Detective William J. Grooms

William J. Grooms

Detective William Grooms was one of four law enforcement officers killed in an incident referred to as the Kansas City Massacre.

Detective Grooms was survived by his wife.

The Kansas City Massacre occurred when the Pretty Boy Floyd gang attempted to free gang member Frank Nash.

Nash was being transported from Oklahoma to the U.S. Penitentiary in Leavenworth, Kansas. Unbeknownst to the officers, an informant had relayed all the information regarding Nash's arrival and his law enforcement escorts to various gangsters throughout the area.

As the group of officers and agents entered their cars at Union Station, in Kansas City, the gang opened fire. In the ensuing gun battle Detective Frank Hermanson and Detective William Grooms, of the Kansas City Police Department, Chief of Police Otto Read, of the McAlester Police Department, Oklahoma, and Special Agent Raymond Caffrey, of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, were shot and killed. Frank Nash, the prisoner the gang was trying to free, was also shot and killed.

Pretty Boy Floyd was shot and killed the following year during a shootout with officers. A second gang member was arrested and executed for the murders, and the third gang member was found dead from an unrelated murder.

A little over one year later an officer who was present at the scene became emotionally unstable because of the incident and went on a shooting rampage, killing Patrolman Grant Schroder of the Kansas City Missouri Police Department.