Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(a) an excuse, a pretence; a person used to fool onlookers, e.g. to disguise a relationship.

1725		New Canting Dict. n.p.: A blind a Feint, a Pretence, a Shift, an Artifice, to make a Person believe the contrary of what is intended.
1737, 1759, 1760, 1776		Bailey Universal Etym. Eng. Dict.
1742		Ordinary of Newgate His Account 22 Nov. 10/1: The Studder’s, a Gang of Thieves, travelling most of the Kingdom with their China-ware, which was a Blind to conceal their Rogueries.
1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1809		G. Andrewes Dict. Sl. and Cant.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1823		‘Jon Bee’ Dict. of the Turf, the Ring, the Chase, etc. 12: Blind—a feint or excuse.
1845		Bell’s Life in Sydney 30 Aug. 3/2: We hare too much reason to fear that the avocation [of hawking] is adopted more for a ‘blind’ than any thing else, by these skulking, idle fellows.
1859, 1860		Hotten Dict. of Modern Sl. etc.
1870		Hotten Sl. Dict.
1880		W. Hooe Sharping London 34: blind, something done to deceive.
1882		Sydney Sl. Dict. (2 edn) 9: Old Ann has gone a durrynackin with a fakement and some spunks for a blind. / Old Ann has gone a-begging with a written placard and some matches for a blind.
1889		Clarkson & Richardson Police! 226: The chief actors, with their immediate supporters, had travelled as a ‘blind’ on omnibuses, with hampers of pigeons and men displaying guns, as though they were going to a pigeon-shooting match.
1890		Bird o’ Freedom 1 Jan. 3/2: Who was the nincompoop with her in the morning? A mere blind. [...] This was a wrong ’un [...] and she daren’t own she was going to meet him. So she gave the other ‘smudge’ a dollar to fetch her.
1901		‘Miles Franklin’ My Brilliant Career 125: It is nice to have an old auntie, as a blind, is it not?
1906		A.H. Lewis Confessions of a Detective 145: You heard your party say ‘Twenty-third Street ferry?’ [...] That was a blind.
1910		Magnet 3 Sept. 26: That tale that I spread about us calling in at Bordeaux was only a blind.
1917		F. Packard Adventures of Jimmie Dale (1918) I i: It was a blind, of course. He worked alone, absolutely alone.
1922		Joyce Ulysses 320: I know where he’s gone, says Lenehan, cracking his fingers. – Who? says I. – Bloom, he says, the courthouse is a blind. He had a few bob on Throwaway and he’s gone to gather in the shekels.
1930		J. Lait Gangster Girl 7: The names on the door were blinds.
1933		Ersine Und. and Prison Sl.
1952		Lait & Mortimer USA Confidential 145: The Chinese tong set-up is used by the Mafia to transmit narcotics and other contraband; such things as laundry bales, cases of Chinese vegetables and packages of tea are blinds.
1953		‘Curt Cannon’ ‘Now Die In It’ in I Like ’Em Tough (1958) 56: She’d come into the Dewdrop as a blind.
1979		J. Morrow Confessions of Proinsias O’Toole 93: Time to pack it in [...] when even a mindless vessel like Tessy Hagan has you taped well enough to pull a blind like that!
1983		R. Aven-Bray Ridgey-Didge Oz Jack Lang 19: Blind Subterfuge.

(b) (US/UK Und.) one who distracts from the activities of a criminal, typically a pickpocket’s assistant.

1823		‘Jon Bee’ Dict. of the Turf, the Ring, the Chase, etc. 12: Blind [...] One who stands before another while he robs a third person.
1866		H.L. Williams N.-Y. After Dark 13: Experts in picking pockets, as ‘stalls’ and ‘blinds’.
1952		Lait & Mortimer USA Confidential 37: The brats make swell blinds.
1970		G.F. Newman Sir, You Bastard 117: [He] hoped the man was a blind.

(c) (Und., mainly US) a supposedly legitimate business which in fact masks a criminal one; thus blind man.

[1849		Paul Pry 29 Jan. 1/2: it is no more than a common ‘dancing shop,’ [...] the cognomen of ‘Wine and Supper Rooms’ being a blind].
1904		Sun. Times (Perth) 17 Jan. 1/1: An alleged watchmaker of Wellington-st. has no time for anything but stolen gold [...] his jeweller’s shop is a blind of the most barefaced variety.
1908		‘Old Sleuth’ Dock Rats of N.Y. (2006) 50: The men ostensibly were fishermen, and their boat was stated to be a fishing-boat; and to lend color to the claim, the men did go off between times on fishing expeditions, and the latter little trick had been their best ‘blind’ and ‘throw off’.
1929		V.W. Saul ‘Vocab. of Bums’ in AS IV:5 338: Blind—A legitimate business used to conceal an illegitimate one.
1947		J. Archibald ‘When a Body Meets a Body’ in Popular Detective Sept. 🌐 Louie once ran a cigar store in Shamokin but it was only a blind to take horse bets.
1949		Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn) 26: blind man One who operates a legitimate business as a screen for criminal activity.
1950		Goldin et al. DAUL 29/1: Blind, n. [...] 2. Any deceptive exterior concealing an illegal establishment or criminal activity.
1959		J. Gosling Ghost Squad 152: I imagine Bernstein thought that it [i.e. a smart shop] gave an aura of respectability to his nefarious enterprises; for all this was a blind.
1962		Ragen & Finston World’s Toughest Prison 791: blind – A legitimate business enterprise used as a cover under which to operate a criminal enterprise.
1981		(con. c.1920) A. Harding in Samuel East End Und. 220: I think his shop may have been a ‘blind’ for another business.