Infamous America - KIDNAPPINGS Ep. 3 | Brooke Hart: “Human Devils”

Episode Date: October 8, 2025

On November 9, 1933 – 22 year old Brooke Hart, the heir to a department store fortune and San Jose’s most eligible bachelor, went missing in broad daylight. The crime obsessed kidnappers believe they have a brilliant plan to extort money from the Hart family. But it was more brutal than brilliant, and when it unraveled, no one was prepared for the reaction of the people in San Jose, California. Join Black Barrel+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons: blackbarrel.supportingcast.fm/join   Apple users join Black Barrel+ for ad-free episodes, bingeable seasons and bonus episodes. Click the Black Barrel+ banner on Apple to get started with a 3-day free trial.   On YouTube, subscribe to INFAMOUS+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons: hit “Join” on the Legends YouTube homepage.   For more details, please visit www.blackbarrelmedia.com. Our social media pages are: @blackbarrelmedia on Facebook and Instagram, and @bbarrelmedia on Twitter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Harold Thurman and John Holmes couldn't have been more different. Harold grew up on a farm before moving to the city of San Jose, California with his family in 1917 at the age of 11. Modesty defined his upbringing, but Harold quietly harbored dreams of wealth he would never pursue. His five sisters had well-paying careers and comfortable marriages, which left Harold as the family's outlier. He drifted in and out of low-paying jobs, ran with the wrong crowd, and bore the weight of his family's disappointment. For Harold, an accusation of criminal behavior wouldn't have surprised anyone. John Holmes was two years older than Harold, and John's family had moved to San Jose two years before Harold's family. John's father owned a popular tailor shop, and he sent John to San Jose High School, where John initially thrived.

John was a tall, clean-cut football star who embodied promise, but his temper caused a heated argument with a teacher and got him kicked out of school. His expulsion could have derailed him completely, but it didn't. John landed a job at an electronics store, and by the age of 20, he was married with kids on the way. At 24 in 1928, John appeared to settle into family life, but then he made a radical change which sent his life down a different path. He left his job and relocated his family to the scenic coastal town of Half Moon Bay. Half Moon Bay was nestled between San Francisco to the north and San Jose to the south, and it became a smuggler's paradise.

During the first eight years of the Prohibition era, Half Moon Bay had developed into an outlaw haven for boats transporting illegal alcohol. John worked at a local gas station, which perfectly positioned him to meet smugglers who told sensational stories of their criminal exploits. Through the romanticized stories of the smugglers, John became fascinated by a life of crime. He was obsessed with news stories about crime, and he spent hours analyzing the ways in which he would have committed the crimes differently from the crooks who got caught. As his obsession grew, his life changed in two ways. He separated from his wife and kids, and he received a promotion from gas station attendant to salesmen for Union Oil.

His new job required him to spend long days on the road traveling between sales calls. During one of those long trips in 1933, he stopped at a gas station where Harold Thurman worked. As the two men talked, they realized they had similar interests and backgrounds. They both grew up in San Jose. They both craved a wealthy lifestyle, and they both had spent their adult years doing low-paying jobs. Both were tempted by a life of crime, but neither had crossed the line and neither had been arrested. The more they talked, the more they believed they could succeed where other criminals failed. And that was when John had an idea.

As a union oil salesman, he knew that Union Oil couriers carried lots of money on them. John and Harold decided to kidnap and rob a union oil courier. On September 25, 1933, they executed the crime with precision. The crime turned out to be more of an old-fashioned stick-up than a kidnapping, but they were pleased with the outcome. They stole $716, which was the equivalent of nearly $18,000 today. A month later, they targeted a shell oil career. Once again, they released their victim unharmed and,

walked away with $700. To Harold and John, this life of crime thing felt easy. The average person in California in 1933 made about $550 per year. In a matter of minutes across two days, John and Harold had stolen more than $1,400. They felt invincible, and they were ready to tackle something bigger with higher stakes and greater rewards.

They put their biggest plan into action less than three weeks after their second small-time robbery. Kidnappings for ransom were all over the newspaper headlines in the early 1930s. Smart kidnappers had hauled in $50,000 or more in ransom money. That was life-changing money, and that's what John and Harold wanted. They targeted the 22-year-old heir to a local department store fortune, and their effort led to outrage and horror on levels they couldn't possibly have imagined. From Black Barrel Media, this is infamous America.

I'm your host, Chris Wimmer, and this season we're telling stories of some of the most notorious kidnappings in American history, the crazy events which surrounded each abduction, and the chaotic investigations of the cases. This is episode three, Brooke Hart, Human Devils. By 1933, John Holmes and Harold Thurmond had seen at least three high-profile kidnappings for ransom play out in the newspapers. At the end of 1932, a wealthy manufacturer in Indiana named Arthur Wolverton had been abducted and ransomed for $50,000. A little more than a month later, baby Charlie Lindberg had been abducted, and his father, the world-famous aviator Charles Lindberg, paid a $50,000 ransom.

A year later, in July 1933, George Machine Gun Kelly and his wife abducted an oil baron named Charles Erchell in Oklahoma. Oklahoma and collected $200,000 in ransom money. Holmes and Thurman had made just $1,400 from their first two criminal efforts, and they were determined to go bigger in their next attempt. Their target, Brooke Hart, was the son of a wealthy and well-loved family in San Jose. The Hart family owned and operated Hart's department store, a business that was deeply rooted in the fabric of the community. Alex Hart and Eleanor Hart had four children.

the eldest of whom was 22-year-old Brooke. Brooke was the heir to the Hart's department store fortune, a fortune which began with his grandfather. In 1866, Leopold Hart started a small market called the Cash Corner Store at the corner of Santa Clara Street and San Jose Street. What began as a humble venture evolved into a thriving store, which was said to have the same notoriety in San Jose as Macy's had in New York. When Leopold's son Alex joined the family business, he grew it into an all-in-one department store,

which was a novel idea at the time. Customers could find household essentials and high-end goods in the same place. Hearts Department Store, as the business was called by locals, attracted people from all walks of life, and it soon became a social hub as well as a retail store. The Hearts earned sterling reputations by keeping the doors open late, and the price is low. and they offered jobs when money was scarce. Despite the family's newly built Victorian mansion and Brooke's flashy Studebaker Roadster,

envy didn't muddy their reputations. They gave back more than they took, and the townspeople cherished them for it. Brooke Hart essentially grew up in the store. He spent his childhood stocking shelves before graduating to bookkeeper and then sales clerk. After he attended Santa Clara University and then returned to the store,

his father promoted him to vice president of the business. Brooke Hart was referred to as, quote, the town's most eligible bachelor. He was poised to lead the family business into a new era, and he and his father, Alex, had a close bond. Alex Hart had grown up at the end of the Old West era, and he was in his 50s by the time the automobile became commonplace. He never learned to drive,

and he relied on Brooke as his driver and partner on daily commutes to the store and to business meetings. The routine meant the two were frequently together, a rhythm that was noticed by two men who were eager to make a small fortune on a kidnapping for ransom plot. John Holmes and Harold Thurman had been watching Brooke Hart's routine,

and they believed they were smart enough to succeed where other kidnappers had failed. Machine Gun Kelly and the Lindbergh kidnapper had received their ransom money, but at least according to the next, newspapers of the time, both had been caught and convicted of their crimes. Kelly's guilt was certain, but the Lindbergk kidnappers' guilt was a little more hazy. John and Harold were confident that their plan would allow them to get away clean. My relentless sleep problems have

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At Mood.com, get 20% off your first order with our promo code, Infamous. Go to Mood.com and use the code infamous to get 20% off your first order. And they have a 100-day satisfaction guarantee. Mood.com promo code infamous. Just 17 days after their last robbery and abduction, Holmes and Thurman set their on Brooke Hart. They had observed his daily routine, and they knew he would be alone for only a few minutes at closing time. Brooks' habit was to leave the store, retrieve his green Studebaker from the parking lot across the street, and circle back to pick up his father Alex. That evening,

the plan unfolded ahead of schedule. Alex Hart was expected at a dinner event at the San Jose Country Club, which was hosted by friends from the Chamber of Commerce. The event began at 6 p.m. A little before six, Brooke exited the back of the store and started to walk across the parking lot. His last words to his father, who was headed toward the front of the store to be picked up at the curb, were simple and routine. I'll be right back. Five minutes later, Alex Hart was still waiting at the front of the store for his son. He grew worried and his anxiety built as the minutes ticked by. At the 30-minute mark, frustration turned to slight panic.

It was not like Brooke to keep his dad waiting, and Brooke had his own meeting with a friend at 6.30 p.m. If the car had broken down, Brooke surely would have walked back to the store. Hoping for an explanation later, Alex accepted a ride to the dinner with a friend and assumed he'd reconnect with Brooke afterward. At 8.30 p.m., Alex returned home to find that Brooke hadn't shown up. He learned Brooke had also missed his 6.30 appointment. Panic fully said. in. Alex made a desperate call to the police, but he had little information to give them. As far as he knew, Brooke had simply disappeared. The reality was just as bad. Just before 6 p.m., Brooke had

exited Hart's department store and walked across the street to the parking lot where his Studebaker waited. Brooke climbed into the car, started the engine, and began to drive out of the lot to pick up his father. As he slowed to exit the lot, John Holmes, armed. armed with a pistol, jumped into the passenger side of the Studebaker. He jabbed the gun into Brooks' side and ordered him to drive. Harold Thurman, waiting nearby in John's car, followed them closely as they traveled 10 miles outside of San Jose to the small town of Milpitas. In Milpitas, they stopped the cars. John and Harold transferred Brooke from the Studebaker to John's car, and then the three men

headed toward what is now called the San Mateo Bridge. John and Harold would have known it as the San Francisco Toll Bridge, which was its original name when the bridge was built across part of San Francisco Bay four years earlier in 1929. When the kidnappers made it to the bridge, they rolled out onto the span and stopped John's car. They dragged Brooke from the vehicle, and John struck the young man over the head with a brick. The blow was intended to knock Brooke out, but it didn't. He screamed for help, and John struck him again. The second blow knocked Brooke unconscious.

The kidnappers bound Brooke's hands and feet with baling wire, and they tied some of the wire to concrete blocks. At some point during the ordeal, Brooke regained consciousness and began to struggle. But it was too late. He was already sufficiently bound, and John Holmes was a physically imposing former football player. He and Harold subdued Brooke easily.

They hoisted Brooke up to the bridge railing, and shoved him over the side. Brook Hart plummeted into the waters of San Francisco Bay. John and Harold thought their work was done, but Brooks seemed to free himself from the wire. As he thrashed in the water, he reportedly yelled for help. John fired several shots from a small caliber gun, either from the bridge or down by the water,

to silence Brooke Hart. The kidnappers then fled the scene, and believed, like other criminals before them, they had committed the perfect crime. They never intended to keep Brooke alive. Hiding an adult during ransom negotiations was too risky, so killing him immediately was part of their calculated plan. The next phase was to demand the ransom money

while making everyone believe Brooke Hart was still alive. But that wasn't as easy as they believed. For a plan that was supposed to be perfect, the number of mistakes and oversights grew quickly and then dramatically. The Hart family's home was chaos by 8.30 p.m. They had already reported Brooke missing to the police and were calling friends to piece together any leads. Brooke's father was the last to see or hear from him just before 6 p.m. After that, there was nothing until the phone rang.

Brooke's younger sister, 18-year-old Elise, answered. On the other end was a strange man. His voice was cold and calculated as he demanded, $40,000 in cash for the safe return of Brooke Hart. Adjusted for today's value, the kidnappers were asking for nearly a million dollars. The man on the phone warned that any involvement with the police would result in Brooks' death. Further instructions will follow, he added before hanging up. Alex Hart, Brooke's father, was already working with authorities, and he quickly called the San Jose

police chief with the update. Within hours, the Bureau of Investigations, the Santa Clara Police and the San Francisco Police were actively involved. A missing person's bulletin went out, alerting authorities to search for Brooke Hart and any sign of his green Studebaker. The police wasted no time. Guards were stationed outside the family home. An investigator was on site for real-time updates, and phone lines were monitored with tracking devices.

Alex Hart made a plea to the public. He spoke of Brooke's exceptional character, and the close bond they shared as father and son. The words struck a chord, though the town didn't need convincing to rally. Brooke was well-liked and well-respected. Everyone was invested in bringing him home. On November 11th, two days after Brooks' disappearance,

the first major lead surfaced. Brooke's leather wallet was discovered on a refueling tank on the SS Lurline, an ocean liner docked in San Francisco and bound for Los Angeles. More than 100 passengers were detained while the ship was searched. It's believed that legendary baseball player Babe Ruth was among them. He had just finished his second to last season with the Yankees, and he was two years away from retirement.

After a thorough search of the ship, authorities found nothing more related to Brooke Hart. They speculated that Brooks' wallet was carried to the bay through a nearby sewer outlet, and then it became lodged on the ship. At nearly the same time, the missing Studebaker was found abandoned with its lights still on. That cast an ominous tone on the investigation when ransom notes started to arrive. It's difficult to discern the exact dates and demands of the ransom notes, and there were a number that were deemed fraudulent. But most accounts agree, the correspondence finally led to one primary ultimatum. The captors demanded that Alex Hart personally drive the $40,000.

in cash to Los Angeles. To signal his agreement, he was instructed to place a sign with the number two in the front window of the department store. And that was when the kidnappers learned of their first major oversight. Alex complied with the demand. He placed the two sign in the window and scrawled a message beneath it, which read, I cannot drive. Alex Hart was 64 years old in 1933.

For most of his life, the two dominant modes of transportation. were the horse and the train. By the time the automobile became widely available in the 1920s, he was in his 50s and he never learned to drive. The kidnappers had missed that critical detail, and now they had to revise their plan. They decided written correspondence would take too long, and opted instead for a phone call. In doing so, they played right into the hands of the Bureau of Investigation. On November 15th, Harold Thurman called Alex.

and the Bureau's tracking devices started working. Alex answered and kept Thurman talking while the bureau agent listened intently. Alex, with equal parts calm and desperation in his tone, kept rambling. He explained why he couldn't drive or travel. On top of not having a license, he was also sick, and he suggested they use a go-between for the ransom. At first, Thurman seemed open to the idea, but tensions rose when he and Alex,

Alex couldn't agree on a person to act as the intermediary. Thurmond went back to insisting Alex make the trip himself, and he grew furious when Alex continued to insist that he couldn't. But with every passing second, Bureau agents grew closer to finding the location of the call. Then, one of the agents who had been listening nodded to Alex. His stalling had paid off. The Bureau had successfully traced the location of the call.

Officers mobilized to apprehend the kidnappers before they could vanish. But Alex's job wasn't done. He had to keep the kidnappers on the phone long enough for the police to close in. Alex did as instructed and maintained a steady stream of chatter. He reversed course, making it appear as though he were complying, but then he demanded ironclad proof that the kidnapper had his son and that his son was okay. Alex pressed further, asking where in Los Angeles he should go and how he would find his son after handing over the ransom money. He kept the kidnapper on the line as long as possible.

Harold was in a public pay phone booth in downtown San Jose, walking distance from the police station. He was so engrossed in the heated exchange with Alex Hart that he failed to notice the police officers who swarmed the area. Suddenly, the door of the foam booth burst open and officers grabbed Harold Thurman. Six days after the kidnapping, one of the kidnappers was under arrest. And he realized, much like Chicago killers Leopold and Loeb had realized 10 years earlier, his plan was not as perfect as he thought. Harold Thurman never thought he'd be caught, and his lack of preparation for an interrogation became glaringly obvious.

Questioning began around 8 p.m. At first, Harold claimed he'd been talking to a friend when the police arrived, but he couldn't recall who. He changed his story and insisted he was talking to his mother. The interrogation continued like that for the next six hours, until sometime between 2 a.m. and 3 a.m., Harold cracked. He named his accomplice John Holmes and provided a detailed account of the crime. He confessed that it started with John jumping into Brooke's car as Brooke exited the parking lot across from the department store. Harold narrated their route,

described how they switched cars, drove to the bridge, and brutally attacked Brooke. Harold confessed to tying Brooke with wire and throwing him into the bay. Harold then outlined the ransom notes and the call that sealed his fate. To top it off,

he revealed the whereabouts of John Holmes. The police rushed to a San Jose hotel, where John was supposed to be staying, and they brought Harold along as bait. Around 4 a.m. on November 16th, Harold knocked on John's door. A sleepy voice asked from behind the door, who is it? Harold answered nervously, it's me, Harold. John unlocked the door.

Officers stormed in and arrested the second kidnapper in his underwear. After John put on some clothes, officers took him to the police station and started his interrogation. Initially, John denied everything. detectives assured him they already knew the truth and had no patience for lies. Like Harold, John cracked under the pressure. When he started talking, he revealed details which were darker than those from Harold. John, the former family man and football star, admitted to methodically planning the kidnapping. He said he and Harold stalked Brooke Hart for six weeks.

He coolly explained how they decided early on that Brooke would not survive the origin. deal. They had nowhere to stash him during negotiations, and ironically, they believed it was too risky to keep him alive. John revealed the details of tying Brooke with wire, throwing him over the bridge, and then shooting him to make sure he was dead. The calculated callousness was stunning, and the details of the crime were released to the public the next day, November 17, 1933. The story of Brooke Hart's murder ignited a fury which was beyond the police's expectations. The San Jose Evening News published an op-ed titled Human Devils, which stated, If mob violence could ever be justified, it would be in a case like this, and we believe the general public would agree with us.

The article further described the newspaper's haunting visit to the heart home, suggesting the enormity of the loss was enough to push even the most. most composed people to seek bloody vengeance. The newspaper was right. The general public did agree. Ten days later, when Brookhart's body was found, the discovery sent the general public over the edge. After the confessions of John Holmes and Harold Thurmond, police divers searched the gloomy waters of San Francisco Bay near the San Francisco Toll Bridge.

They found two blood-stained 22-pound bricks and a pillowcase. Rumors spread that the pillowcase had been used in the murder to cover Brooke's head. More rumors circulated about the cold-blooded nature of John Holmes. People said he took his estranged wife to the movies after murdering Brooke Hart. One newspaper claimed claw marks were found on a steel column near the site where Brookhart was dumped, which prompted readers to picture the young man in a desperate struggle for his life. That detail, along with the pillowcase and the movie date, were never verified. but they all added fuel to the frenzy that was building around the case.

On November 26th, 17 days after Brookhart went missing, two duck hunters found his remains. After the work of fish, crabs, and eels, the remains were barely recognizable. Authorities were only able to verify the identity from the markings on his clothing, which bore the stamp of Hart's department store. The post-mortem examination revealed Brookhart had died of drowning,

and that none of the gunshot wounds had been fatal. The confirmation didn't provide any comfort, and it wouldn't have stopped the mob that was forming outside the county jail, even if it had arrived in time for people to hear it. John Holmes and Harold Thurmond sat in the Santa Clara County Jail as a crowd gathered at St. James Park across the street. By the time Brooks remains were officially identified, the rage of the crowd couldn't be contained.

People lit torches and chanted, give them to us. The crowd hurled bottles, bricks, and rocks at the jail, and their numbers grew at an alarming rate. The best guess is that Sheriff William Emig had about 17 lawmen, in addition to himself, to contend with a mob of nearly 5,000 people. The sheriff requested immediate National Guard reinforcements from California Governor James Rolf. Rolf didn't just deny the request, he fanned the flames by stating, I will not call the Guard. guard to protect kidnappers who willfully killed a fine boy like that. Let the law take its course. Any hope that vigilante justice could be avoided, disintegrated when rumors spread through

the mob, that the signed confessions might not hold up in court without a witness to corroborate them. Worse, psychiatric evaluations could lead to insanity please, which might give Holmes and Thurmond a way out. By that night, the crowd's number swelled. closer to 10,000 and was described as pure hysteria. At around 11 p.m., a group of men started bashing the door to the jail with a 20-foot steel battering ram. A photographer for the San Francisco Chronicle snapped a photo of the scene, which makes it look like it's straight out of a Hollywood movie. In the jail, Sheriff Emig told his men to hold the line as long as they could without shooting anyone. Tear gas pushed back the rioters briefly, but it only delayed the inevitable.

Soon, the battering ram broke through the doors, and a group of men stormed the jail. Estimates say they were at least 50, and there could have been many more. They fought and trampled the sheriff and all the officers. They seized the keys and surged upstairs to the cells. They viciously beat the kidnappers and dragged them from the building to the park across the street. rioters hit the kidnappers with branches and bricks. They stripped the clothes from Holmes and Thurman and burned their skin with lighters while they tied nooses around their necks.

The mob threw the ropes over the branches of two big elm trees. They yanked Harold Thurmond into the air. John Holmes was bigger and stronger and he resisted. As the rioters heaved on his rope and tried to pull him off the ground, he slipped free of the noose. The rioters pulled him down, and broke both of his arms. After that, they successfully lynched the second of the two kidnappers and murderers.

The crowd of between 5,000 and 15,000 men, women, and children, cheered while the bodies of John Holmes and Harold Thurman swung from the branches of the elm trees for the next 45 minutes, until they were cut down by police. By the next morning, photographs and reports of the lynching spread across the nation. The fallout was immediate and, and fierce. Critics pointed fingers in every direction. Sheriff William Emig insisted that he had done all he could with his limited resources. The Bureau of Investigation distanced itself, stating its role

ended with the arrests. Governor Rolf defended his inaction and claimed the lynching should serve as a warning to other would-be kidnappers. He went so far as to promise pardons for anyone in the mob. Eight months later, Governor Rolf died of a heart at the attack, and many attributed his death to the stress of the heart case. It appears as though a grand total of eight people were arrested and or charged with crimes related to the lynching. None of the cases were pursued, and no one was convicted. The elm trees, which were used for the hanging, were cut down after a vote by the San Jose City Council. But St. James Park is still there, only a block away from downtown San Jose. The elm trees stood there. The elm trees stood

near the statue of President William McKinley, who delivered a speech at St. James Park in 1901, and was assassinated six months later. The monument was meant to honor the fallen president after one of his final public appearances. And then, 30 years after it was erected, it was the site of one of the final public lynchings in California. Next time on Infamous America, we're telling the story of the abduction of the great-grandson of a man who died in 1935, but remains the 12th richest man in American history. Get ready because this one is wild, and it proves, as often happens,

that truth is stranger than fiction. That's next week on Infamous America. Members of our Black Barrow Plus program don't have to wait week to week to receive new episodes. They receive the entire season to binge all at once with no commercials, and they also receive exclusive bonus episodes. Sign up now through the link in the show notes or on our website, blackbarrelmedia.com.

This episode was research and written by Mandy Wimmer, original music by Rob Villeer. I'm Chris Wimmer. Thanks for listening.