Worlds Worst: PUBLIC ENEMY NUMBER 1; Serial Killers, Cold-Blooded Murderers and Gun-Toting Gangsters. Each Week Former Top West Midlands Detective JOHN PLIMMER Looks at the Most Notorious Criminal Figures of the Last Century -and How They Were Caught. Gangster Who Led Killing Spree across Mid-West America

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Byline: JOHN PLIMMER

TO the Depression-hit America of the 1930s, the exploits of the midwestern gangsters who robbed banks and outwitted cops struck a chord.

And like so many gun-toting mobsters, John Dillinger became a cavalier and legendary figure amongst the povertystricken population.

But the manwho indirectly brought an end to the gangster era was nothing more than a cold-blooded killer and ruthless armed robber whose life ended on a Chicago street in July, 1934.

John Herbert Dillinger was born on June 22, 1903, in Indianapolis. His mother died three years later so he was raised by a caring but disciplined father against whom he rebelled.

After school he worked in a factory, but couldn't hold the job down when he began getting into trouble with the police.

The family moved to a farm in nearby Mooresville in the hope that young Dillinger would settle into a rural life but it proved a lost cause. He was soon in court on car-theft charges.

With the encouragement of his father, Dillinger joined the US Navy. But he deserted in 1924 and returned to Mooresville, where he joined forces …