The Downfall of Fatty Arbuckle

Fatty Arbuckle, Virginia Rappe

On this day in 1921, silent-film star Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle was arrested for the rape and murder of aspiring actress Virginia Rappe. He was later acquitted, after three separate trials, but his career and reputation were irreparably damaged.

Roscoe Arbuckle was born in 1887 in the town of Smith Center, Kansas. When he was two years old, his family moved to Santa Ana, California. His mother encouraged him to perform and by age eight he was singing on stage with the Frank Bacon Company. When he was twelve, his mother passed away, and his father, who never believed that Roscoe was actually his child, refused to support him. Roscoe started working odd jobs at a local hotel and was encouraged to compete in a talent show by a customer who had heard him sing. He won the competition and began his career in vaudeville which then led to starring roles in silent films.

After appearing in Mack Sennett’s Keystone Cops comedies, Roscoe Arbuckle formed his own production company in 1917. He wrote and directed many films starring his friend Buster Keaton. In 1919, Paramount offered him a $1 million a year contract. By this time he was well-known as "Fatty" Arbuckle. He had earned the nickname in school when by the age of twelve, he weighed 185 pounds.

In 1921, Arbuckle decided to take a break from his hectic film schedule. By this time he had developed an addiction to morphine after almost losing a leg due to an infection that had turned into a severe carbuncle. He was also suffering from second-degree burns on his buttocks due to an on-set accident. Despite these health issues, he and his friends, Lowell Sherman and Fred Fishback, drove to San Francisco, rented a hotel suite and invited several women to party with them. One of these women was Virginia Rappe.

Virginia Rappe was born in 1895 in Chicago, Illinois. By age fourteen, she was working as a commercial and art model. To further her career, she moved to San Francisco in 1916. It was there that she met and became engaged to dress designer Robert Moscovitz. Unfortunately, Moscovitz was killed in a streetcar accident and Rappe moved to Los Angeles. In 1917, she was given a prominent role in the silent film, Paradise Garden, opposite the popular movie star Harold Lockwood. In 1919, she began a relationship with director Henry Lehrman and starred in several of his films.

On the night of September 5, 1921, Virginia Rappe was found in Roscoe Arbuckle's hotel room, seriously ill and in distress. The hotel doctor determined that she was suffering from severe intoxication and gave her morphine to calm her down. She was taken to the hospital two days later. On September 9, she passed away from a ruptured bladder and secondary peritonitis.

During Virginia Rappe's hospitalization, her companion at the party, Maude Delmont, told her doctor that Rappe had been raped but the doctor found no evidence that the crime occurred. This did not stop Delmont, who had a police record for extortion and blackmail, from reporting Arbuckle for sexual assault. Investigators determined that Arbuckle, due to his large size, had caused Virginia Rappe's injuries while raping her. At a later press conference, Maude Delmont's manager alleged that Arbuckle had raped her with a piece of ice. By the time the story hit the press, it was alleged that Arbuckle had used a Coca-Cola bottle.

The case went to trial despite the fact that Arbuckle's defense had presented a letter from Maude Delmont in which she confessed that she made up the story in order to blackmail Roscoe Arbuckle. During the first trial, several witnesses, who had been pressured to testify against Arbuckle by San Francisco District Attorney Matthew Brady, stated that there was physical evidence of injuries caused by Arbuckle. However, when defense lawyer Gavin McNab cross-examined them, one witness admitted that she had been threatened with perjury charges and a nurse admitted that bruising on Virginia Rappe could have been caused by heavy jewelry that she had been wearing at the party. McNab also presented evidence from several pathologist experts that indicated that Virginia Rappe's bladder had ruptured because she had long suffered from cystitis, exacerbated by heavy drinking, which she had done plenty of the night she fell ill. Arbuckle also testified in his own defense, stating that everyone thought Rappe had just had too much to drink and that he never harmed Rappe in any way. After five days of deliberation, the jury determined that they were hopelessly deadlocked, with ten jurors voting "not guilty" and two "guilty" holdouts. A mistrial was declared.

On January 11, 1922, Roscoe Arbuckle was again on trial for the rape and murder of Virginia Rappe. During the second trial, the defense presented evidence that several prosecution witnesses from the first trial had been pressured by Brady to testify against Arbuckle. A security guard who had testified that Arbuckle had wanted the key to Rappe's dressing room, was found to have been charged with sexually assaulting an eight-year-old girl. He was hoping to get a deal from Brady for his testimony. The defense was also able to discredit fingerprint evidence from the first trial. Gavin McNab believed that he had so much evidence on his side that it was unnecessary for Arbuckle to testify a second time. However, the jury disagreed. Believing that Arbuckle's refusal to testify was a sign of guilt, nine jurors voted "guilty" while there were three holdouts for "not guilty". Another mistrial was declared.

A third trial began on March 13, 1922. By this time, Arbuckle's films had been banned and the press had painted him as a lecherous old man who used his weight to overpower innocent girls. William Randolph Hearst said of the scandal that it "sold more newspapers than any event since the sinking of the Lusitania." Arbuckle's accuser Maude Delmont gave lectures across the country about the "evils of Hollywood." Gavin McNab was taking no chances at this new trial. In addition to poking holes in the prosecution's case, he allowed Arbuckle to testify on his own behalf. It only took six minutes for a jury to find him not guilty. In addition to that verdict, they also issued the following apology to Roscoe Arbuckle:

"Acquittal is not enough for Roscoe Arbuckle. We feel that a great injustice has been done him. We feel also that it was only our plain duty to give him this exoneration, under the evidence, for there was not the slightest proof adduced to connect him in any way with the commission of a crime. He was manly throughout the case and told a straightforward story on the witness stand, which we all believed. The happening at the hotel was an unfortunate affair for which Arbuckle, so the evidence shows, was in no way responsible. We wish him success and hope that the American people will take the judgment of fourteen men and woman who have sat listening for thirty-one days to evidence, that Roscoe Arbuckle is entirely innocent and free from all blame."

Despite the acquittal, Arbuckle was unable to find work in Hollywood. He owed over $700,000 in legal fees ($10,500,250 in 2018 dollars) and was forced to sell his cars and his house. To help with his financial situation, Buster Keaton agreed to give him 35 percent of all future profits from his production company.

After a directing stint under the alias of William Goodrich, Arbuckle finally made a brief acting comeback in 1932. Warner Bros. gave him a contract to perform in six short comedic films, the only films in which Arbuckle's voice is heard. The films were successful in the United States, although still banned in the United Kingdom. On June 29, 1933, the day after he had wrapped up filming for the last short film, he signed a contract to star in a full-length feature. That night he celebrated the contract with friends. He later died in his sleep from a heart attack at the age of 46.

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