Editing Lenny Bruce (section)

==Legal troubles==
[[File:Lenny Bruce arrest.jpg|thumb|upright|Bruce at his arrest in 1961]]
Bruce's desire to help his wife stop working as a stripper led him to pursue schemes designed to make as much money as possible. The most notable was the Brother Mathias Foundation scam, which resulted in Bruce's arrest in [[Miami]], [[Florida]], in 1951 for impersonating a priest. He was soliciting donations for a [[leper colony]] in [[British Guiana]] (now [[Guyana]]) under the auspices of the "Brother Mathias Foundation", which he had legally chartered—the name was his own invention, but possibly referred to the actual Brother Matthias who had befriended [[Babe Ruth]] at the [[Baltimore]] orphanage where Ruth had been confined as a child.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.chatterfromthedugout.com/babe_and_brother_matthias.htm |title=Babe Ruth and Brother Matthias |publisher=Chatterfromthedugout.com |access-date=December 5, 2013 |archive-date=June 15, 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120615141848/http://www.chatterfromthedugout.com/babe_and_brother_matthias.htm |url-status=usurped }}</ref>

While posing as a laundry man, Bruce stole several priests' clergy shirts and a clerical collar. He was acquitted because of the legality of the New York state-chartered foundation, the actual existence of the Guiana leper colony, and the local clergy's inability to expose him as an impostor. Later, in his semifictional autobiography ''[[How to Talk Dirty and Influence People]]'', Bruce said that he had made about $8,000 in three weeks, sending $2,500 to the leper colony and keeping the rest.{{Citation needed|date=October 2024}}

===Obscenity arrests===
On October 4, 1961, Bruce was arrested for obscenity<ref>{{cite web|url=http://freenetpages.co.uk/hp/lennybruce/chronology.htm#1961|title=Lenny Bruce – Chronology|access-date=June 4, 2007|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070613155335/http://www.freenetpages.co.uk/hp/lennybruce/chronology.htm#1961|archive-date=June 13, 2007|url-status=dead}}</ref> at the [[Jazz Workshop]] in San Francisco, where he had used the word "cocksucker", and said that "to is a preposition, come is a verb"; that the sexual context of 'come' was so common that it bore no weight; and that if someone hearing it became upset, he "probably can't come".<ref name=linder/> Although the jury acquitted him, other law enforcement agencies began monitoring his appearances, resulting in frequent arrests under obscenity charges.
[[File:Lenny Bruce Mugshot 4-27-63.jpg|thumb|left|Bruce in 1963, after being arrested in San Francisco]]

Bruce was arrested again in 1961 in Philadelphia for drug possession, and again in Los Angeles two years later. The latter arrest took place in then-unincorporated [[West Hollywood, California|West Hollywood]], and the arresting officer was a young deputy named [[Sherman Block]], who later became county sheriff. The charge this time was that the comedian had used the word "schmuck", an insulting [[Yiddish]] word that was also considered a term for "penis". The Hollywood charges were later dismissed.<ref>Gross, David C. ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=Ny1o6iXffDgC&q=shmuck English-Yiddish, Yiddish–English Dictionary: Romanized]'' Hippocrene Books, 1995. p. 144. {{ISBN|0781804396}}</ref>

On December 5, 1962, Bruce was arrested on stage at the [[Gate of Horn]] folk club in Chicago.<ref>{{cite web|title=Comedians in Courthouses Getting Cuffed: Lenny Bruce and George Carlin, December 1962|url=http://thecomicscomic.com/2014/03/25/comedians-in-courthouses-getting-cuffed-lenny-bruce-and-george-carlin-december-1962/|website=The Critic's Comic|date=March 25, 2014 |access-date=February 28, 2015}}</ref> That year, he played at [[Peter Cook]]'s [[The Establishment (club)|The Establishment]] club in London, and in April the next year he was barred from entering the United Kingdom by the [[Home Office]] as an "undesirable alien".<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.lennybruceofficial.com/the-life-of-lenny-bruce/chronology-the-60s/ |title=Chronology – The 60's &#124; The Official Lenny Bruce Website |publisher=Lennybruceofficial.com |access-date=December 5, 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131108235828/http://www.lennybruceofficial.com/the-life-of-lenny-bruce/chronology-the-60s/ |archive-date=November 8, 2013 |url-status=dead }}</ref>

In April 1964, he appeared twice at the [[Cafe Au Go Go]] in [[Greenwich Village]], with undercover police detectives in the audience. He was arrested along with club owners Howard and Elly Solomon, who were arrested for allowing an obscene performance. On both occasions, Bruce was arrested after leaving the stage.<ref name=linder>{{cite web|last1=Linder|first1=Doug|title=The Trials of Lenny Bruce|url=http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/bruce/bruceaccount.html|website=Famous Trials: The Lenny Bruce Trial 1964|access-date=October 13, 2021}}</ref>

A three-judge panel presided over his widely publicized six-month trial, prosecuted by Manhattan Assistant District Attorney [[Richard Kuh]], with [[Ephraim London]] and [[Martin Garbus]] as the defense attorneys. Bruce and Howard Solomon were found guilty of obscenity on November 4, 1964. The conviction was announced despite positive testimony and petitions of support from—among other artists, writers and educators—[[Woody Allen]], [[Bob Dylan]], [[Jules Feiffer]], [[Allen Ginsberg]], [[Norman Mailer]], [[William Styron]], and [[James Baldwin]], and Manhattan journalist and television personality [[Dorothy Kilgallen]] and [[sociology|sociologist]] [[Herbert J. Gans|Herbert Gans]].<ref>[http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/bruce/brucetrial.html Excerpts from the Lenny Bruce Trial (Cafe Au Go Go)] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100628084404/http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/bruce/brucetrial.html |date=June 28, 2010 }}. Retrieved June 25, 2010.</ref> Bruce was sentenced on December 21, 1964, to four months in a [[penal labor in the United States|workhouse]]; he was set free on bail during the appeals process and died before the appeal was decided. Solomon, the owner of the club where Lenny was arrested, later saw Bruce's conviction overturned.<ref>''People v. Solomon'', 26 N.Y.2d. 621.</ref>