The family had pioneered in the region after the railroad arrived in 1883, starting with George Emley, a great-uncle to Ernest. Ernest’s father and an uncle followed around 1890. Ernest was born December 14, 1892 in Reardan, a small town about 22 miles west of Spokane. He married in 1913, but that did not work out. He was again unmarried when he entered the army and served in France, returning to the U.S. in June 1919. In 1920, Ernest was helping with a brother’s wheat crop and improving his own homestead about 45 miles northwest of Spokane.
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| Car Camp, ca 1920. National Archives. |
By the spring of that year, auto-camping was, if not “all the rage,” at least a trend that had mushroomed in popularity. Over the previous five years, the number of visitors to the national parks had almost tripled. Consumer magazines, such as Sunset and Woman’s Home Companion, published more and more “how-to” articles to help beginners who wanted to experience the latest thing.
The Emleys were farmers, so they could only plan for a few days off. Most of the eleven adults and five or six children in the group were relatives or in-laws, but they may have invited a few friends along. They gathered in four cars on a Friday afternoon and found a spot along the San Poil River near Keller, a mining town about 15 miles east and a bit north of today’s Grand Coulee Dam. Three autos were parked and strung with ropes and canvas to form a shelter.
By all accounts, the weekend was a success. They used the fourth car, Ernest Emley’s good-sized Essex, for excursions around the area. On Sunday evening, seven men piled into the car and went looking for some booze. They could not just visit a bar because the Volstead Act, which enforced national Prohibition, had gone into effect at the end of January.
As it happened, the state highway through Keller was one of the few that linked Canada with the main east-west roads and rail lines across central Washington. Thus, the men soon located a bootlegger (or perhaps he found them). Mellowed by whisky from the north, they headed back to camp. But a community center happened to be holding a dance, so they pulled in there to enjoy the music. Four got out so they could hear better. After a bit, Ernest drove on with the other two. He presumably expected to return later for the others.
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| Agent William C. Vest. U.S. Government photo. |
Authorities were well aware that liquor was moving south through Keller. They had reassigned two Prohibition Agents from Tacoma to try to stop it. That particular day, Ferry County Sheriff James L. Moore had been keeping an eye on an Oldsmobile that he suspected belonged to a bootlegger. He called the two agents – William C. Vest and John G. Montgomery – in the evening and told them they might have a chance to catch the suspect with “the goods.”
Here, it’s important to note that these men had no training, and little experience, in law enforcement. Sheriff Moore, about 40 years old, was an immigrant from Nova Scotia, Canada. He had been an unemployed mechanic when he was elected sheriff in late 1918. Vest, about 35, had worked on a survey crew and then as a civilian supply clerk for the U.S. government. Montgomery, about 38, had been a watchman, jailer, laborer, and city health inspector. Both were army veterans. Montgomery served stateside during the Spanish-American War, while Vest was in France with the quartermaster corps during World War I.
When Prohibition first went into effect, enforcement jobs were part of the old patronage or “spoils” system. Prospective agents “qualified” simply by knowing an elected official or political operative who had favors to dispense. They were not subject to Civil Service exams or rules, and there seemed to be no training to speak of. New agents got an identification card, a badge, and a gun. Vest and Montgomery were certified on March 3, 1920.
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| Agent John G. Montgomery. U. S. Government photo. |
The story of what happened next in Keller depends upon who was talking. The agents claimed they had identified themselves as federal officers as they and the sheriff approached the car in front of the community center. The Emley party vehemently denied that. Another man who witnessed the events from the porch of the center agreed. Beyond that, the officers had neither a warrant nor “probable cause” to search the vehicle. In fact, they had most likely mistaken Emley’s Essex for the Oldsmobile that Sheriff Moore had been watching. They were startled, and a bit annoyed, when the car simply drove off.
The agents hurried to the sheriff’s car and started in pursuit.
Meanwhile, Ernest had turned around and was coming back. The time was now 10:30 to 11:00 p.m., so he had probably decided to go right back for the other men. The sheriff supposedly tried to block the road, but Emley easily slid by and continued along the road. Hoping to gain the driver’s attention, the sheriff fired two warning shots into the air, using a .30-caliber Luger.
At this point, the Essex would have been an indistinct block in the darkness, outlined by the reflected glow of its own headlights. Yet, caught up in the moment, the two agents fired directly at the car. The sheriff joined them after a few seconds, firing three times from another pistol, a Remington .38-caliber automatic. Montgomery said he too fired three shots, using a .38-caliber Smith & Wesson revolver. Vest’s gun was a .45-caliber Colt automatic. He was later seen to insert three or four cartridges into its magazine.
Hit twice, once in the back of the head, Ernest Emley died almost instantly and the Essex slammed into a ditch. One passenger dove to the floor of the car, while the other jumped out and ran off. He was soon caught and arrested, along with the other man. The Emley party had no weapons whatsoever, and only a handful of whisky bottles. Both of the arrested men were soon released.
The Ferry County prosecutor lodged manslaughter charges against Vest and Montgomery. Sheriff Moore was not indicted, perhaps because he hadn’t fired at the car at first. Some legal maneuvering followed, starting with a change of venue to Spokane. That presented the oddity of having Ferry County attorneys as prosecutors in a federal court, while federal lawyers handled the defense.
The case was based largely on the statements from the three shooters. It would turn on whether or not the use of such deadly force was justified. No bullets had been collected from the shooting scene, and only a single empty shell casing from the Luger. As physical evidence, prosecutors did have the autopsy report and photos of the death car, the latter showing four holes in the back window of the car. Blazing away in the dark, the officers got off nine or ten shots at a level where some were almost bound to hit someone in the car. Only happenstance saved the other two riders from being shot.
To bolster their case, prosecutors called several witnesses who testified that Montgomery was at least tipsy, while Vest was drunk and abusive on the night of the shooting. Naturally, the two denied having imbibed any liquor. Besides, the defense asserted, all that was irrelevant. Here were two federal officers, engaged in what was already known to be a dangerous attempt to enforce the law. The jury cannot tie their hands because of this unfortunate accident. The federal judge followed with favorable (to the defense) interpretation of the Volstead Act. In the end, the jury declared Montgomery “not guilty” and split on Vest.
In the six months before a new trial for Vest, federal authorities (the defense) contacted criminologist Luke S. May. Since there were no bullets to assess, he really had only the autopsy report to go on. He concluded that the death wound had probably not been inflicted by a .45-caliber slug. That, of course, further weakened the case against Vest. One of May’s operatives did interview a local who said that the sheriff knew the agents were “intoxicated,” but called them anyway.
With again lenient instructions from the judge, the jury took a little over two hours to return a “not guilty” verdict for Vest. Sadly, Emley’s death was not the first attributed to over-zealous enforcement of the Volstead Act by federal, state, and local officials. Nor would it be the last.
James Moore did not run for reelection, so he was no longer sheriff of Ferry County by the time of the second trial. It’s not clear what he did between then and 1930, when he appeared in the census as a guard at Folsom Prison in California. Vest left the Prohibition Unit not long after the trial and was back in Tacoma in 1922, selling insurance. Montgomery stayed with the service essentially until Prohibition was repealed in 1933.
| References: Laura Arkey, “Ferry County – Thumbnail History,” Online Encyclopedia of Washington State History, HistoryLink.org, Seattle, Washington (June 1, 2006). |
| An Illustrated History of Stevens, Ferry, Okanogan and Chelan Counties, State of Washington, Western Historical Publishing Company, Spokane (1904). |
| “Killings Resulting from Prohibition Enforcement,” Congressional Record – Senate, January 18, 1930, Volume LXXII, Part 2, United States Printing Office, Washington, D.C. (1930). pp. 1859 - 1886. |
| Luke S. May, Luke S. May Papers, Special Collections, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington (1969). |
| “[News Related To Emley Case],” Oroville Weekly Gazette, Seattle Times, Spokane Chronicle, Spokesman-Review, Spokane, Washington; Idaho Statesman, Boise, Idaho; The Oregonian, Portland, Oregon (November 1886 – October 1921). |
| Daniel Okrent, Last Call: The Rise and Fall of Prohibition, Scribner, New York (2010). |
| Terence Young, Heading Out: A History of American Camping, Cornell University Press, Ithaca, New York (2017). |
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