The Mabel Street Mob - The Police Raid on the Tailfeathers Roadhouse.

Captain Andy Donovan spoke with quiet authority and when he said “listen up men” they listened. “The Mabel Street Mob are known to be holed up at the old roadhouse outside of town on the Normanton road. You know the place, the old Tailfeathers Saloon and Gambling Den”.

We are fairly sure, they are all there –

Loretta Salerno, the newest member of the gang and the driver. She likes to tote a Thompson and not just for show, she is a deadly shot, not been long in the States, originally from Southern Italy, no one seems quite sure where.

Ruth Marrot – a shadowy figure, she runs the finance side of the operation, looks like she had an accident with an acid bath, another deadly shot with her colt automatic.

Nicole Boursier, the 2nd in command and the front woman for the gang. Comes from Louisiana way, we think she has French connections with the Cosa Nostra in Marseilles.

Barbara Vasseur, another high class French girl, known as the executioner, you can guess her role in the mob. She can shoot the pips out of an apple with that shotgun. Of course there’s not much left of the apple.

Patsie Jones from Brooklyn – mad as the hat she wears, the meanest of the bunch and twice as nasty.

We think the mastermind behind the gang is also going to be there but we're not sure what she looks like -

Lian Su Smith, Chinese American and a bit of a looker by all accounts. Generally avoids the limelight but cunning as a fox and much more dangerous. There are no known photographs and live witnesses generally turn out not to be.

“OK Don’t forget” he said “These girls are seriously dangerous and we need to go in fast and shoot first. I’ll take care of the Attorney’s Office, don’t forget the storyline, you gave them fair warning and they fired on us first, we only responded in self defence. If we do it by the book we will be coming back in body bags, OK you all got that”. There were some very nervous nods of assent, maybe the body bag comment, maybe the shoot first.

The Police Squad -

Walter Ellery is good with his weapon’s of choice - a baton and a sticky bun, not so useful against these girls unless he can get up close, and if he does he’s not going to hit some pretty little girl – is he? Actually – yes, he’s meaner and tougher than a doughnut eating cop should be.

Petra Stanislav – the top of her year at the Police Academy, she is the rookie in the squad, but more capable than most cops, unfortunately renowned for her clumsiness, everyone leaves the room when she loads her pistol.

Big Jim Floyd – strong as a horse but as clumsy as Stanislav. This was to be a problem.

Norman “Action Man” Grumach, smart as a whip but not as good with firearms as he thinks he is.

Juanita Aguila, another fine cop but maybe better at operational organisation rather than actually in the operation.

Finally Captain Andy Donovan – a veteran of the streets of Chicago, he's led many squads on raids such as this, but he feels a little uneasy with the quality of the officers under his command for this sort of raid. He was looking forward to retiring in one piece, and this had been on his mind more than a little recently, especially since the fiasco with the moonshine Here  and even more especially since coming to this hick town, full of bootleggers and dopeheads.


The Mabel Street Mob are somewhere on the table decided by dice, so Captain Andy’s plan was simple, he was entering from the road on the left. Expecting most of the mob to be in the saloon he sent the car with Walter driving and Petra as shotgun to go fast past the roadhouse and block the road out and then the main force in the van with Norman driving would pull up outside. Everyone would hop out and dive into the roadhouse and arrest or more probably shoot anyone in there. They would then mop up the rest of the gang wherever they happened to be.

If they acted fast they should catch the gang napping and have numbers on their side initially.

Dispositions of the Mob were decided on a dice roll. 1 dice for each of the mob - 1, 2 or 3 they are in the road house on a 4 they are in the big cabin, 5 in the small one, 6 somewhere on the board in a random place.

A close up of the small cabin. (I must fit a door), but I always think that, and still haven't got round to it.

The police car drives past the Saloon, but the van with most of the cops in it is not immediately behind, as it should have been, it was slowed by a missed activation.

Stanislav jumps out of the car and takes cover as she was taught in the Academy, Walter is slower and is still in the drivers seat - too many donuts will do that. The Police van finally arrives and screeches to a halt. The noise causes the mobsters to react, Patsie Jones comes out of the saloon to see what is happening. Sees the police and jumps back shouting “It’s the cops” She's not the sharpest knife in the drawer.

Inside the roadhouse Patsie, Loretta and Nicole are alert and covering the windows and doors. They decide to stay put and are prepared to have a shootout with the cops. Not too many brain cells in the building but Nicole should have known better. (Bad dice roll)

In the small cabin Ruth the Bookkeeper is alert and checks the door, then the window to see what is happening and she doesn’t see Petra crouched behind the police car, but does decides she is in a good position to sneak away with the books if she has to, so remains in the cabin.

In the big cabin Barbara checks the door worried by the screeching tyres outside, but the Boss of the outfit - Lian is fast asleep on the bed.

Walter finally gets out and takes cover behind the car. The road block is in place. Its looking good so far, although the van was a move behind the car due to a missed activation everyone is in place and the mob haven't decided to run yet.

Disaster - No one has emerged from the truck, it turns out Big clumsy Jim Floyd, tripped and somehow blocked the doors. (They didn’t activate for 2 moves) Lian wakes like a snake and she and Barbara are out of the big cabin making for the brown truck to get away (self preservation like the force is strong within them). They realised the raid was concentrated on the roadhouse and they passed a brains test but failed a guts test so decided to do a runner and escape, leaving the rest of the gang to take the heat.

The police finally get out of the truck but all the girls are active and ready. Big Jim Floyd sees Lian and Barbara and shouts stop we are the law, Captain Donovan gives him a sideways glance, what did I tell you he thinks as the girls open fire. Barbara’s 1st shot with the shotgun takes Jims hat off but does small damage, no brains in there to damage, but her other shot takes down Juanita. Lian firing just after Barbara only has Jim as a target and she hits him with two shots, he goes down OOF.

Mad Patsie cracks open the saloon door and fires at Officer Norman Grumach and takes him out with 2 shots to the chest. Double 6’s will do it every time. He falls to the floor before he can get a shot off.

Captain Donovan has not survived in the Police Force for so long by being a mug and he sees officers down all around and runs for cover in the field to the left. He knows the operation is a bust.
Three cops down around the van and Big Andy is in the field on the far side of the board.
Hopefully you can still see Officers Walter Ellery and Petra Stanislav in cover behind the police car watching the towns finest shed blood in front of them.

From the back window of the saloon Nicole sees Officer Ellery with his bag of doughnuts and fires, missing and he ducks down behind the car, rookie Stanislav sees the gun flash and gets off 2 shots, one hits the window frame but the other hits Nicole who falls to the floor bleeding badly.

From the small cabin Ruth the Bookkeeper sees Stanislav fire into the Saloon and returns that fire, missing but causing Stanislav to duck back into the cover of the car.

An eerie silence ensued. Andy Donovan is crouched down behind the fence in the field, looking back at his downed command, there’s going to be a lot of paperwork to fill in.

Barbara in the cabbage patch is re-loading her shotgun, Lian has reached the brown truck but can’t get in, the door is stuck, Nicole is groaning in the Saloon, but otherwise it’s quiet.

Walter and Petra, get good guts rolls and pop up from behind the Police car, there is no movement in the Saloon window where Nichole was but they spot Ruth the Book Keeper in the cabin, they both snapfire, Walter shades Petra to the shot but his bullets go into the log walls. Officer Petra Stanislav got top marks on the shooting range but this is reality, paper targets don’t shoot back and she misses as well, again hitting the log walls. Ruth holds her nerve and snapfires back at Walter hitting him once and he drops to the ground, Petra, fires back but ruffled by the moans of her partner her shots miss again and she runs out of ammo. Ruth fires back and hits Petra, but it is only a flesh wound, she drops back behind the car to stop the bleeding.

Another pause as everyone assesses the situation.

Patsie and Loretta burst out of the saloon making for the brown van and escape. Lian finally gets the door of the van open, Barabara is ready to jump in, Andy Donovan recovers his nerve and fires his shotgun but is out of range and misses.

Officer Stanislav recovers from her flesh wound and pops back up, but Ruth the Bookkeeper is covering the area and fires, missing but Stanislav ducks back again.

Ruth leaves the shelter of the log cabin and climbs in to the van, Andy Donovan runs towards the van as it speeds off and does not get in another shot.

Headlines in the Globe Newspaper the following day.

Four Officers wounded, in an abortive raid on an isolated Roadhouse Tavern known as the Tailfeathers Saloon. The raid lead by Captain Andrew Donovan - recently arrived from the Chicago Police Force was a complete fiasco. Witnesses said that the police van pulled up but no one got out for what seemed like an eternity. This gave the gang plenty of time to react to the raid and the officers were gunned down mercilessly as they emerged from the van.

Questions are being asked at the highest level why such a small and ill prepared squad should take on the notorious Mabel Street Mob unaided.

Captain Donovan could well be retiring earlier than he thought. All the Mabel Street gang got away except Nicole Boursier, who is badly wounded and may not recover, but if she does she may turn States evidence or need busting out of jail or both.
This game was the opening chapter for my game at DevLAM 17, which I hope to post next, although I've been flying aeroplanes yesterday and want to write that up for the Wings of War forum where I am taking part in the OTT (Over The trenches) campaign series of games and I'm nearly 2 months behind on that.

Here's another photo I liked but didn't use in the writeup, the Thompson toting Loretta on the porch of the Roadhouse.

If you are still here – Thanks for reading and take care out there.