Saint Valentine's Day Massacre Rats, had been the valet of the Chicago hit man Fred Goetz. Bolton was privy to many of the Barker Gang's crimes and pinpointed the Florida hideout of Ma and Freddie Barker (both of whom were killed in a shootout with the FBI a week later). Bolton claimed to have taken part in the St. Valentine's Day Massacre with Goetz, Fred Burke, and several others. Because the FBI had no jurisdiction in a state murder case, they kept Bolton's revelations confidential, until the "Chicago American" newspaper reported a second-hand version of the bank robber's confession. The newspaper declared that the
Saint Valentine's Day Massacre that both machine guns be brought there at once. Through the then relatively new science of forensic ballistics, both weapons were determined to have been used in the massacre – and that one of Burke's Tommy guns had also been used to murder New York mobster Frankie Yale (who participated in O'Banion's murder) a year and a half earlier. Unfortunately, no further concrete evidence would surface in the massacre case. Burke would be captured over a year later on a Missouri farm. As the case against him in the murder of Officer Skelly was strongest, he was tried in Michigan