EPISODE 14: The Last Suspect & Conclusion
Betty Short Telgraham
The Last Suspect & Conclusions
Welcome to the concluding episode of the Black Dahlia and the Blue Dahlia podcast. I am your host, Scott Tracy. Elizabeth Short’s cause of death is hemorrhage and shock; concussion of the brain and lacerations of the face. Hemorrhage and shock is commonly seen in victims suffering from multiple battlefield wounds as well as severe traffic accidents. The concussive blows to the head and the facial cuts by design are delivered to the face of the tortured victim; the killer watches with pleasure as the last glimmer of life expires. Hemorrhage and shock begins when the victim experiences a 20 percent blood loss and death is irreversible at 25%. Exsanguination is the cause of death at 50%. Draining a body of blood is a post mortem event. What was the blood loss at end of life at 50%? 25%? It’s not possible to answer given that her body was drained of remaining blood. The Coroner lists two causes of death for a reason. Given that the killer would desire to extend the victims slow death, in order to experience as much pleasure as possible out of the victims pain, I suggest the killer intended for Elizabeth Short to die of exsanguination. Time for a quiz.
Can you name a victim of Exsanguination? I found only 2 instances in modern crime history.
First: The Atlas Vampire killer of Sweden murdered 32 year old prostitute Lilly Lindeström in her bed in Stockholm on May 4th 1932. The Atlas Vampire was never caught.
Second: Iana Kasian was killed by her husband Blake Leibel at their home in West Hollywood in June of 2016. Iana was scalped and hung upside down over the bathtub. Blake Leibel had done substantial research on serial killers and had published a graphic comic novella called Syndrome. On page two of his graphic comic, two exsanguination victims are hung upside down over a drain and they watch each other die.
Jane Doe #1 was severed at the waist. What can be learned when compared to similar crimes? Is bisection common? Elizabeth Short is the only victim ever bisected in California. When Winnie Ruth Judd murdered her victims in Phoenix and her trunks at were found to be leaking blood at Union Station, the severed body of Sammy Samuelson made front page headlines in Los Angeles newspapers, that may have inspired the Black Dahlia Avenger to cut Elizabeth Short in half as it appears headlines were a goal. Winnie Ruth Judd’s crime plays a role in how the LAPD viewed the Black Dahlia case early in the investigation, given the memory that a woman and only a woman had ever committed such a shocking crime.
Angels of Death for Los Angeles and Phoenix
The Velvet Tigress chose to cut the body to fit in her luggage. Why was Elizabeth Short severed? There is no need, no benefit to bisection.
Another quiz. Since 1947, how many American murder victims have been bisected? Hint: you can count the number of victims on one hand. The answer is four.
Karina Holmer, Delia Mendez, Kala Williams and Quinn Wilson were bisected. None of these four examples of mutilation bares any similarity to the modus operandi of the Black Dahlia Avenger. Studying these murders reveals a theme; these killers made efforts to hide the crime. All of the victims were moved from the crime scene. None were cut with a scalpel; power tools were used.
In June of 1996, Karina Holmer, the 20 year old Swedish au-pair, disappeared from the alley outside a Boston nightclub, Zanzibar, where she had been last seen dancing in the street at 3 a.m. 32 hours later a homeless person finds the upper half of her body in a dumpster near Fenway Park. Her lower half was never recovered. Her killer was never found.
In May of 1999, 34 year old Delia Mendez a streetwalker was found in a dumpster behind a PET supermarket in Hollywood Florida. Her car is nearby. She was commonly seen in this part of town. Her killer never found.
In May 2012, 20 year old Kala Williams found by hikers, her lower half stuffed into an orange plaid sleeping bag, the rest of her body is covered by leaves and debris. Reported missing on April 2, her body was found six weeks later. Her killer never brought to justice.
In March 2015, 33 year old Quinn Wilson was robbed and beaten to death by Daniel Landsberger over crack and cash in Lisbon Ohio. After a 3-way drug party in Landsberger’s trailer; the men fight, Wilson is stabbed and beaten in the head until his skull cracks, his body cut in half with a power tool on Landsberger’s mattress.
Landsberger confesses to a neighbor. Police discover the remains of a mattress and box spring still smoldering in a fire pit in the yard near the trailer.
The murders of three women remain unsolved because the bodies and crime scene are hidden, not because the victims were severed. None of these killers thought it necessary to drain blood from the victim. Whoever killed Karina or Kala or Delia did not worry about blood in their car. None of these murderers resemble the Black Dahlia Avenger who maximizes time with the body after the death. The Avenger presents Elizabeth Short’s mutilations so the public would see his work; the pre and post mortem sculpting, the slicing of the mouth, the slashing of the breast, the cross hatching on the genitalia and the scooping of the tattoo from the thigh. The Black Dahlia Avenger is a killer who imagined and planned a crime that had never happened before.
Avoiding the attention of the police was not his primary consideration. this killer prioritized making a splash in the headlines over his need to escape detection. This killer let Richardson, of the Examiner, hear his voice on the telephone. This killer mailed Beth’s belongings to the police and left fingerprints on the envelope, left the purse and shoes in a cafe’s trash bin where he could be seen. This ego-driven crime sequence confounded the LAPD who expected the criminal to avoid capture. Instead this killer who has hunted his victim and reverses the playing field and now embraces the role of prey. This killer’s choice to engages in a cat and mouse game with the police has much in common with risks taken by Jack the Ripper and the Zodiac. The wisest choice for any murderer who wants to escape detection and arrest would be a successful “disappearance” of the body as is seen in the case of Jean Spangler and in the case of Mimi Boomhower. Without a body the investigation is looking for a missing person not a murderer.
In contrast, Elizabeth Short is one of the least missing corpses in history. In this case the word missing applies to Beth’s final week. There is a low ceiling as to what can be learned by studying this elusive victim. Indeed, none of what can be learned or assumed can have any value if her killer was a stranger. I believe the intersection of the killer and victim is a random act. As the previous observations show there are no crimes that match up identically with the torture murder of Elizabeth Short. Understanding this articulate killer requires comparing other crime scenes, other victims, other killers. I have one more comparison to offer; a frightening series of multiple headless torsos were found in California rivers in 1948. The torso of an unidentified woman is seen floating in the American River north of Sacramento in June. Six months later, another headless torso was found in the Sacramento River south of the city. This time neighbors saw a man burn a mattress outdoors and a suspect, 48 year old, Victoriano Corrales admitted to the police in December that he killed Maria Pulido, as well as his previous female companion, Alberta Gomez in June. Corrales told the Sacramento police where to look for Maria’s head and legs. Police recover the head and one leg and in the process discover another headless body floating in the river. This time, is that of a man; believed to be in his 40’s, wearing long underwear and blue socks; his legs tied with a sash cord. The male victim had been in the water two weeks; police stated fingerprints were not expected to reveal his identity.
Victoriano Corrales understood that water, soil and time will do significant damage to human remains and hinder identification.
In contrast with a LA Times headline in 1929: “headless armless legless torso of a woman found in the swollen Los Angeles River” … The detached head is found weeks later, dental work allows the identification of the body of 40 year old divorcee Laura Sutton, murdered for financial gain by a former suitor, 58 year old Dr. Frank Westlake who used his scalpel to dismember Sutton. The doctor had the skill to bisect his victim but no reason to think of bisecting Mrs Sutton because there was no benefit. A clean bisection done by a person of experience is a signature act that elevates a skilled killer like the Black Dahlia Avenger from a messy killer like Victor Corrales, the scalpel bisection is an action that announces “I am not like the others, I am special..”
There is one other killer in American crime history who bisected and drained his victims blood. This killer claimed to local police that he moved to California. The Mad Butcher of Kingsbury Run dismembered 12 known victims between September of 1935 and January of 1938. The Mad Butcher is best categorized as a missionary serial killer, who would justify murder as being necessary to rid the world of undesirables. A missionary killer will not confess or show remorse as he believes he is fully justified by a higher power, he is an avenging angel. The victims of the Mad Butcher vary in gender, race and sexual preference. The significant commonality; all victims live on the margins of society. Kingsbury Run is a dry riverbed on the edge of urban Cleveland. This hobo jungle is the killer’s hunting zone.
11 of the 12 victims were beheaded, killed when alive, one victim was decapitated. Seven of the heads were never found. One victims head was wrapped in his bloody pants, another head was wrapped in newspaper, two were wrapped in burlap bags, one wrapped in butcher paper and rubber bands. None of the heads of the bisected victims were ever found. disposed of in lakes and rivers. Two bodies were disposed in city dumps. The killer is not hiding the bodies as much as he is discarding them. Victim #2’s head is buried near the body with a bit of hair visible from the top of the head as if it is sprouting from the earth. Of the six male victims — four of them were castrated, of the six female victims — four are severed. The Cleveland Torso killer shows an unusual amount of variation of experiments with the corpses. He used lye to remove skin on Victim #8. He stole the heart of Victim #9. You can see why the newspapers named the Butcher “Mad”. These variances serve to highlight the significant single unifying and terrifying signature; these victims were executed. Beheading is a deliberate act that is justified and carried out by the hand of God. The tension in the city of Cleveland is high after four years of gruesome murders and no arrests. On Aug 18th 1939, the Cleveland Director of Public Safety, Elliot Ness directed a midnight raid in Kingsbury Run with a force of 35 police officers, accompanied by three fire trucks. The police arrested 63 hobos who were questioned and fingerprinted. Then the police burn the shantytown to the ground. Elliot Ness was crucified in the press for this action. These hobos were victims of the depression, they were not criminals. Over time the city newspapers realized the beheadings have ceased. The press gave Ness no credit for this outcome. Why would they? No arrests were made. In hindsight, Ness’s choice to disrupt the hunting ground for the killer, created a satisfactory result for the city as the killing stopped, and ironically, a satisfactory result for this Missionary Serial Killer, as the leveling of shantytown had removed the blight of society’s undesirables. In sharp contrast to Elizabeth Short, the victims of the Mad Butcher are anonymous in death, executed without ceremony and disposed, as if erased from the ledgers of life and death.
A typewritten letter dated Dec 21 1938 was received by the Cleveland police, commonly referred to as the Gone to California note, it is the basis for the tenuous supposition that the Mad Butcher killed Elizabeth Short. QUOTE
Letter to Cleveland police
“ Chief of Police Matowitz, You can rest easy now as I have came out to sunny California for the winter. I felt bad operating on those people but science must advance. I shall soon astound the medical profession— a man with only a D.C.
What did their lives mean in comparison to hundreds of sick and disease twisted bodies. Just laboratory guinea pigs found on any public street. No one missed them when I failed. My last case was successful. I know now the feeling of Pasteur Thoreau and other pioneers.
Right now I have a volunteer who will absolutely prove my theory. They call me mad and a butcher but ‘truth will out’.
I have failed but once here. The body has not been found and never will be but the head minus features is buried in a gully on Century Blvd. between Western and Crenshaw. I feel it is my duty to dispose of the bodies… It is God’s will not to let them suffer.” END-QUOTE
A remarkable note from a self-appointed genius who compares himself to Thoreau and Pasteur. The author’s use of the word "failure" when he refers those he had killed, has a disquieting Dr. Frankenstein feel to it. The note-writer’s dismissal of the humanity of his victims reinforces our conclusion of a Missionary style serial killer. However, there were no body parts found in a 1939 search of Los Angeles near Century Blvd, the LAPD unearthing bones belonging to a small animal This letter does not prove the Mad Butcher was in Los Angeles in 1938, much less offer any indication the killer was in the city in January of 1947. Cleveland police detective Peter Merylo initially considers this Gone to California note to be genuine, within a year he correctly dismisses it as a hoax. California investigators tentatively identified the likely author of the prank letter in 1942 as Charles DiVere, a quack doctor.
The Mad Butcher is not the Black Dahlia Avenger. The last suspect has been eliminated, thus the Black Dahlia Avenger is unknown to us today and a stranger to Beth and this necessitates a conversation about victimology. Could there be a reason Beth was taken by her killer? What is revealed about the Black Dahlia Avenger that he would target Beth as a victim?
Beth took risks with strangers, what level of responsibility should be assigned to her? Very little. Beth’s risk is similar anyone hitchhiking in 1947. Blaming the victim is not the point of the intellectual exercise. There is an aspect to Beth’s wanderlust that is connected to her being a victim in her childhood. There is great harm done when a parent betrays the child. Beth was the only member of her family to reach out to Cleo, the father who betrayed his family during the depression and ran from his responsibilities as a parent and husband; Beth was the only family member to experience a repeat disappointment. Beth’s need for attention is a constant thread that runs thru her choices. There is empathy for the fact that Beth has the understanding and courage to know she needs to journey find herself. And journey she does; Elizabeth changed cities: Medford, Miami, Vallejo, Lompoc, Long Beach, Hollywood and San Diego. She changed names: `Bette with an “E” in Boston, Betty with a “Y” in a telegram, Beth in her letters to Gordon and she is Elizabeth from Chicago in the registration book of Mecca motel when she spends the night with Red Manley.
Beth’s hunger for the attention that she deserved leads to flirting and a jealousy that undermining her loving relationships. Quote Joseph Fickling: “Your devotion is my most precious possession. Darling, how many lips have joined with yours since ours last met? Sometimes I go crazy when I think of such things.” Beth’s tendency to lie or fib creates distrust in her relationships with men. As Fickling addresses in a loving manner in another letter: “Just tried to call you for the sixth time since 11 A.M. I hope that you enjoyed your breakfast date which you seemed to have kept despite the fact that you said you were not going to. If I am ever able to understand you, I'm going to consider myself quite accomplished.”
The Los Angeles press positions the elusive Elizabeth as the MacGuffin named the Black Dahlia . Mysteriousness sells newspapers, homelessness does not. from the Hollywood Citizen News QUOTE “She has variously been described as attractive but not beautiful, exceedingly temperamental" sexy unpredictable and a girl "with a past”. Numerous equally attractive girl friends have told police about "scenes" in hotels, rooming houses and bars where the mysterious Miss Short was well known but whose habits and activities remained vague and peculiar. Her known friends have associated her with dapper well-to-do men about town as well as elderly women. She changed her address frequently and was not known to permanently employed.” END-QUOTE
Police and press assume if they discovered Beth’s secret life, it would lead to a killer. They were wrong. This 1947 point of view is fueled by the number of Beth’s contacts who are in hiding, who hesitate to come forward, who seem to have little to offer. Looking at the situation today I note Beth isn’t hiding, she is lost. What was perceived as mystery in 1947, I now know is a void.
Beth fibbed often. It is something teenagers do. She told her mother and others that she was a working actress,.told Anne she was meeting her sister, told Manley she worked at an Airline in San Diego. Beth told Mrs French she had a baby and lost it. When Beth showed people a newspaper article about Matt Gordon with a woman’s name crossed out on the bottom, Beth would say the newspaper got the name the wrong, it should be her name in the paper. How many people believe her when she says the newspaper got the name wrong? Beth doesn’t care if others see through her lies and fabrications. In the stories Beth tells to others she presents herself as a victim. On the highway back to LA, Beth told Manley about a date in San Diego who scratched her arms, she told Elvera French it was bug bites. Why should anyone believe BETH when she says a marine is TRYING TO KILL ME when the next thing Beth says, “My Daddy is coming in an hour”, is clearly a lie. Most of Beth’s stories about men threatening her are hearsay. Beth’s contacts would be aware of her fabrications and this raises the question, did Beth cry wolf too often? Consider the number of fruitless calls made from a pay phone that night at the Biltmore hotel; if Beth’s friends have grown weary of her damsel in distress requests, she has only the kindness of strangers to rely on, again. Rather than guess which of her victim stories are lies or fantasies; I view Elizabeth Short as a young woman who is more scarred than scared.
Beth's constant lying with little reason for doing so is a significant indicator of a Cluster B personality disorder. The subset of Antisocial personality traits offers three examples of actions evident in her life : Persistent lying, disregard for needs or feelings of others, and disregard for the safety of self. one of the Histrionic personality traits applies;. Excessively dramatic, emotional, or sexually provocative actions to gain attention. Remember Mary Unkefer mentioned Beth would sit so her tattoo would show. These antisocial and histrionic traits are the type of patterns that lead FBI profiler John Douglas to conclude Elizabeth Short was a victim because of her personality and lifestyle. QUOTE “Elizabeth Short longed for something that always eluded her.” She “was young and emotionally vulnerable and needy, with a highly dependent personality. … She could easily be targeted by anyone who wanted to dominate or hurt women. He could have spotted her a mile away.” I agree with the conclusion with the caveat that John Douglas is offering an historical perspective. He was two years old in 1947. As an armchair crime enthusiast and a David Fincher fan, I loved the show Mindhunter. On the show, the John Douglas character visits the crime scenes and imagines himself in the killers mindset. Profiling observations of historical crimes like the Black Dahlia or Jack the Ripper can offer insight, but with a significantly lower ceiling of value than observations that would be gleaned at an intact crime scene or interactions with live witnesses.
Douglas explains his system is an instinctual art: “This methodology means some part of this is going with your gut as far as the killer, but also be on firm ground when you are winnowing down the suspects. A profiler isn’t going to look at a crime scene and come up with an address and phone number.”
Going with your gut isn’t ideal science. Intuition is real, however, emotions are unreliable. At what point does intuition become insight. Allow me to offer an analogy that I find appropriate and amusing. A profiler is a bit like a dowser. Scientists dismiss dowsing because it can’t be duplicated in a lab. Yet, every farmer I have ever met believes in dowsing. because every farmer wrote a check. Water was found. A dowser attempts to sense what is beneath the surface, a profiler does the same. A dowser can’t find a water closet in a office building and a Mind hunter is not going to be able to spot a serial killer in elevator. Intuition is has limits but there is no doubting its value as a tool to see beneath the surface of the human psyche and explore the madness and sadism of dark souls.
Criminologist Dan Kennedy challenges profiling when he asks, “at what point is murder normal? It can’t be. One is doing something abnormal.”
At what point is murder normal is an interesting question. Everyone of us is capable of deadly violence in certain circumstances. We don’t say a soldier is murdered in wartime because violent death is codified and normalized in war. If we watch a movie, Americans don’t murder Germans, they kill Nazis. A soldier at war develops a skill set similar what is seen in a serial killer: Dehumanization and Compartmentalization.
That doesn’t mean the Black Dahlia Avenger is a veteran. War feeds a human capacity for violence and aggression that is always in place. These wartime skills are not desired in peaceful society. Psychopathic killers are able to process situations involving trauma, blood and violence as normal without ever experiencing combat. The question abnormal psychology hopes to address is why are psychopathic murderers at war with society. In Psychology, the use of the word abnormal refers to a deviation from ideal mental health. Freud compared the mind to an iceberg with the unconscious submerged, unseen and unknowable. Staying with this reference to abnormal behavior, let me sum up the “why” problem – one can’t find a needle in a haystack, by poking an iceberg with a pitchfork. There is no single trigger. There is single answer to “why”. That question is a too broad. Ah. The “how” question can be addressed. I would highlight the findings of professor Jack LEVIN. QUOTE
“ … the presence of empathy… (is) important “for sadistic serial killers in two respects. First, their crimes require highly tuned powers of cognitive empathy (that they use to) capture their victims. Killers who do not understand their victims’ feelings would be incapable of conning them effectively.
Second, … emotional empathy is critical for a sadistic killer’s enjoyment of the suffering of his victims. … a killer who tortures…and humiliates must be able to both understand and experience his victim’s suffering. Otherwise, there would be no … sexual arousal. Thus, he feels his victim’s pain, but he interprets it as his own pleasure. Indeed, the more empathic (the killer) is, the greater his enjoyment of his victim’s suffering.”
Levin offers the example of Ted Bundy who would entrap young female students by faking an injury, Bundy’s victims would be snared because they had empathy.
Applying Levin’s definition to the lone women murder victims; compare the bludgeoning of Jeanne French, an unplanned emotion-based act of rage, in contrast to the planned violence inflicted on Elizabeth Short. The key emotion of the impulsive murder is the rage of the killer, Jeanne French lies unconscious in the mud as she dies. The key emotion in the Black Dahlia torture is the victim’s fear and pain. The 1947 police and the public process the overkill murders as an extension of killer’s rage and therefore that murderer must have a personal relationship with the victim. Overkill is not a predictor of whether a homicide was premeditated. The sheer number of unsolved crimes proves the overkill assumption to be false. I have quoted a number of sources that study serial killers. It’s commonly stated that who murdered Elizabeth Short is not a serial killer. This is an uninteresting assumption stated as fact. There is no similar Black Dahlia mutilation crimes on record, that is true. However, as the Avenger showcases a level of articulation that indicates prior violence; the comfort level with blood, the lust for torture, the sense of purpose and design in post mortem treatment of the body; it is very likely the Black Dahlia Avenger disposed of his previous victims. As John Douglas states, “You don’t jump into this kind of thing without some criminal evolution and development.” The Black Dahlia Avenger developed a significant appetite for torture Let me pose a question, How would the police know when a serial killer begins killing? They can’t. That makes the question mute, in a way, doesn’t it? Investigators need multiple connected crime scenes so the signature elements and patterns can emerge which creates a profile that can be predictive.
Of course, this crime falls short of the FBI definition of three crime scenes…yet notice how the actions of the Black Dahlia Avenger align with the FBI description of Organized Nonsocial Lust murderer: This sexual offender is cunning and methodical. Commonly the killer lives some distance from the actual crime scene. The killer will cruise in his hunt for an arbitrary victim. This assailant is likely to commit his crime in isolation and transport the body to a venue where there is a high probability that it will be discovered. The offender is excited by the idea of the discovery of the slain body and by society’s reactions. The organized nonsocial lust murderer may dissect the victim’s body in an attempt to hinder identification. It’s unlikely that physical evidence will be present at the crime scene. This outline certainly fits the Avenger. I counted 10 out of 11 examples of type. Elizabeth Short’s killer is an Organized Nonsocial Lust murderer who has fantasized how he would torture his next victim. The signature elements evident in the mutilations are a result of these fantasies. The psychological pattern of Elizabeth Short’s personality aligns with Levin’s observations of victimhood. Thus my conclusions on the case.
FIRST There are no missing days. On the 12th of January Four Star bartender Arthur Legura saw Elizabeth with two blondes. This is two days after Four Star bartender Buddy Le Gore saw her with two brunettes, one of whom was a regular customer. Four Star waitress Gloria Hattenberg commented to police that she had seen Elizabeth that night and recognized she had been a guest multiple times in the tavern and almost always in the company of women. There is no one to report Beth missing. It’s clear the LAPD has an reason to manufacture this fiction of missing days, given the Public Relations embarrassment that Officer Myrl McBride would create if the officer did not “officially” change her mind about identifying Elizabeth at the downtown Corral Bar, because Beth told McBride, “a man was trying to kill me”, then Beth turned up dead. I appreciate the research of Steve Hodel when he interviewing officer Myrl McBride, I am convinced. There are missing nights. No missing days.
SECOND The Norton Ave. location has no evidentiary value. There is a message in the suburban body placement, but no message in placing this dead body in this real estate development. There is no lovers lane. There is no surrealistic element or choice. Both Betty Bersinger and LAPD patrol officer Wayne Fitzgerald did not see a body at first glance, but an alabaster mannequin discarded in the weeds; the vacant lot presentation is an advertisement for an Avenger.
THIRD The press influence. On the web, the primary question concerning the press is whether the Black Dahlia moniker was invented the newspapers. That question is answered by reading a newspaper. The Associated Press story in the San Bernardino Sun of Jan 18th states Police Captain Loren Q. Martin, of Long Beach said the moniker was given to Elizabeth Short by “hangers-on at a neighborhood drug store near where she lived… “ Hangers-on. Locals. Not friends. The Black Dahlia is only a nickname in the sense that co-workers have derogatory monikers for questionable new hires. Consider this, there is no evidence Elizabeth Short ever heard those words "The Black Dahlia” spoken.
There is a large number of Black Dahlia myths to dispel in 2021, but there were no myths in 1947. The press manufactured an identity for the Black Dahlia thru fictionalization. Jack Smith answered the phone at rewrite desk of the Los Angeles Daily News and the police beat reporter gave Jack the story over the phone and Smith wrote the lead: ‘The nude body of a young woman, neatly cut in two, at the waist, was found early today on a vacant lot near Crenshaw and Exposition Blvd.’ this copy was submitted to the city editor who inserted the word “beautiful”. That editor never knew Elizabeth Short. He doesn’t know of she is beautiful, but he does know the story of a beautiful nude woman is going to be front page. A beautiful nude means a bigger headline, photos and column space. Useful to fictionalize.
To quote Los Angeles crime expert, Joan Renner, “A depressed and lonely young woman with daddy issues looking for love by sacrificing her pride isn’t the the stuff of novels or movies.” Here I am with a podcast about a 70 year old unsolved murder of a homeless person; not the Red Hibiscus Murder, the Black Dahlia.
Quoting Harry Hansen "There were crimes that same year that were at least as heinous and victims at least as pretty and none of them got anywhere near the same attention. It was that name, 'Black Dahlia, that set this one off … just those words strung together in that order turned Elizabeth Short's murder into a coast-to-coast sensation. 'Black' is night, mysterious, forbidding even; the Dahlia is an exotic and mysterious flower. There could not have been a more intriguing title. Any other name and it wouldn't have been anywhere near the same.” ` It’s true. Naomi Cook got one day of news. The Black Dahlia gets 70 years of headlines. There is power in the name Black Dahlia.. Hanson forgets that the very first headline was about not the Black Dahlia. GIRL TORTURED AND SLAIN; HACKED NUDE BODY FOUND IN LA LOT is about the discovery of Jane Doe #1.That is the headline that sold the most papers. Hanson forgot how significant timing is to how the Black Dahlia story evolves in the media. The killer noticed the news was getting sparse when he sends Elizabeth’s belongings to the press and challenges the police to capture him. Next time the Black Dahlia news got soft another mutilation murder happens on the westside. The press presents the Jeanne French murder as a sequel murder. The return of “The Black Dahlia Avenger” is presented as if it’s a the return of Werewolf movie. Thru the summer, newspapers embrace a werewolf model as “repeatable box” storyline..
It is remarkable that a murder case would get a noir movie title moniker, and this brings me to the FOURTH conclusion. The press embraced the Noir fiction elements of the crime. I have talked previously about the noir style of press photos utilizing movie lighting techniques to demonize suspects in police custody. There are developments in this case that fit perfectly into film noir themes. The Black Dahlia is the MacGuffin. Count how many boxes get checked on the following list of film Noir elements:
•An outsider comes to the big city. Check. Noir stories are city stories; bleak and heartless urban cityscapes of cement and headlights; no farms, no seasons, no harvest. If you want to know the weather in Noir, look at the asphalt. If its wet, it rained.
•No heroes in the story. The game is crooked. Check. The main character in Noir is a “Mark” struggling against fate.
•Fatalism, A noir is the opposite of a western, there is no good guy to save the town. Check.
•Creatures of the night: one the sees the despair and madness in faces of indifferent strangers. Check. I call your attention to the despair and madness in faces of the many confessors to the crime.
•Femme fatale, a caged songbird, the chartreuse, a sexy desirable and unattainable woman. Check.
•No happy ending. Check.
The Black Dahlia fictionalization packaged the mystery as noir entertainment.
The FIFTH conclusion: Dr. DeRiver is the major obstacle to a result in the Black Dahlia investigation. I have covered DeRiver’s incompetence; His Lombroso inspired belief system that ignores modern psychology, the two innocent men executed under his supervision, the useless pronouncements that a woman was responsible, and that the killer would confess and the Leslie Dillon alter ego fiasco. And yet there is more. There is an abuse of his office. The Sexual Offense Bureau misdeeds had a effect on potential witnesses, let me explain, DeRiver was one of five experts who testified at a California state assembly committee on abnormal sexual behavior at this time. “There is a general agreement, except in response to Homosexuality. Dr J Paul DeRiver’s testimony stands alone in its recommendation of both brain surgery and electroshock therapy for … homosexuals. DeRiver said it was his experience that while most sexual offenders could be (re-educated) … homosexuals are not likely to change because are they are happy in their perversion.” DeRiver is no Freudian, this is 100% Lombroso inspired.
I discussed in podcast #6 how, Harry Weiss, part owner of the Jewel Room and other bars, betrayed his gay patrons by turning over their names to the LA vice squad. Then Weiss paid kickbacks to vice based on his legal fees. Once arrested, Los Angeles judges were known to have instructed homosexuals to accept treatment at the hands of Dr. J. Paul DeRiver. QUOTE “it was stipulated that they would go to me for the necessary treatment, either take shock treatment or they sit down there for an hour at a time and they’re re-educated – that’s the way I practice medicine.” END-QUOTE As this was a court-ordered treatment, DeRiver benefited monetarily; the convicted homosexual is forced to pay for their own electroshock therapy. Outed homosexuals would lose employment and be labeled as pedophiles.
Homophobia plays a significant role in the sparse results of the missing nights investigation. Why would Jewel Room and Gay Way bar patrons speak to the police? There is no basis for trust. The LAPD is looking for a sexual deviant in gay bars, perhaps seeking a gay version of Albert Dyer to pin the crime on. Why volunteer anything when your friends and coworkers could lose their jobs and be forced to pay for their own shock treatment? Frances Campbell, the bisexual waitress who worked at the Crown Grill, is on the District Attorney list of suspects because they think she’s not telling them everything. There is no reason to assume her information might break the case. There is every reason to think Frances Campbell would tell the police if she had a clue what happened. No doubt volunteering information represented a risk to multiple witness.
Lt. Frank Jemison, of the Los Angeles District Attorney's Office interviewed Anne Toth, asking “Didn’t Beth Short at one time or another indicate to you … she wasn’t fond of queer women…” Anne replied, “…she always made the statement, very queer people in this town, queer people, referring to both men and women I guess. That is the only thing referring to queers that she ever mentioned…” Elizabeth Short didn’t have a problem with queers, she was known and remembered in those bars. The DeRiver Queer problem negatively effected the Black Dahlia investigation.
On Jan 9th 1947, Elizabeth Short walks south on Olive into the dead of night; a week later, the myth of the Black Dahlia rises up haunts American culture to this day. I hoped to solve the puzzle of Who Killed Elizabeth Short. However, it’s not possible to fill in all of the blanks when the crossword has so few clues given. I feel I have solved the puzzle of the Black Dahlia; from the origin of name to why the Black Dahlia is the Angel of Death for Los Angeles.
Raymond Chandler wrote of Los Angeles as “a big, hard-boiled city with no more personality than a paper cup.” This sentence cuts like an ax when it hits your brain, as it captures the truth of the feel of the city; however, it falls short of capturing the depth of the dark soul of Los Angeles.
The tragedy of Elizabeth Short is not the tragedy of a paper cup. What holds the naive wannabe has no bottom. Los Angeles has the soul of an intestine that holds and squeezes you, then moves you along.
ONE LAST THING, a newspaper interviewed Lynn Martin. Let me share what she said. Quote: “There are a lot of girls in Hollywood who could end up like Beth Short. Hollywood draws them from all over the country. Hollywood is a lonely place when you come into it without home ties or friends and very little money. There are few places for a lonely girl to go except into a bar. Girls pick each other up in a store or a bar and start rooming together like old friends. Women rammed together on daily or weekly arrangements to save on expenses. It doesn’t matter if they don’t know anything about each other. It’s somebody to talk to and share the rent with—like Beth and Marjorie and I. Sharing rent means more money for something to eat or a new pair of shoes. Even more important than food sometimes is having make-up and being able to see your hair looking good because if you look good you can always get a man to buy you a thick steak, some French-fried potatoes and a cup of coffee. Nothing ever tastes good at first. But the guys you pick up all insist you order steak or chops, and you get so sick of meat—meat all the time and after a while you can hardly get it down. You don’t drink at first because you don’t like liquor. You don’t like the taste, but you drink because when you're on a date in a bar you have to order something. And when you are out on a date the first thing is always a couple of drinks and then a couple of drinks. You’re always lonely in Hollywood, even when you’re out with people; they don't belong to you – those people. None of them really care what happens to you. Lots of times you can hardly stand the man you’re with, but you can forget about that after a few drinks.
Lots of times the girls talk to each other about getting out of Hollywood and staring all over again. They’re going back home or there going to get married to someone. Down in the heart of all of them is sort of hazy dream about a husband and a house and a baby. They talk about it, and they dream about it, but somehow they almost never do it.
This life is like a drug. You can’t give it up…Most of the girls are pretty innocent and wel meaning at first. The road down hill is gradual. Sooner or later they become pregnant and many of them resort to an illegal operation and sometimes some of them end up like Beth Short.” END-QUOTE
Thank you for listening to the Black Dahlia and Blue Dahlia podcast. This has been rewarding for me, intellectually and emotionally. I appreciate your company on this journey. Good bye.
* Jeanne French’s cause of death was also listed as hemorrhage and shock. The bleeding was internal. The stomping of her chest caused ribs to break and puncture her liver and lungs. Unconscious as she lay in the mud and weeds, Jeanne French slowly bled to death internally, unattended. Elizabeth Short’s death is observed.
† Example, Patrick Kearney, the Trash Bag Killer of Orange County, was convicted of killing and dismembering 21 men and boys. Kearney shot hitchhikers in the head with a derringer held in his right hand as he drove his VW with his left. Kearney dismembered his victims with a hacksaw and discarded the body parts along Southern California freeways in the early 70’s. Only some of his victims were drained of blood. Kearney also bathed a few victims, he did not like the smell of blood.
‡ Unknowable if the amount of blood at the time of death is more than 25 less than 50.
§ If one “Googles” bisection minus Black Dahlia; notice how few hits there are to that search.
** I don’t include Ethel Shannon McCarson, 42, found April 6th 2015 in a wooded area outside Orlando Florida. Decapitated arms legs and cut in half the victim his dismembered in a manner similar to victims of the Mad Butcher of Kingsbury Run. Orange County Medical Examiner spokeswoman Sheri Blanton said 'It is rare that someone is this disarticulated,'
†† Historically electric chainsaws were industrial; too heavy for one person. The development of a one person chainsaw began in 1950.
‡‡ Like Elizabeth Short, Kala was suddenly homeless at the time of her disappearance and was last seen walking at night on a downtown Spokane street.
§§ The murders of Kala and Karina appear to be post-rape murders.
*** Spangler has never been declared dead. Boomhower was declared dead twice, first eleven days after her death, that ruling was reversed then reinstated seven years later.
††† Westlake was a retired physician, Mrs. Sutton was found in April 1929.
‡‡‡ Including the Lady of the Lake as a Butcher victim.
§§§ Females victims bisected #3, #7, #10. The Lady of the Lake, victim #0, also bisected. Only one male bisected victim #6.
**** On September 12, 1936 due to the ever-mounting pressure the murders put on the mayor, Eliot Ness was placed in charge of the investigation. Prior to that date Ness faced on the substantial amount of corrupt policemen.
†††† https://clevelandmemory.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/press/id/32/rec/1
"Police dig for clue in "mad butcher" murder. On the basis of a photostatic copy of a letter received from the Cleveland, Ohio Chief of Police in which the writer identified himself as a murderer and told of having buried the head of one of his victims in a gully in Southeast Los Angeles, jail trusties under the supervision of Detective Lloyd J. Hurst and Police chemist Ray Pinker today were successful only in unearthing some bones which were thought to be those of a long-dead animal rather than those of a human being. Photo shows detective Lloyd Hurst (left) and police chemist Ray Pinker inspecting bones dug up today.”
‡‡‡‡ Badal, James Jessen. In the Wake of the Butcher: Cleveland Torso Murders, The Kent State University
§§§§ A stranger by name. A situation similar to Lita Guzman’s could be likely. Lita felt comfortable because she’s seen the man once before on the train. Beth may have been drawn to a face she had seen before.
***** Or dancing on the street at 3 a.m. outside a nightclub.
††††† Also significant: the subset of Borderline personality traits; Unstable and intense relationships, anxiety of self esteem & identity issues. the subset of Narcissistic personality traits; Unreasonable expectations of favors and advantages, taking advantage of others and failing to recognize others' needs and feelings.
‡‡‡‡‡ Husbands kill wives at a rate seven times higher than the rate of wives killing husbands. Do we say a husband killing his wife is more normal? When a wife kills her husband, that crime gets more attention in the media because it is less common. Our culture normalizes a husband murdering his wife over time.
§§§§§ There is no correlation between military service and serial killers. William Bonin is the exception, a veteran who saw combat as air force gunner in Vietnam. The vast majority of serial killers who have military experience saw no combat and were often discharged as misfits. Rod Alcala was a clerk in the Army who went AWOL in 1964 with a nervous breakdown. Jeff Dahmer was a medical speciality when discharged. Gary Ridgway saw no combat as he worked on supply ship. David Berkowitz saw no combat. Dean Corll was an Army radio repairman, discharged after 10 months. David Radar saw no combat in Okinawa or mainland Japan. Randy Kraft supervised the painting of test planes in air force, discharged in 1969 for homosexuality.
****** emergency room staff
†††††† Police will seek a reason, provocation, victim and perp.
‡‡‡‡‡‡ British study.
§§§§§§ On July 24th 1974 17 year old Cheryl Strother was abducted after summer school. Her body found one month later by a hunter at Tobacco Leaf Lake at Fort Knox Her body had been tied to a tree with her own shoelaces and had been stabbed 47 times. Overkill, But is there a correlation between damage and rage? Why tie Cheryl to a tree with her own shoelaces and watch the victim’s face as the knife goes in? That is torture not rage. Yet if the killing was premeditated, the killer would have brought rope to tie the victim up. Like the Jeanne French murder, this unsolved case is an example of how overkill is not an indicator of premeditation.
******* Even more true for torture than for murder.
††††††† The history of the Hillside Strangler is demonstrative of evolution of the criminal. 18 year old Yolanda Washington strangled her in Kenneth Bianchi’s car on October 18th 1977. When the killers overpowered their ninth victim two months later 17 year Kimberly Martin, murder had become normalized.They found appetite for torture rape murder created a routine. Angelo Buono’s shop became the “death house”.
‡‡‡‡‡‡‡ The Psychology of Lust Murder, Paraphilia, Sexual Killing, and Serial Homicide, 2006 Catherine E. Purcell, Ph.D. and Bruce A. Arrigo, Ph.D
§§§§§§§ The mutilation slayer of attractive 22-year-old Elizabeth Short, whose butchery was described by a police psychiatrist as that of a sex perverted madman, was being sought on a nationwide scale today, with authorities trying particularly to locate her several “boy-friends." Her suitors were many, said Police Capt. Loren Q. Martin, of Long Beach, where the girl lived until recently, He added that to hangers-on at a neighborhood drug store near where she lived she was known as "the Black Dahlia,” Some newspapers cut the “sex” from sex perverted before publishing this story.
******** Headlines matter. Few remember Charles Dingle, 23-year-old customer at Herbie’s Bar in Queens, who argued with the bar’s owner, Herbert Cummings; then shot Cummings in the head. Dingle held four women hostage, raping one of them and forcing another—a part-time mortician—to attempt to dig the bullet out of Cummings’ head, and then, when that effort at evidence-extraction failed, to sever that head with a steak knife. Everyone remembers the headline of April 14 1983, Headless Body Found In Topless Bar
†††††††† Mrs Sally Oswald was found dead nude in bed on the 11th floor of Hotel Figueroa. the victim has writing in ink diagonally above her breasts. “I had to do it.” The April 6th 1950 newspaper headline: Possible Sex Murder. The lead was “In circumstances reminiscent of the city's murders of three years ago…” The similarity to Jeanne French case was obvious; a very drunk nude victim with writing on her chest. 12 empty liquor bottles were found in the hotel room she shared with an unknown man who spent the last night lying in bed next to his dead companion. 108 stories published on the crime in various papers across America over the next two days, then none on the 8th. After the autopsy, the “repeatable box” fell apart. What happened is unknown. There is no closure as the press stopped reporting on the story.
‡‡‡‡‡‡‡‡ Los Angeles Daily News,Dec 8th 1949, Page 34 article points out that the LAPD psychiatrist describes himself as a sexologist in his recently published
§§§§§§§§. DeRiver’s March 25, 1949 testimony during his City Council hearing.