"Little Augie" Orgen, Diamond went to work overseeing bootleg alcohol sales in downtown Manhattan. That brought him into conflict with Dutch Schultz, who wanted to move beyond his base in Harlem. He also ran into trouble with other gangs in the city. On July 14, 1929, in the New York Broadway Hotsy Totsy Club (partly owned by Diamond), Diamond and fellow gang member Charles Entratta shot three drunken brawlers in the club; two (William Cassidy and Simon Walker) were killed and one (Peter Cassidy) was severely wounded. The club's bartender, three waiters, and the hat check girl "vanished" (one of them was found shot dead in New Jersey). Diamond was not charged, but he was forced to close the club. In 1930, Diamond and two henchmen kidnapped Grover Parks, a truck driver, in Cairo, New York, and demanded to know where he had obtained his load of hard cider. When Parks denied carrying anything, Diamond and his men beat and tortured Parks, eventually letting him go. A few months later, Diamond was charged with the kidnapping of James Duncan. He was sent to Catskill, New York, for his first trial, but he was acquitted. However, he was convicted in a federal case on related charges and sentenced to four years in jail. In a third trial, in Troy, New York, he was acquitted. Trip to Europe On August 23, 1930 Diamond, under the false name John Nolan, boarded the ocean liner in New York, bound for Europe. The NYPD suspected that he might have left the US aboard or , but he was not found on either ship when they reached Europe. The NYPD then sent a wireless telegraph message to Belgenland, which replied that a man answering Diamond's description was among her passengers. Diamond spent much of the voyage in the ship's smoking room playing poker. One report claimed that in this way he won thousands of dollars in the course of the voyage. Belgenlands officers, however, refuted this, saying his winnings were small. The NYPD telegraphed the police in Plymouth, England; Cherbourg, France and Antwerp, Belgium, warning them that he was an undesirable character. When Belgenland reached Plymouth on August 31, Scotland Yard officers told Diamond he would not be allowed to land in England. He told reporters that he wanted to travel to the French spa town of Vichy for "the cure". However, his real reason was