Lew Moxon

Roughly 10 years before their murder, Dr. Thomas Wayne and his wife Martha attend a costume party, to which Thomas wears a bat-like costume. Thomas is subsequently taken from the party at gunpoint to meet notorious racketeer and bank robber Lew Moxon, who forces the doctor to remove a bullet from his shoulder. After completing the operation, Thomas overpowers Moxon and his men and escapes. Moxon is then arrested and sentenced to ten years in prison for armed robbery. As he is taken away, he swears revenge on Thomas Wayne.

Ten years later, Moxon's first order of business after getting released is to inform Thomas that he will get someone else to exact revenge against him. It is suggested that Moxon ordered Joe Chill to kill the Waynes and make it look like a mugging, but to spare their son Bruce in order to leave a witness who will describe his parents' murder as a robbery gone wrong.

Years later, Batman learns of Moxon's involvement in the murder of his parents, by which time the aging gangster is operating a blimp business. Batman confronts Moxon and accuses him of ordering the Waynes' murders, but Moxon, who is suffering from amnesia, has no memory of the crime and is able to pass a lie detector test. He is then released on bail with his only official crime being a minor charge for assault.

Batman determines that Moxon's blimp business must be a front for illegal activities and continues to trail the gangster. Eventually, after uncovering that Moxon is indeed using his blimps for criminal purposes, Batman confronts him while wearing his father's costume (his own having been damaged during an earlier fight). On seeing Dr. Wayne's costume, Moxon suddenly remembers what he had done. Thinking Batman is actually Thomas Wayne's ghost seeking revenge, Moxon panics and runs out into the street, where he is struck and killed by a truck.[2]

Lew Moxon was reintroduced into the post-Zero Hour Batman continuity as an aging mob boss with failed political aspirations, who returned to Gotham City after several years in self-imposed exile. Years earlier, Moxon had traveled in the same circle of wealthy socialites as Bruce's parents, even though the Waynes privately disdained him as nothing more than a common thief.

Bruce is invited to a party celebrating Moxon's return to Gotham City, where he is reintroduced to the old man's daughter, Mallory, Bruce's childhood sweetheart. At the party, Bruce discovers that Moxon is the target of professional assassin Deadshot. For protection, Moxon has employed the ruthless Philo Zeiss - who murdered Bruce's friend, Jeremy Samuels, in an earlier story - as his bodyguard.[3] When Bruce confronts Zeiss as Batman, Zeiss reveals that Moxon had ordered him to kill Samuels as retaliation for something that Thomas Wayne had done to him years earlier.

Moxon survives Deadshot's assassination attempts (though now uses a wheelchair), but fires Zeiss for his failure. Batman discovers Mallory is an active member of her family's criminal empire.[4]

Ultimately, Batman discovers that Thomas, Martha, and (a very young) Bruce Wayne had attended a costume party (to which Dr. Wayne wore a Zorro costume) which was also attended by Moxon. At the party, Angelo Berretti, an "employee" of Moxon's business, told Thomas that a man's life was in danger. Thomas made Berretti promise his safe return before departing. He was then informed that the man in question was Moxon's nephew, who needed a bullet removed from his shoulder following a failed armed robbery. Thomas performed the operation, but refused to take any money for his services, and attacked Moxon. Following this, a furious Moxon had ordered a hit on Thomas, only to be thwarted by Berretti, who wanted to honor his word.

Batman questions Berretti as to whether his former boss had been involved in the murder of the Waynes, which occurred a few months after the costume party. Berretti tells him Moxon was not involved. After Batman accepts Berretti's version of events and departs, Berretti holds his hand to his face and utters an ambiguous "Oh, thank God". Moxon's involvement in the killing of the Wayne is, therefore, left to the reader's imagination.[5]

During the Bruce Wayne: Murderer? storyline, Nightwing stakes out Moxon's house, where he overhears him and Mallory arguing about the news revolving around Bruce Wayne.[6]

Moxon (alongside his bodyguard Hellhound) is later killed by his former protector Zeiss at a meeting of Gotham's crime bosses (arranged by Spoiler). This event occurs at the commencement of the Batman: War Games story line.[7]

In Batman: Three Jokers, Lew Moxon was mentioned to have owned a restaurant called Lew's Restaurant. It was mentioned in the news that the last members of the dwindling Moxon Crime Family were killed at their restaurant where an eyewitness states that the Joker was responsible. It was also mentioned that the Moxon Crime Family were accused of orchestrating the deaths of Thomas and Martha Wayne, only to be exonerated when Joe Chill confessed that he committed the murders alone.[8]