The man who couldn't be killed , also known as iron mike , was an alcoholic ex-fireman .Like a lot of people in the 1930s , he was down on his luck.So were five of his buddies.They all took out separate life insurance policies on Malloy and plotted to kill him.They tried poisoning him, drowning him,freezing him,even running him over with a taxi , but nothing worked.By this point, Malloy had become a celebrity among police and paramedics for his ability to cheat death, so when the "murder trust" finally succeeded in gassing him with carbon monoxide. His buddies were all sentenced to electric chair.