The Violent Life and Death of Contract Killer Elmer "Trigger" Burke
His Hair-Trigger Temper and Violent Tendencies Eventually Led Him to the Electric Chair
In June 1954, contract killer Elmer “Trigger” Burke was in the Dorchester neighborhood of Boston on “business.” Burke was stalking a man named Joseph “Specs” O’Keefe.
Four and a half years earlier, O’Keefe along with ten others had been a participant in the famous Brinks robbery in Boston, in which the thieves had made off with nearly $3 million in cash and securities. In the years following the robbery, dissension between O’Keefe and the other participants had caused a bitter fallout.
O’Keefe felt that the other robbers were holding back on him and not giving him his cut of the money. This was exacerbated by the fact that O’Keefe had multiple criminal cases pending against him simultaneously and needed cash to pay for his legal defense.
While out on bond in the spring of 1954, O’Keefe confronted some of his former partners in crime which resulted in several…