later is a devil may care attitude. But they’re also incredibly devoted to the task and can incredibly devoted to their men. So Colonel Petter is like, I can take these two and use all of the good things that they have and train them to be the best that they can be. And so he does.
And so for Maine and McGonagall losing Colonel Petter was like kind of, you know, you have that one boss you just absolutely love. And then they retire and they go Hawaii. You never see him again.
Theresa: It sounds very, Angie, have you gone through this? Because this is an extremely precise example.
Angie: Yeah, I love my boss and he left me for the state of Hawaii and I’ll never get over it. But I will see him again. He’s he’s he’s still he still texts me on the regular. So we’re good.
Anyway. So just because Colonel Petter was you, Colonel Petter was let me give you a little back story about his time, like their time underneath him leading up to the LaTanoo River action. Maine would write home to his mom and tell her how much he liked being where he was, where there were no women to fuss over the mess. And in one letter, he said he would tell them he writing home, he would tell how he and McGonagall would start their fires saying, quote, the coal is in very large lumps to split it, we just fire a revolver shot into it and it cracks wonderfully. Maine and McGonagall are Colonel Petter’s weapons officers. So there’s like no lack of weapons or ammo around. So to split the firewood with your revolvers seems just like the best way to use our time. And McGonagall was more than qualified to deal with Maine when he’d had too many to drink.
Maine might get rowdy and start causing problems. And McGonagall would just point his pistol at him and say, I’ll shoot you Blair. And that seemed to do the trick every single time.
That doesn’t mean that the walls of the house they were staying at weren’t peppered with bullet holes from all their wild nights. Good. I’m just going to give you that visual like they’re having a great time. Lewis, like I said earlier, he says in his book that they have this sense of devil may care attitude and that possessed like these two, these two guys that that character trait alone caused their men to love them even more. And it gave them this sense of like, I don’t want to say immortality, but this belief that if they’re with Maine and McGonagall, all is going to be well.
And so we will follow you to the very depths of hell because they’ll get us out bottom line. But to really send this story home, the previous New Year’s Eve. So during all this training, Maine had been a bit heavy on the bottle. And one of their young recruits who also happens to live in the same house with them found Maine to wish him a happy New Year’s when in short order, Maine punches him in the face and into a wall. So having he’s having to go pretty sure at this point, McGonagall steps in and sends Maine to fetch some water. And while Maine is gone, McGonagall gets the young recruit out of the house, but not before Maine fires a few rounds at them. When they return home, because this is where they live. So like the next morning they come back. They quote found Maine alone in the house, largely sober with all the windows shot out and surrounded by 36 small bottles of sherry brandy, one side of beef, one leg of lamb and two loaves of bread.
They pose the obvious question. Where the hell did you get all this stuff? Get up the tracks and hide the lot. So at some point after McGonagall got the younger gentleman out of the house, Maine gets it in his head to go raid the brigade headquarters. Oh, my God, he steals. He finds. Louis goes on to say that they had just managed to hide all of it and patch up the windows by the time the local police arrived to investigate. Incidentally, when Maine woke up the next day, he had no memory of the night before because when Maine saw the young officer, he said, who hit you?
Just tell me and I’ll short the bugger out. And I can only imagine the look on the young officer’s face. Like he has come to the realization he that Maine doesn’t remember hitting him, but Maine is going to go and protect him now. Now, a little while later, Colonel Petter confronts Maine saying, quote, by the way, so this is like a few days later, I know who broke into the brigade HQ on New Year’s Eve and stole all the drink.
To which Maine says, huh, you tell because it was a great mystery at the time. And for Petter, that was the end of it. Like he got his point across. Maine knew he knew the end problem solved. We’re never going to talk about it again. And Maine, you’re not going to pull this crap again.
So now we’ve got our time in training sorted out. Fast forward back to Petter’s death at the LaTonny River. After he dies, the command of Maine’s unit falls to a man called Keyes. We’re not a big fan of Keyes.
Maine had thoughts about Keyes kind of surrounding these orders that Keyes puts out during the LaTonny Reaction that Maine sees as suicidal sacrifices. Like they’re not going to win at this moment. Why are you sending them there?
You’re just sending them to their death. And so Maine has some real big, big feelings about this. And he doesn’t like Keyes and Keyes in return doesn’t like Maine. This part is a bit murky, but as I understand it, one night while Maine and McGonagall are playing chess in the officer’s mess, Keyes comes in and Maine ushers him out on the end of the bayonet.
Oh, yeah. Discipline action follows and Maine kind of gets a mouthful and just goes about festering his hate for Keyes. I think I said this in the first part of the story, but Maine hates bullies. He does not like loudmouth and he’s not a fan of like self-proclaiming people that just only have fabulous things to say about themselves. Like he’s a man of action.
Show me, don’t tell me. And he also has an authority issue with superiors who act like they are actually superior and this high-born officer was that I think his real problem with him was that you, you were the son of an aristocrat. You became an officer because of that. And now you’re just going to look down your nose at everybody else. Like we’re all men.
We all put our pants on the same way. And so like that, that’s kind of the source of his beef, but then it just gets bigger and bigger. Anyway, but the thing that doesn’t sit well after Petter’s death is that between the training and fighting, his unit had found a dog and our boy, Maine loves animals. And this dog kind of becomes his unit’s mascot.
While they’re fighting at the LaToni River, one of the officers shoots their dog. And keys doesn’t really do anything about it. Like doesn’t, like, what are you going to do? The other, the other officer thought the dog was tiresome.
And to Maine, that was like the biggest. Absolutely not. You could possibly do because the dog wasn’t tiresome. He was our dog. He belonged to our unit and you had no right to shoot him, which honestly, fair.
Right. This doesn’t sit well with Maine. Keys is in action on it, nor the other guy who obviously shot it. And just a few nights after keys was invited to leave the officer’s mess via the bayonet, someone comes to the conclusion who the dog killer was and attacks a one major Bevel Charles Allen Napier. Now Napier has no real proof, but he tells keys that the huge unknown assailant was Maine.
And even keys at this point is like, I’m not sure about that, but if that’s what you say, okay. So Maine takes the rap and gets RTO, which means he’s basically sent back to his former or parent unit. Um, no one actually knows who attacked Napier, but Maine takes the rap either way because he’s not going to let any of his guys take the fall regardless of who did it.
Nobody knows. Maine never says it wasn’t him. So that was kind of the end of it for him. Um, he’s on, he’s, he’s being sent back to Britain because he’s being returned to his former unit and on his way home, Maine is hospitalized in Egypt with malaria.
Oh, I don’t know about malaria in a minute. Um, it’s here that he meets a nurse he really likes and they have great conversation. The nurse writes to his sister to let him let everybody know he’s doing fine, um, which I thought was really cool. And it is also here where he learns as an expeditionary force that’s being raised to head up and train grill, uh, gorilla army for the Chinese to help fight the Japanese who at this point, everyone thinks is going to join the access like at any moment. And he lets McGonagall know, Hey, like you should go to China with me.
This sounds great. Technically it’s Burma where their training camp is going to be, but it is also here at this hospital and not in a prison cell. Like all the stories say that he meets a one captain, David Sterling. And with that, Maine becomes a founding member of LD attachment, otherwise known as the SAS. Oh, wow. And that’ll be my story next week.
Theresa: Oh my gosh. Okay.
Angie: So David Sterling did not pull him out of the jail cell just to clarify. Like all the stories say he, he visited him in the hospital. A little bit more noble. A little bit, but you know, I will say I’m like.
Theresa: I was going to say, there’s something more romantic, more idyllic to pull a founding member of the SAS out of a jail cell in a hospital because when I think of a hospital bed I’m like, you seem a little puny versus you seem a little tough.
Angie: Yeah, I mean I get it. So there was this longstanding belief that he did go to jail for both his ushering keys out of the mess hall on the end of the bayonet and then this assault of this other gentleman. But he never did. And even Keyes said, I wasn’t in the mess when that happened. So like there’s all these, this is what everybody said was happening but even Keyes himself was like maybe didn’t do it. Like his personal journals, by this point Maine was already like, by the point that other officers were noticing some issues, Maine was already in the hospital. Maine had been RTU’d like a month before and was sitting with malaria in Alexandria. So on the one hand you have like this really, you’re right, romantic view of like that wonderful scene in the mummy where Evelyn goes and pulls O’Connell out of the prison cell.
And that’s their meat cute. But then you also have this idea that like David Sterling knows for a fact Maine has been RTU’d. He knows he’s going to be court-martialed. He knows all of these things could potentially be going south for Maine but also like you have a unique skill set that I would very much like to use in the desert.
Could you, would you join my unit? I mean either way, whether he pulled him out of the hospital or jail cell, Sterling saved his career one way or the other. Like just by chance. Right. If he wanted him. So yeah, that’s my story of the early years of Maine’s career. Nice. Okay.
Theresa: Well, I’m going to take us on a wildly different place. So, Sida, let’s go. Okay. So, I am going to, okay, so in the episode where I covered William Riker in Holy City, the Holy City Culp, I mentioned somebody in passing. I mentioned a lawyer named Melvin. I think I called him Belly but apparently his pronouns Belly.
Whatever. I liked Belly. You know, but then it was just like that meant in middle school he was probably called Melly Belly.
Yeah, he probably was. But so I mentioned this lawyer in passing that William Riker had and then later on a friend of mine, Wendy, sent me a one liner about this lawyer and I went, oh, I need to do a deep dive. And then I went, wait a minute, I know this name.
Oh, it’s the same lawyer. So that day I’m going to do a deep dive on Melvin Belly. Although now he’s in my head is Melly Belly. And my sources, gwerne.net, the bio of Melvin Belly, found SF, Melvin Belly, King of Torts by Art Peterson. Torts? Like the little pie? Okay, but Tort is also a legal definition. Oh, okay.
Angie: So, same spelling. I’m hungry. Okay.
Theresa: Apparently you haven’t had breakfast, right? Like, so these are things. Right. I, O, O, F, Sonora, Melvin Belly, Noe Hill in San Francisco, San Francisco landmark number nine, Belly Building.
Okay. So we’re going to start in July 29th, 1907, Melvin Belly is born. He’s born to a prosperous family in Sonora, California. He’s the only child of Caesar A. and Linoe Moran Belly.
Belly. Caesar is a prosperous banker and rancher whose family had immigrated from Switzerland right after the Civil War. And from what we understand, Melvin really admired his father. He’s not as fond of mom and mom apparently dressed him in little Lord Fauntleroy suits.
Angie: Okay, to be fair, I wouldn’t be fond either.
Theresa: But I have a feeling you have to do more than just come up with atrocious outfits to be not so pleased with.
Angie: Honestly, because it’s really, yeah, agreed, agreed.
Theresa: Now here’s where I get a little in the woods or the little woods in the weeds. But I’m doing this on the off chance that this means something to you because this is your neck of the woods. The family lived in an apartment on the east corner of Washington Street and Leno Berk Street. Yes, it does. Now this is above his maternal grandparents’ pharmacy.
Angie: Oh my gosh. Okay. Okay.
Theresa: I’ll go take a picture for you. Thank you. Dr. Lewis, Louise or Lewis and Anna Christina Moran. Now during his youth, he’s drawn to these grandparents. He’s fascinated by medical collections of his grandfather, the Pothic carry jars in the drugstore. His grandmother, Anna Moran, is the first female pharmacist in California. Cool. So, Lewis, did you know that? Yeah.
Angie: Now I have questions. There is a building downtown that still has the tile in the ground like when you walk through the front door that says pharmacy. It hasn’t been a pharmacist for 55 years.
Theresa: That’s amazing. But I’m wondering. A pharmacist here in 55 years. Yeah.
Angie: I mean, we have other pharmacists now, but not there. It’s an antique store now. Yeah. We’ve been brewing our own potions for the last 55 years. Mommy says.
Theresa: His uncle, Otto, carries on her business. Okay. So, they kept it in the family, at least for a bit, until you got there and then they just up and left.
Angie: I’m not 55 also, so there’s that. I mean.
Theresa: So, 1920, the family moved to the city of Stockton where he’s named valedictorian of his school in Stockton High School. He graduates in 1925. This man, just to set the stage, excelled in debating, acting, and writing for the school paper.
Angie: So, he was a born lawyer then? You would think.
Theresa: Now he ends up running into a little bit of trouble when he’s caught hosting a beer party in the high school newspaper office. In the 20s? Yeah. Now. Love that for him. He’s suspended and they threatened to withhold his diploma. Now his dad successfully sues the principal for Melvin’s reinstatement.
Love that. Now, this incident impresses Belly, who had long since decided to become a lawyer. And Belly graduates from the University of Berkeley in 1929, where he only got kind of average grades. And after he travels around the world for a year, he attends the law school at Berkeley as well.
Okay. Now, it’s in 1941 that he starts attracting attention because of his aggressive representation of people who’ve been damaged in some way. Do you say 1941? 41. So, we’re jumping a little bit.
Angie: I’m going to go… Making sure I had my ears right there.
Theresa: Right. Now, there’s going to be a little bit of jumping back and forth because there’s a lot of nuance that I want to get in. And so, that nuance is going to come in where it made the most sense.
But, yeah. Now, he starts getting his attention because he’s focusing on people who’ve been injured by products, by services, whatnot. He has this creative skill for developing courtroom techniques to present the cases.
Before this tort or tort law, which is what this is, is presenting the damages for being injured. It has not been advantageous. It hasn’t been profitable.
It’s kind of been looked down on. Nobody’s really doing it, right? So, no ambulance chasers. No ambulance chasers. And it’s funny you say that because he’s reported and saying, I’m not an ambulance chaser because I got there before the ambulance is dead. Okay. I mean, that’s kind of the person we’re dealing with, okay?
Okay. His fame spreads far and wide along this practice. And Time Magazine calls him the king of torts for his groundbreaking work in personal injury action. Okay. And it’s around this time that he represents William Riker of the Holy City Cult.
Okay. Now, to kind of set the stage for who he is, he, right after he graduates law, he’s in law school, has this life-altering experience. And it’s during, at this point, it’s the height of the Great Depression. Right.
Okay. And he gets a job with the Work Progress Administration. And he’s riding the rails with hobos.
And he’s reporting on the circumstances of this uprooted and growing underclass. Okay. That’s kind of cool.
Truly, I mean, if you’re a dude and you would feel safe doing that, that kind of seems like a great adventure. Now, on the job, he witnessed the Los Angeles police clubbing Oakleys as they got off the train. So it doesn’t seem like a lot’s changed. Nope. And there is, this gives him the desire to balance his representation of the rich and famous with this extremely heavy dose, a standing up for the people that folks have never heard of. Right.
Angie: No, that makes sense. Good for him. So I love this duality.
Theresa: Now, I probably should have said this earlier, but he looks like a movie star. He looks like a lawyer from Central Casting.
Angie: Oh, I’m so bummed out. Can you describe to me that he was dressed like little Lord Frantzleroy? The image I had in my mind is so different.
Theresa: He’s got a square jaw. He’s got some portly good looks. He’s got this deep booming sexy voice that observers noted he could play like a symphony when he performed in front of a jury.
Angie: Get on it, buddy. Good for you.
Theresa: So when you think of the movie-esque lawyer, it is based off this human. Love it. Okay. And that’s why when I had jury duty, I was like, these guys suck. Turn the channel. I want another true crime.
Yeah. His outwardly manner, how he projects himself into the world just nails the lawyer stereotype. His trial techniques, they’re incredible.
They are extraordinary. Okay. Now, more than anybody else, he is what they call the father of demonstrative evidence. Okay. Now, in his courtroom appearances, he is supporting all of his efforts with photos, movies, scale models, human skeletons, animals, and prosthetics.
Okay. Now, he’s bringing stuff in. He wants the jury to sit up. He wants them to lean in.
He wants them to pay attention to what he’s doing and saying. In one case, he’s pursuing damages for a woman who lost her leg in an accident. And on the first day of the trial, he brings in this rat package to court that looked like it could be nothing other than a leg. Now, remember, his client is missing a leg. He’s known for shenanigans and he has this big leg size box.
Leg size box. Okay. Got it. Throughout the trial, the jury’s captivated and fixated on this box.
Fair. And so, during his summation, Bellae unwrapped not the woman’s leg because, again, the leg is missing, so this could have been said leg. But her prosthesis, passing it around the jurors and proclaimed, this is what my client will wear for the rest of her life. Adding sarcastically, feel the blood as it pulses and flows through her veins.
Ooh, dramatic. Oh, this man leaves no stone unturned. Has some flair, if you will.
Speaking of flair, after he wins the court case, he would raise the Jolly Rager flag over his building and fire a cannon mounted on his office roof to announce the victory and impending party. Ha ha ha ha ha.
Angie: We live in the wrong time. How many of our stories have somebody with a cannon in the front yard and now we have somebody with a cannon on the roof?
Theresa: I mean, we had Cassius Clay with his cannon, we had Shelley Bauman meet the wrong end of the cannon.
Angie: Oh, you’re doing another missing leg story.
: Dang it. I didn’t even see you. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. That’s amazing.
Angie: Oh, I should have included. Did you hear that? Alessandro, she’s doing another missing leg. Ha ha ha ha.
Theresa: And I don’t even have syphilis in this story.
Angie: Dang, but we hadn’t wear yet. So there’s that. We did. Yeah. All right, we’re going to. Not really as fun as syphilis.
Theresa: No, but a missing leg. They come up more often than I feel they should in history. Ha ha ha ha ha. We’re going to, we’re going to zip up to 1964. Now there’s a ton of legal skirmishes that Belly’s involved in. The one that generates a crap ton of his of attention for him was when he represented pro bono. Jack Ruby, the assassin of Lee Harvey Oswald. Lee Harvey Oswald. The man who killed Jack Kennedy.
Okay. Now you remember how Belly said that William Riker wasn’t seditious. He’s just insane. And you should just leave the ravings of crazy lunatic alone. Let the man be right. Yeah. Belly said that Ruby was crazy, a crazy little man who should be judged not guilty by a reason of insanity.
Angie: I mean, he’s got that. He’s working it, you know, I mean, he works
Theresa: for you and I, but the judge and jury don’t agree. Okay. And when the verdicts read, Belly approached the bench with tears in his eyes, saying, you have blood on your hands. He shouted at the judge and then he passed judgment on Dallas as a sick, sick, sick city.
Okay. Big field Dallas booming voice. Now this little indiscretion of his in representing Jack Ruby doesn’t sit well with the American Bar Association and they banned Belly from membership. And it didn’t bother much. He didn’t really get a shit because his response was being rejected from the Bar Association is kind of like being kicked out of the book of the month club.
Angie: It’s going to say, do you have to belong to the American Bar to be a lawyer? Like, I don’t feel.
Theresa: I don’t know. I thought you did, but to hear him be like, kind of. And like, maybe you’re not. I thought getting kicked out of the bar session was the kind of being disbarred, but I didn’t look it up. I just assumed and didn’t.
Angie: I’m curious now because I wonder if it’s. I wonder for us non lawyers, if it’s more of a social thing, like a social standing type thing, then it is an actual like, relevant to getting to continue your career type thing.
Theresa: Well, anyhow, not looking it up and looking it up later when nobody else will hear my responses. Belly as a human, he enjoys really good food and fine wines. He also loves attractive women.
Shocking. And this includes many of his celebrity clients. He has a lifelong love of acting that earned him minor roles in several movies. He was in the 1968 Wild in the streets. The Beatles had or the Rolling Stones had a movie in 1970.
Give me shelter. He was in that. And he also appeared in the television series on Star Trek.
That’s awesome. Now he plays a corruptor of the youth in this episode. And I think it’s his line that referred to it as the worst Star Trek episode in the entire series.
But if you Google that phrase, there are some staunch contenders for the worst episode and everyone has big, big feels that feels right. Now it is Belly in 1969 who decides that Altamont would be a good venue for the Rolling Stones concert, which is historic. And on December 20th, 1969, the Zodiac Killer sends Belly a letter wishing the attorney a merry Christmas and also hoping to retain enough self control to not claim a quote ninth and possibly tenth victim. I’m sorry. So like Merry Christmas.
Angie: I don’t plan to commit any crimes this week. P.S. Can I keep you on retainer?
Theresa: Is that like what the goal here is? Pretty much. But he never replies back. Like Belly replies back like via the paper because there’s no return address. The Zodiac never responds back.
Okay. In October of 1976, he puts out a book, My Life on Trial and Autobiography. In January of 83, he has another book, The Belly Files. So this man is like no tub bull. And I should have mentioned like he’s representing all kinds of people. He’s representing like Zha Zha Gabor and like all of these famous humans. Okay.
Angie: He probably would have represented OJ. Honestly, it’s given the time.
Theresa: December 7th, 1989, he files a $15 billion clash action lawsuit against Union Carbide for the bullpull incident. The bullpull? B-H-O-P-O-L. I don’t think I know what that is. Before I speak out of my ass, let me Google it.
It’s in India when a pesticide plant exposed highly toxic gas to a ton of people. Okay. Yeah, I would have, that was different than what I thought it was.
So I’m glad I was better. 1991, he divorces one of his wives, Leah Triff Belly, whom he now referred to as La Trampa. Okay. And the San Francisco or the examiner called it one of the most scandalous squalid and lurid divorces in San Francisco history. Wow, that’s impressive. I mean, but when you have somebody as charismatic as Belly and he’s using the phrase La Trampa.
Angie: Yeah, it can’t be anything but scandalous at that point, I guess.
Theresa: Now, it’s in the 90s, Belly’s career has declined, his health is deteriorating, and he’s having some serious financial difficulty because he’s got these delayed or obstructed payments from many of these class action lawsuits that he won in the 80s, but the money’s not coming in as quickly and easily as he needs it. Even though he’s won these multi-million dollar settlements, he’s forced to pay his fifth wife after their divorce a lot of money. Fifth wife? He gets married six times. Okay. If at first you don’t succeed.
Angie: Try, try, try, try, try, try, try again. Yeah.
Theresa: There’s also some horrific damage to his building the moment the cannon after the 1987 earthquake that results in some severe and costly damages. The building was deemed uninhabitable and he can’t afford the repairs. Mmm. Waved by a bite of the cannon. I wonder if the cannon’s still there. I don’t think so.
Okay. Now he gets sued multiple times for malpractice. He’s targeted for tax evasion and he declares… Aren’t they all?
Like, so he goes from riding the crest to the lowest of lows. This next line cracks me up. When his dog turned up missing, he offered a reward for its return of either $1,000 or three hours of legal advice.
Angie: Hey, you never know. You might need some legal advice.
Theresa: The consensus was that the finder should go for the $1,000.
: Oh. So we’ve declined. We’ve declined.
Theresa: Now his health continues to drop lower and lower and his death occurs in San Francisco six weeks after his marriage to Nancy Ho. He’s suffering from pancreatic cancer, pneumonia, and he’s also coming off of a stroke.
Cool. One of his sons, Caesar, named after grandpa, accused Nancy Ho of murder and demanded an autopsy claiming that she’d given his father lethal doses of painkiller. The suit is dismissed following a coroner’s verdict that Bel-A had died of natural causes.
Okay. Now, shortly after his death, the San Diego Union Tribune publishes a cartoon that says, I’ve got a guy here claiming he’s been struck and injured by one of the pearly gates. That’s fitting, I think.
Yeah. Now, Bel-A’s, I couldn’t put in today’s money because it like shrinks the entire career, but his lifelong career results were 350 million. But some sources claim the figures as high as 700 million in winning judgments.
Angie: Wow. Okay. That he paid out in alimony. No, no, no, no, no. That he received four clients. Oh.
Theresa: In representing clients, not how much he earned. Gotcha. And I’m misheard. I probably miss that. I’m going to listen to this later and be like, wow, Teresa, could you have worded it any worse?
Hope to be hard about it. Now, while he ended up living in San Francisco for most of his life, he really loved maintaining an interest in Sonora, where he was born. He ended up keeping the title to his family business, and he mourned the loss of Washington Street’s trees and crusaded for planting others.
Angie: Love that. We are Tree City, USA.
Theresa: He urged for the preservation of the dome and railed at those who wanted to move the administration center out of downtown Sonora in the mid 1970s.
Angie: That’s funny. The administration center is still in downtown Sonora.
Theresa: And for me, I’m like, this doesn’t mean much, but I knew this would mean something for you. He would regularly visit his hometown of Sonora, and on every trip he’d stop at the I.O .F. Cemetery on Lighton Street, where his maternal grandparents are buried.
Angie: And I have two missions today. Okay.
Theresa: You do. And although he never spent more than a few days a year there, he was well liked in Sonora and over the years received many honors from their historic society, Chamber of Commerce, and the National Council of the Arts. And to Wallamy County Civic Organizations.
Cool. And when he passed away at his request, he was buried in the Sonora I.I .O.F. Nope, I.O .F. Cemetery in the Moran family plot. He loved the law and the limelight equally and left behind a legacy of both creative and controversial lawyering.
Angie: Creative and controversial. I love this for him. How fun. Yep.
Theresa: And that is the Storvin, the story of Melvin Belli. I will forever call it the Storvin. The Storvin. Yep. That’s a fun word.
Angie: Can you send me the spellings and I will get you the pictures? Yes. Thank you.
Theresa: I will do that. If you’ve enjoyed this Storvin and you’re thinking there’s a Storvin they haven’t covered, but I feel like they really would enjoy it, then you should email us at unhinged.historypod at gmail.com or hit us up on TikTok. I believe Angie still posts on our behalf on Instagram.
Angie: I’m trying. We’re getting there. Okay. I’m having some, yeah. You can reach out on us at TikTok or Instagram. Instagram is just not as posty as TikTok is.
Theresa: As posty? Okay. Yeah. And if you’re thinking a hot diggity, this Storvin means a lot to all of us, then you need to share it with your favorite controversial person who would be the lawyer. And on that note, hey, both of our stories today have lawyers. They did, didn’t they? Look at that. That’s so practical. On that note, goodbye.
: Bye.
Unhinged History 
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