WEBVTT

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This episode may contain content of a
graphic nature, including descriptions of physical and

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sexual violence against adults, children,
and animals. Listener discretion is advised.

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Hi everyone, I'm Tanya and I'm
Talia, and we are Crimes and Consequences,

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a true crime podcast. Ay Tanya, Hi Talia. Welcome back everybody

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to this week's episode of Crimes and
Consequences. This is an oldie goodie.

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Yes, you may have heard of
them as the lipstick Killer. I have

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never heard of this one. Really, yeah, it seems like there's probably

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a few lipstick killers there probably,
Well, this is about William George Harron's

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I'm a give you a little background. Okay, okay, I'm ready before

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I do, though, everybody knows
hit the like subscribe, follow love,

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need more, button, need more, whatever it is on your favorite app.

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And with that, we're going to
dive into this. All right,

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let's do it. See. I
kind of like the older ones that because

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there's I don't know what the word
is, but there's something interesting about killers

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that aren't in our time, Like
it just shows that there were killers.

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Yeah, like throughout time. Probably
there's weirdos everywhere at anytime, anytime in

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our in our human existence. Okay, so let me tell you about William

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George Harrens. He was born in
nineteen twenty eight, he was on the

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eve of the Great Depression, and
he was raised in Evans, still in

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Illinois. He came from a poverty
stricken home and his parents they argued all

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the time. They had no money. Yeah, I know, they probably

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just were yeah, yeah, fuck, I know. At the age of

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elemon, William claims to have witnessed
a couple will say making love. Oh

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no, that's a nice term.
Yeah. When he told his mother,

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she would tell him that all sex
was dirty and he would get a disease.

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Did he ever tried it as a
result. One time, when he

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was a little older, he was
kissing a girlfriend and he just burst into

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tears and started vomiting right in front
of her, voiting because it's dirty.

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It's dirty, and it's you're gonna
get a disease. It's gross. Gross.

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As a child, he was pretty
quiet and he spent most of his

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time alone. When he became a
teen, he just took to the streets

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in search of what we'll call cheap
entertainment. Are you being nice? And

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unfortunately that included petty theft. He
was just kind of what's the word,

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a little hoodlum? Yeah, yeah, so it's an old term, right,

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he's a hoodlum. When he was
twelve, he worked at a grocer

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store, so he actually had a
legit job. One day, he accidentally

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short changed himself, so the register
was a little off and I think he

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had to pay for it. Oh
shit, Yeah, he was messed up

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on the whole change to someone.
So he ended up stealing a single dollar

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bill from an apartment by reaching through
the crack in a chain door. And

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he's twelve, and after that it
all went downhill. Yeah. He soon

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graduated to stealing larger amounts of money
and then later personal items from people.

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That's so creepy. Eventually William had
himself a small collection of stolen items that

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ranged from the expensive to the more
mundane. He had things like cameras,

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cocktail shakers. Oh they're probably like
sterling silver or something, guns gone,

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yeah, and even handkerchiefs. You
why, why do you want someone's handkerchief?

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It's the thrill that I told you. That was his form of entertainment.

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Then he really began like taking robbing
home. Seriously. He would look

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for apartments that forgot to lock their
doors. He would then check to make

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sure like no one's home and sneak
in, and he'd steal anything that had

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any sort of value. And he's
young, so that a lot of things

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may have seemed like they had value, but most of the time he was

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hunting for wallets and purses or any
cash. At thirteen, he was arrested

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for breaking into a local building's basement
and when he was arrested, he was

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carrying a loaded gun. Oh shit, it's not a good start. No,

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So the police ended up searching the
heron's home and that revealed more weapons

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hidden in a refrigerator. Come on, now, nobody found it. And

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I don't know. Maybe they I
had to come on, they're poor as

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hell. Maybe he's in a bag
looked like meat and dashed in the produce

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store behind some cucumbers or something,
and they also found some in the loft

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they had the attic. William admitted
to a string of burglaries. He's like,

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yeah, I did it, and
he was sent to what I believe

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is called the balt School of Wayward
Boys. Wayward change the name. Nobody

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wants to be like, yeah,
I go to that Wayward Boys school.

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Where school you go to, I
know, something different? But he was

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there for several months. He claimed
that he stole mostly for fun and it

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was a way to release tension.
Okay. He described it as a hobby

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for him, something to do while
his parents were busy fighting with each other.

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Yeah, okay, blame the parents. They're so they're busy fighting.

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What else could I do? What
else could I do? I couldn't just

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go out and like play baseball with
my friends. No, I needed to

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go rap. I got to release
this tension. I got to release his

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tension. Not long after he was
released from the Wayward Boys School, he

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was arrested again. Oh no,
This time he was sentenced to three years

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at what I believe is called Saint
Bede's Academy, and that was operated by

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benedictin Monksh Yeah during this time and
sent to a nunnery right. Yes.

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Yes. During his time at the
school, he stood out because he was

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really an exceptional student. He was
very smart. He was released when he

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was sixteen, and he had such
good test scores that he was able to

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enroll at the University of Chicago.
Really, yeah, he's sixteen, He's

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wasting his life. Now he's not. He's going to school. Okay,

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he was wasting his life met with
the months before he got sentenced to live

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with the monks. Yeah, now
we know what to do with our kids.

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While the school proved to be good
from academically, it didn't really hell

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with his what we'll call bad streak. In other words, he was still

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stealing. Yeah, he's getting his
thrills. He's still getting his thrills.

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As a matter of fact, he
was seventeen years old when he was at

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the University of Chicago and he got
arrested again. Oh shit, Well,

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yam can't stay out of trouble,
no, because he likes the thrillsoutely.

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On June twenty six, now we're
in nineteen forty six, he was robbing

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an apartment when he was spotted by
another neighbor who called the police. Police

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fired after William pulled out a gun. Oh no, yeah, and they

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managed to fire off two shots.
But it was a hit over his head

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and there was a nearby flower pot. Oh, and it broke and it

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ended up rendering him unconscious. So
the flower pot fell on I guess that's

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kind of crazy. It's like in
a movie that happened to me once.

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Actually, well, no one was
shooting a gun, but I was sitting

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on my parents' deck and flower pot
fell and hit me right. Yeah,

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that explains a lot, now I
understand. It hurt like a son of

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a bed. Let me just tell
you long term effects. But I didn't

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fall unconscious, so I must have
knocked his ass. Real guid. He

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was arrested and taken to the Cook
County Jail in Illinois. At first he

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was just a thief. They didn't
know that he would end up being the

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lipstick killer. Let's take a look
back some shall we. Let's do that.

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Three terrible murders took place just five
months earlier, between June of nineteen

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forty five in January of nineteen forty
six, so that's an eight month span.

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Chicago was on the alert, but
the rest of the country was as

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well. So let me tell you
about the first one. It's June fifth,

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nineteen forty five, forty three year
old Josephine Ross, who was three

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times divorced. She was unemployed.
She lived with her daughters Mary, Jane,

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Jacqueline, and I don't know where
her other daughter is. They lived

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in Kenwood Avenue apartments in the Edgewood
District, which is located in Chicago's North

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Side. Her body was discovered at
one thirty that afternoon when Jacqueline came home.

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She usually she went to work and
she would come home for lunch.

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She found the apartment she lived in
with her mom turned upside down. The

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drawers were pulled out, chairs were
knocked over, and newspapers were unfurled across

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the floor. She ran to her
mother's bedroom and then she saw something she

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would never forget. Josephine was sprawled
across to her bed. Her throat was

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gashed many times and there were multiple
stabbings. Her head was wrapped in a

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dress. Blood was spewed across the
room. It was on the walls,

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the drapes, the furniture, It
soaked the mattress, and there was an

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adjoining room several articles of women's clothing
in undergarments. They lean this pool of

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bloody water in the bathtop. Oh
that's weird. The only thing missing from

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the house was some change. Really, no fingerprints were found, only dark

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hairs that were in Josephine's hands.
Who was clutching these dark hairs that indicated

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to authorities that she was struggling with
this intruder who eventually killed her, so

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she ripped his hair out. Josephine
had a fiance, but he had an

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alibi. They questioned all her former
ex husbands because she had three right and

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her former boyfriends, and they all
had alibis, so the police had no

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suspects. There was a witness who
saw a man loitering around the apartments and

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running from the scene, and he
had a dark complexion and he was wearing

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a white sweater and dark pants,
but they weren't able to locate them.

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Next, we have this honorably discharged
from the US Navy named Francis Brown.

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Francis Brown was petite, brown haired, and demure. She lived in room

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six one one at the Pine Crest
apartment building on Pine Grove Avenue, not

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far from where Josephine Ross had lived, and she was home alone on the

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evening of December tenth, nineteen forty
five. She arrived a little late.

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It was about nine thirty. Francis
was told by a desk clerk, because

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remember she's running a room, that
a man had entered the foyer earlier asking

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for her. When the man was
informed that she was out, the man

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left. According to the clerk,
Francis seemed to have been expecting the caller

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the person the man there. Her
nude body was discovered the following morning by

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Martha Ingalls. She was a housemaid, curious s twoy francis radio was playing

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really loud at nine am and why
her door was a jar. Martha peeked

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into room six one one and she
found Francis's bed splattered with blood and a

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trail leading to the bathroom. Oh. She found Frances stretched over the bathtub,

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her head wrapped in her pajamas,
a butcher knife rammed into her neck,

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and a bullet hole in her skull. Oh my gosh. No valuables

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were taken, but there was a
message written in lipstick on the wall of

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her apartment and it read as follows
quote for Heaven's sake, catch me before

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I kill more. I can't control
myself. Wow. I feel like we've

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had that before. And one of
our Patrion episodes we had a killer yea

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uh huh, and he's like,
I'm not going to stop and it was

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on a mirror and I think I
did. It was something like the title

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had to do with mirror or something. Yeah. Yeah, we've done so

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many guys, I know un together
at some time. I mean, I

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remember it, but I don't remember
the name. Please found a bloody fingerprint

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smudged on the door jam of the
entrance, and an earlier witness, his

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name was George Weinberg, came forward
to report that he did hear a gunshot

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at like four am. And additionally, of course there's that night clerk.

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She'd been stationed in the lobby of
the building. She reported a nervous man.

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He was about thirty five forty years
old. She thought he wade maybe

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one hundred and forty pounds. He
got off the elevator, fumbled for the

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door to the street, and he
left. Now next, we have a

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beautiful six year old named Susanne Degnan. She went to bed Sunday evening and

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this is January sixth, nineteen forty
six. She spent the whole day earlier

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with her family. She went to
bed. Her parents were Jim and Helen

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and they had a happy family.
They lived at Thorndale and Kenmore in the

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Edgewater district. They had two daughters, Susanne and Betty. They shared a

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huge, huge turn of the sentry
kind of home. They shared it with

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another family, one of those big
homes. They occupied the first floor,

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and then the people named the Flynn's
had the upstairs floor. During the night,

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the only sounds that household heard were
the momentary barking of the Flynn's dogs,

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which wasn't unusual. I mean,
I have dogs, they barget flies,

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and they heard some men talking in
the street. Cecilia Flynn thought one

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of the men had said something like, this is the best looking building around.

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Helen, Susanne and Betty's mom at
one point sat up in bad She

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woke her husband up. She explained
she thought she'd heard Susanne crying. The

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couple listened for a few minutes and
then they hear anything, so they went

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back to sleep. So it's the
morning. Now it's January seventh. Jim

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Dad went to wake up his daughter's
for school. He thought it was odd

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that Susanne's door was closed, since
she was afraid of the dark and she

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always kept her door open. So
he peeks inside her bedroom and her window

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is fully raised. The curtains were
blowing just like you see in the movie.

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Yeah, the cold breeze, and
Suzanne was nowhere to be seen.

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She couldn't be found. The rust
of the family gets up. They're looking

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everywhere. They're in the looking in
the closets, they looked on the fire

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escape. They woke up the Flints
and asked them if they could search their

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part of the home. And that's
when they began to panic because Suzanne was

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not in the house. And she's
six and she's taken from a window.

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Right. That's brazen, right,
because in the nature of this crime,

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we have a child that's disappeared.
The police department dug into this case with

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fervor. There was a new police
commissioner's name was John Prendaghast, and he

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became personally involved like this meant something. The Degnan apartment, according to this

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author, her name is Dolors Kennedy, she wrote this book, was immediately

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quote filled with police from the area, eager to resolve the disappearance of Suzanne

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Degnan. On the floor of Suzanne's
bedroom, they found what they thought was

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a discarded tissue. But it wasn't, Tanya, Oh was it? It

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was a ransom note? Oh shit, really a ransom note. It was

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probably blown from the bed because the
window was open in the wind and it

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read quote get twenty thousand ready in
weight and weight is spelled wrong for word?

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Do not notify FPI or police bills
in fives and tents. Yeah,

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that's a lot of five sutents.
On the backside was a warning burned this

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for her safety. Oh that's ominous, dude. You can't even spell weight,

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00:16:59.840 --> 00:17:02.840
right. You think you're going to
get away with nappy? Bring it

206
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for ransom and don't don't notify the
police. Oops, already did that.

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Who's not going to notify the pol? They always notify the police. Come

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00:17:08.640 --> 00:17:14.599
on. Exactly outside the apartment,
police found a seven foot ladder that,

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when held upright, reached to the
sill of the girl's window. Oh godamn

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it did say she was on the
first floor, But that's fine. The

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00:17:22.640 --> 00:17:27.039
ladder, police learned, had been
stolen from a nursery several blocks away.

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Investigators spread throughout the ear They're searching, they're asking questions, They're hoping to

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00:17:32.680 --> 00:17:38.240
find a witness or something. There
was an anonymous call that suggested they search

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00:17:38.640 --> 00:17:45.039
the local sewers. Shit the sewers. Oh shit, But before I tell

215
00:17:45.079 --> 00:17:52.759
you more, I'm gonna take a
quick break. That evening detective Lee O'Rourke

216
00:17:52.920 --> 00:17:59.519
and Harry Benois did just that.
They searched the sewers, noticing that a

217
00:17:59.640 --> 00:18:06.680
sewer her cover a nearby Wilthrop Avenue
looked misplaced. They flashed their light into

218
00:18:06.720 --> 00:18:08.839
the well. It's not really a
well, it's a sewer, yeah,

219
00:18:10.119 --> 00:18:15.200
and they found what looked like the
head of a golden haired dow No,

220
00:18:17.720 --> 00:18:23.319
it wasn't a doll's head. Before
that evening ended the rest of Suzanne because

221
00:18:23.559 --> 00:18:29.680
it was just her head. Oh
shit. Her legs and torso were found

222
00:18:29.759 --> 00:18:33.400
scattered in the debris of other sewers. Are you kidding me? Her arms

223
00:18:33.480 --> 00:18:37.519
weren't found for several weeks. Oh
my god, who fucking does that?

224
00:18:37.640 --> 00:18:44.039
Well, we know, but it
looks like Jesus Christ. A basement washtub

225
00:18:44.160 --> 00:18:48.880
below one of the apartments off of
Wilthrop Avenue proved to be the place of

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00:18:48.000 --> 00:18:56.079
dismemberment. So he brought her into
an apartment like a laundry room, right,

227
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and he just cut her up?
What the fuck? Like, what

228
00:18:59.279 --> 00:19:02.440
the fuck is that? Yah?
Yeah? And it's like, how are

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00:19:02.480 --> 00:19:06.720
you not worried that someone's gonna walk? Yeah? They found blood, pieces

230
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of human flesh, and blond hairs
in the dream. Oh poor little Susianne.

231
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I don't know what the fuck is
sex? What a matter of people?

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I hate people do. Chicago's greatest
manhunt and perhaps one of the most

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intensive ever conducted in the nation at
the time it was on. Yeah,

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00:19:29.319 --> 00:19:32.880
police had the task of trying to
pluck the killer out of a city of

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four million. It's a long time
ago, guys. Yeah, this isn't

236
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like DNA, And yeah, I
really feel for cops back that it had

237
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to because I can't even imagine.
They worked around the clock. This is

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00:19:45.319 --> 00:19:48.799
a quote from an author, Lucy
Freeman. They worked around the clock,

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00:19:49.119 --> 00:19:53.559
often driving their own cars and using
their own time a police work day and

240
00:19:53.720 --> 00:19:59.200
night. They questioning potential suspects.
They interviewed more than eight hundred people.

241
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They gave lie detect her tests to
one hundred and seventy geez. The crime

242
00:20:03.279 --> 00:20:11.200
Laboratory compared seven thousand sets of handwriting
with a ransom note. Can you imagine

243
00:20:11.240 --> 00:20:14.799
the tedious job that was. Now, we have computers to put it in

244
00:20:14.920 --> 00:20:18.240
and see, but these people had
to do it all manual. The police

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00:20:18.279 --> 00:20:23.039
received over five thousand, two hundred
and fifty tips from all over the world,

246
00:20:23.559 --> 00:20:26.720
and they investigated three thousand, one
hundred and fifty three of them.

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00:20:27.000 --> 00:20:33.480
Geez police believed the kidnapper slash killer
must have driven a car the few blocks

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to the place of dismemberment, so
Suzanne had been put in a car.

249
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She was seventy four pounds and carrying
her through the streets would have probably caused

250
00:20:42.759 --> 00:20:47.319
too much attention. But I don't
know. With him, I don't either.

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These streets weren't empty. Even in
the late hours, there were still

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people. Witnesses had seen a woman
in the vicinity carrying a large bundle in

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both her arms. Near the Degnen
home, she got into what seemed to

254
00:21:00.400 --> 00:21:04.440
be an awaiting automobile where a balding
man sat behind the wheel. Another witness

255
00:21:04.839 --> 00:21:10.440
he was a seresman on Furlow he
saw a large, dark man carrying a

256
00:21:10.519 --> 00:21:12.880
shopping bag, but the couple and
the man with the bag they were never

257
00:21:14.000 --> 00:21:18.240
identified. The author I talked about, Dolores Kennedy said quote. The most

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00:21:18.279 --> 00:21:23.480
promising suspects were arrested, and upon
those arrest State's Attorney William J. Towey

259
00:21:23.799 --> 00:21:29.480
and Chief of Detectives Walter G.
Storms would tell the press that this time

260
00:21:30.000 --> 00:21:33.039
they had found the killer. Inevitably
the suspect would end up passing a lie

261
00:21:33.119 --> 00:21:37.079
detector test or I have an alibi, and police were forced to admit that

262
00:21:37.680 --> 00:21:44.319
the fingerprints that they did have didn't
match, so they were basically leading the

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00:21:44.400 --> 00:21:47.079
public un to believe all we got
him this time, and then it would

264
00:21:47.160 --> 00:21:52.400
just fall Yeah, a janitor.
Sixty five year old Hector Berber was arrested

265
00:21:52.440 --> 00:21:57.359
on suspicion. So they actually arrived
at he worked in the apartment building where

266
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the Degnans lived, and the sink
where Suzanne was believed to be dismembered.

267
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That was in an area that he
frequented a lot, and the grimy state

268
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of the ransom note because it was
dirty, suggested it could be a janitor.

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Really, if janitors have dirty hands. Okay, okay, don't you

270
00:22:22.279 --> 00:22:26.480
think that's a stretch. That's a
big stretch. That's a big stretch.

271
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The police were so confident that they
told the press, quote, this is

272
00:22:30.200 --> 00:22:36.960
the man. Oh, despite the
discrepancies between his profile and the one that

273
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they had developed originally, which stated
that the killer had skills of a surgeon.

274
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Oh oh yeah, that's right,
because she wasn't dismembered, or was

275
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at least a butcher. They just
felt confident he was the one because the

276
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notes dirty and janitors, I guess
are dirty. I guess all the janitors

277
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obviously never looked dirty. All right, right, he doesn't go home and

278
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wash his hands. Come on,
he was an older and you know he's

279
00:23:02.559 --> 00:23:04.079
sixty five. I guess as the
elderly. It doesn't seem so old to

280
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me. He was beaten by the
police. Oh no, under questioning for

281
00:23:08.839 --> 00:23:14.720
forty eight hours. Damn. He
suffered injuries, including a separated shoulder,

282
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oh out of him, and he
still didn't confess. Yeah. Wow.

283
00:23:19.720 --> 00:23:25.559
He got a lawyer through the janitor
union, and he was released on a

284
00:23:25.680 --> 00:23:29.480
writ of habeas corpus. You know
what he had to say about this experience

285
00:23:30.240 --> 00:23:33.119
said quote, Oh, they hang
me up. They blindfolded me. I

286
00:23:33.240 --> 00:23:37.440
can't put up my arms, they're
still sore. They had handcuffs on me

287
00:23:37.559 --> 00:23:40.519
for hours and hours. They threw
me in the cell again. I was

288
00:23:40.599 --> 00:23:45.440
blindfolded. They handcuffed my hands behind
my back and pulled me up on bars

289
00:23:45.839 --> 00:23:51.480
until my toes touched the floor.
I know, eat, I go to

290
00:23:51.640 --> 00:23:56.119
hospital. Oh I'm so sick anymore, and I would have ended up confessing

291
00:23:56.160 --> 00:24:02.680
to anything Oh that's some human violation
right there. Fucking shitty, that's how

292
00:24:02.720 --> 00:24:04.559
they did it back in the day. Though. Yeah, he's lucky he

293
00:24:06.160 --> 00:24:11.240
held his ground right because he need
be hanged. Probably probably he ended up

294
00:24:11.240 --> 00:24:15.960
spending ten days in the hospital.
Oh shit, what it's a long time,

295
00:24:15.000 --> 00:24:18.599
so longed in. You can't do
that shit, not anymore. No,

296
00:24:19.400 --> 00:24:25.799
not they do. But it was
determined that Hector, sorry, couldn't

297
00:24:25.799 --> 00:24:32.039
write English well enough to even by
the crude standards of a ransom note for

298
00:24:32.240 --> 00:24:36.599
him to have written it like he
couldn't read or write. He sued the

299
00:24:36.680 --> 00:24:40.039
Chicago Police Department. He sued for
fifteen thousand, and you know what the

300
00:24:40.160 --> 00:24:45.640
judge did, what gave him twenty
wow wow, which would be a lot

301
00:24:45.680 --> 00:24:51.000
of money today less what a ransom
note was for was for twenty grand Oh

302
00:24:51.160 --> 00:24:56.240
well he didn't write it, yeah, exactly. Five thousand dollars of the

303
00:24:56.319 --> 00:25:00.799
twenty thousand awarded to Hector was given
to his wife, as the police had

304
00:25:00.880 --> 00:25:07.440
tried to pressure her to implicate her
husband in the murder. They were laying

305
00:25:07.599 --> 00:25:11.480
on the pressure, fucking ing as
winner turned into springs. Her time is

306
00:25:11.519 --> 00:25:15.279
going by. Yeah, police had
their theories, they had lots of them,

307
00:25:15.519 --> 00:25:18.759
but they had no concrete leads.
The ransom note had been sent to

308
00:25:18.799 --> 00:25:23.279
the FBI laboratories, and I told
you there were fingerprints that were found.

309
00:25:25.039 --> 00:25:29.160
Most of the prints belonged to the
family members and the policemen who handled it,

310
00:25:29.279 --> 00:25:32.119
because he's back then his hands were
dirty, No, just kidding,

311
00:25:32.319 --> 00:25:37.839
Yeah, who knows whose hands were
dirty? But a few smudged prints hadn't

312
00:25:37.839 --> 00:25:42.680
been identified. Thomas Laffey, the
Chicago Police Department's expert, spent a lot

313
00:25:42.799 --> 00:25:48.799
of time trying to match them with
thousands and thousands of files, but he

314
00:25:48.839 --> 00:25:52.400
couldn't. That had to be frustrating
as all hell. Right, at some

315
00:25:52.480 --> 00:25:56.119
point you're like, guys get blurry, and you're like yeah, they're like,

316
00:25:56.240 --> 00:25:59.039
oh, I can't look at any
more fingerprints. They also, I'm

317
00:25:59.039 --> 00:26:03.400
sure they all start to look the
same. Right. The search seemed impossible,

318
00:26:03.880 --> 00:26:08.359
But then something changed. A college
student named none other than William Harrins

319
00:26:08.759 --> 00:26:14.319
turned up out of nowhere, and
the spotlight of suspicion was turned on him

320
00:26:14.519 --> 00:26:19.599
with full force. So now I'm
going to go back over the night he

321
00:26:19.759 --> 00:26:23.559
was caught, which I did talk
to you about earlier. Remember the flower

322
00:26:25.599 --> 00:26:30.279
Oh yeah, yes, so he's
about eighteen. Now it's June twenty six,

323
00:26:30.480 --> 00:26:37.119
nineteen forty six. William was arrested
on attempted burglary charges because someone saw

324
00:26:37.200 --> 00:26:41.880
him breaking into an apartment and he
fled and the buildings janitor nice pursued him,

325
00:26:41.960 --> 00:26:45.480
blocked his path out of the building. Up. Yeah, hello hero,

326
00:26:47.240 --> 00:26:51.720
janitor, Hero not dirty hands.
William, though, ended up pointing

327
00:26:51.759 --> 00:26:56.000
the gun he was carrying the old
janitor and said, quote, let me

328
00:26:56.160 --> 00:27:00.440
get out, or I'll let you
have it in the guts. Oh okay,

329
00:27:00.039 --> 00:27:04.960
go ahead. Then surface police go
the doors right there. Yes,

330
00:27:06.359 --> 00:27:10.480
I will not block. The janitor
stopped chasing him. Yeah, William made

331
00:27:10.519 --> 00:27:14.000
his way to this nearby building.
He was Lena lay low, but someone

332
00:27:14.079 --> 00:27:18.000
spotted him and they called the police, and I described it a little bit

333
00:27:18.119 --> 00:27:22.039
before. But two officers closed in
from two different directions, and William was

334
00:27:22.119 --> 00:27:27.920
trapped brandishing a revolver. He points
the barrel at one of the officers.

335
00:27:29.680 --> 00:27:33.720
Now, one of the reports say
that he pulled the trigger and the gun

336
00:27:33.759 --> 00:27:37.200
misfired. The police stay he pulled
it twice in a misfired. William's versions

337
00:27:37.279 --> 00:27:41.799
a little bit different. He said
he was just basically bluffing with a gun

338
00:27:42.720 --> 00:27:48.880
and the cops charged after him.
A scuffle resulted and it ended only when

339
00:27:48.480 --> 00:27:56.680
an off duty police officer dropped three
flower pots on William's head, so they

340
00:27:56.799 --> 00:28:02.640
had fired after Adam. One of
the flower pats fell down, and then

341
00:28:02.880 --> 00:28:07.759
the officer threw some nice at his
head. At least two nice because they

342
00:28:07.799 --> 00:28:11.519
are total three that he said.
According to William, you remember drifting into

343
00:28:11.759 --> 00:28:17.880
consciousness only when he was being questioned. The police had it taken him to

344
00:28:18.079 --> 00:28:22.279
Bridewell Hospital, which is right by
the Cook County Jail. He says policemen

345
00:28:22.359 --> 00:28:26.519
were threatening him. They were pushing
him, they probably were, and then

346
00:28:26.599 --> 00:28:30.160
punching him. Yes, given what
we know, they probably were. And

347
00:28:30.200 --> 00:28:34.680
they were jabbing him in the body
and he felt his hands being pushed onto

348
00:28:34.720 --> 00:28:40.559
an inkpat. Oh, they're getting
his finger pricked. He would know because

349
00:28:40.559 --> 00:28:44.720
he's been arresting quite a few rights. He claims he was drifting in and

350
00:28:44.799 --> 00:28:48.440
out of consciousness, and then the
questioning became more intense. They were demanding

351
00:28:48.480 --> 00:28:52.000
to know how he did it,
to say how he did it, and

352
00:28:52.119 --> 00:28:56.680
that they knew he did it.
At one point, someone allegedly punched him

353
00:28:56.680 --> 00:29:02.279
in the testicles, causing him to
near vomit. They also burned him with

354
00:29:02.440 --> 00:29:07.720
ether. Really, m, how
do you burn someone with either poor ether?

355
00:29:07.559 --> 00:29:11.559
Oh? Okay, let's liquid like
alcohol? Yeah, I think I

356
00:29:11.640 --> 00:29:14.839
think right. Thought it was like, Oh, I guess it is like

357
00:29:14.920 --> 00:29:19.559
chloroform or whatever. They did it
wow allegedly yeah. William later said he

358
00:29:19.640 --> 00:29:26.319
was interrogated around the clock for six
consecutive days, being beaten and abused by

359
00:29:26.400 --> 00:29:30.160
police, and he was not allowed
to eat or drink in six days.

360
00:29:30.400 --> 00:29:32.960
Yes, I don't know if I
believe that. I wasn't allowed to see

361
00:29:33.000 --> 00:29:37.799
his parents for four days, and
he was also refusing an opportunity to have

362
00:29:37.880 --> 00:29:41.119
a lawyer for all those six days. Now I would normally say I don't

363
00:29:41.119 --> 00:29:45.759
believe it, but given what we
know about one janitor, yeah, I

364
00:29:45.880 --> 00:29:49.960
don't know. I don't know.
So this gets even crazier too. Psychiatrists

365
00:29:51.119 --> 00:29:57.160
doctor Haynes and Roy Rinker gave him
sodium pentathal truth serm. Okay, they

366
00:29:57.200 --> 00:30:02.119
didn't have a warrant, his parents
didn't consent. But he's eighteen, so,

367
00:30:03.119 --> 00:30:06.960
oh he's not quite eighteen, that's
why. And then on the truth

368
00:30:07.000 --> 00:30:11.720
serum he was interrogated for three hours. Oh, they were going to get

369
00:30:11.759 --> 00:30:15.119
this guy under the influence of the
drug. The authorities claimed, William spoke

370
00:30:15.200 --> 00:30:21.519
of an alternate personality named George Merman. Okay, okay, and it was

371
00:30:21.599 --> 00:30:26.559
George Merman that committed the murders.
William claimed that he recalled little of the

372
00:30:26.720 --> 00:30:30.079
drug induced interrogation, which is probably
fucking true. I mean, I don't

373
00:30:30.079 --> 00:30:33.400
know. I've never had truth serum. Please. No, I've had a

374
00:30:33.480 --> 00:30:36.519
lot. I've had a lot of
things, but I haven't had that.

375
00:30:37.720 --> 00:30:41.519
It might be fun I don't know. What William actually said is in dispute

376
00:30:41.799 --> 00:30:49.960
as the original transcripts disappeared. We
shouldn't laugh. It's not funny. If

377
00:30:51.000 --> 00:30:52.920
it wasn't true, it'd be funny. Yeah. Right, on his fifth

378
00:30:52.960 --> 00:30:59.839
day and custody, William was given
a lumbar puncture. Oh without anesthesia.

379
00:31:00.640 --> 00:31:03.720
Oh no, it's like a spinal
tap. Oh, this is making me

380
00:31:03.880 --> 00:31:07.319
like moments later, I don't I
don't even know why. He was driven

381
00:31:07.359 --> 00:31:11.160
to police headquarters for a polygraph test. They tried for a few minutes to

382
00:31:11.319 --> 00:31:15.200
administer the test, but he was
in such obvious pain that the test had

383
00:31:15.200 --> 00:31:21.839
to be rescheduled. Why would they
give him a lumber it's a spinal tap.

384
00:31:22.200 --> 00:31:23.680
I don't know. I don't know
either. Well, it was nineteen

385
00:31:23.759 --> 00:31:26.640
forty six. They were doing all
kinds where they were just making sure he

386
00:31:26.799 --> 00:31:32.160
was healthy, giving him a physical. Sure, we'll go with that.

387
00:31:32.359 --> 00:31:37.039
Eventually, the polygraph was administered and
authorities announced that the results were inconclusive.

388
00:31:38.480 --> 00:31:41.839
On July second, nineteen forty six, he was transferred to the Cook County

389
00:31:41.920 --> 00:31:48.640
Jail, where he was placed in
the infirmary to recover from his injuries.

390
00:31:48.759 --> 00:31:56.720
His various injuries. Police things seems
so wrong about william claims that he was

391
00:31:56.799 --> 00:32:00.880
taking the rap for George. Psychologist
explained that it's a time that William made

392
00:32:00.960 --> 00:32:07.200
up his duo personality like normal children
make up imaginary friends. He did it

393
00:32:07.319 --> 00:32:10.240
to keep his diabolical deeds separate from
the person he is, you know,

394
00:32:10.519 --> 00:32:15.680
like was me, it was George. It was the evil too, yeah,

395
00:32:17.200 --> 00:32:23.680
Sullia. He tried to portray himself
as the average son student. He

396
00:32:23.960 --> 00:32:30.079
dated nice girls, and he went
to church. But then authorities were skeptical

397
00:32:30.319 --> 00:32:37.359
of William's claims and suspected that he
was laying the groundwork for an insanity But

398
00:32:37.759 --> 00:32:45.599
the confession earned widespread publicity with the
press transforming Merman to murder man, George

399
00:32:45.640 --> 00:32:52.599
Merman, George to murder murder man. Oh that's clever. So handwriting analysis

400
00:32:52.720 --> 00:33:00.559
did not definitively link William's handwriting to
the lipstick message really lipsticks, I remember,

401
00:33:00.599 --> 00:33:02.240
right with lipstick? I don't know
if it is in my handwriting,

402
00:33:02.359 --> 00:33:07.720
right, I don't know. Please
claim that the fingerprints, though matched a

403
00:33:07.799 --> 00:33:12.519
print discovered in the scene of Francis
Brown's murder. It was first reported as

404
00:33:12.559 --> 00:33:19.119
a bloody smudge, remember, but
now it's a last fingerprint match. Furthermore,

405
00:33:19.240 --> 00:33:23.000
a fingerprint of the small left finger
was allegedly connected to William on the

406
00:33:23.119 --> 00:33:29.599
ransom note. There were nine points
of comparison at the time. Williams supporters

407
00:33:29.759 --> 00:33:37.079
pointed out the FBI handbook regarding fingerprint
identification and it required twelve points of comparison

408
00:33:37.640 --> 00:33:43.079
to have a positive match, but
nine's close enough. Later, Chief of

409
00:33:43.240 --> 00:33:46.799
Detectives Walter Storms confirmed that the bloody
smudge left on the door jam as I

410
00:33:46.839 --> 00:33:52.160
said, was Williams. Police did
searches of William's home without a warrant,

411
00:33:53.599 --> 00:33:58.720
and he lived in the college dorms
too, and they found other items that

412
00:33:58.880 --> 00:34:02.480
got a lot of publicity. They
found a scrap book containing pictures of Nazi

413
00:34:02.680 --> 00:34:08.239
officials that belonged to a war veteran
named Harry Gold. And he got it

414
00:34:08.519 --> 00:34:15.280
when he burglarized Harry Gold, which
was the same night Suzanne Dagnim was killed.

415
00:34:16.000 --> 00:34:21.719
Gold lived by the dagnanms. Oh, so that puts William in the

416
00:34:21.920 --> 00:34:25.280
area. Yeah. In addition,
the police found in William's possession a stolen

417
00:34:25.360 --> 00:34:32.800
copy of Psychopathia Sexual Sexualists. I'm
not sure how to say it. Yeah,

418
00:34:32.880 --> 00:34:37.639
I yep, okay, And it
was stolen. The press focused on

419
00:34:37.719 --> 00:34:40.599
it and started to depict this young
burglar as a real life mister Hyde.

420
00:34:40.840 --> 00:34:46.119
The police also found a stolen medical
kit among his possessions. They announced that

421
00:34:46.239 --> 00:34:51.280
the medical instruments couldn't be linked to
the murders because there was no trace of

422
00:34:51.320 --> 00:34:53.599
biological material like blood, skin,
and hair. But it was a big

423
00:34:53.679 --> 00:35:00.239
sensation that they found some medical kind. He probably just stole them. There

424
00:35:00.360 --> 00:35:06.639
was no biological material of anybody found
on William well, of course, and

425
00:35:07.239 --> 00:35:12.360
on any of his clothes. The
medical tools were too small to really be

426
00:35:12.679 --> 00:35:17.920
used for any real dissection. Please
believe that William actually used the medical tools

427
00:35:17.920 --> 00:35:24.239
because they were tiny to alter war
bonds he stole. I I don't know

428
00:35:24.320 --> 00:35:28.119
how you do that, but okay, apparently he could do that. Back

429
00:35:28.159 --> 00:35:30.920
then, a gun was found in
his possession and they linked that to the

430
00:35:31.000 --> 00:35:38.079
shooting. A cult police positive revolver
had been stolen in a burglary at the

431
00:35:38.119 --> 00:35:45.119
apartment of some guy named Guy on
December third, nineteen forty five. Two

432
00:35:45.239 --> 00:35:51.079
nights later, bullet went through the
closed eighth floor apartment where Marian Caldwell lived

433
00:35:51.360 --> 00:35:53.480
and it wounded her. William had
that gun in his possession, so now

434
00:35:53.519 --> 00:35:59.480
we know he has a god and
he is shot somebody. According to the

435
00:35:59.559 --> 00:36:05.360
Chicago Police Department, the bullet that
injured Marian was linked through ballistics. A

436
00:36:05.480 --> 00:36:07.480
man named George I can't pronounce his
last name, so I'm not going to

437
00:36:07.960 --> 00:36:12.400
He was an active soldier made a
statement the day after the murder of Suzanne

438
00:36:12.519 --> 00:36:15.559
that he saw this figure walking in
the direction of the Degnan's residence with a

439
00:36:15.599 --> 00:36:21.559
shopping bag. Remember I mentioned that
He said he was about five feet five

440
00:36:21.760 --> 00:36:23.360
nine inches, saw way to hunt
him, seventy pounds, about thirty five

441
00:36:23.440 --> 00:36:28.360
years old, and he was wearing
a fedora and a dark overcoat. But

442
00:36:28.599 --> 00:36:31.920
it was too dark for George to
make out the facial features. When the

443
00:36:32.000 --> 00:36:37.639
police showed him a photo of William
on July eleventh, he couldn't identify him.

444
00:36:37.960 --> 00:36:42.440
Okay, so we don't really have
anything linking him to the murder.

445
00:36:43.079 --> 00:36:46.320
Just days later, on July sixteenth, during a hearing, George, who

446
00:36:46.360 --> 00:36:51.119
couldn't identify him on the eleventh,
pointed at William and said, quote,

447
00:36:51.320 --> 00:36:54.920
that's the man I saw, okay, and he made a positive identification.

448
00:36:55.440 --> 00:37:00.519
This sounds a little shady to me. No, no, no. The

449
00:37:00.880 --> 00:37:05.679
Chicago press stated that this solidified the
case against William. I mean, now

450
00:37:05.719 --> 00:37:09.199
we have an eye, which right, and that helped him get his indictment.

451
00:37:10.119 --> 00:37:16.199
A little spoiler alert That testimony was
later discredited. Oh all right,

452
00:37:16.280 --> 00:37:20.880
so my shadiness alert. Yes,
it's true. It was later discredited.

453
00:37:21.480 --> 00:37:28.480
A radio newscast reported on the Chicago
Tribune scoop of the confession which William heard

454
00:37:28.519 --> 00:37:34.360
in his cell. A radio newscast
reported on the Chicago Tribune scoop of the

455
00:37:34.480 --> 00:37:39.320
confession which William heard in his cell. He was incredulous, stating quote,

456
00:37:39.360 --> 00:37:43.519
I didn't confess to anybody, Honestly, my god, what are they going

457
00:37:43.599 --> 00:37:47.360
to pin on me next Williams lawyers
pressured him to take a plea bargain.

458
00:37:47.639 --> 00:37:53.440
That's probably a smart because at this
point they're just there to the deal,

459
00:37:53.719 --> 00:37:59.639
which was a topic behind closed door
meetings. As we know, stated that

460
00:37:59.679 --> 00:38:02.639
william would serve one life sentence if
he confessed to the murders of Josephine Ross,

461
00:38:04.119 --> 00:38:08.840
Francis Brown, and Suzanne Tegnan.
And let's not forget that he did

462
00:38:08.920 --> 00:38:15.280
shoot somebody else, but that's just
a footnote except to her. Yeah,

463
00:38:15.400 --> 00:38:20.840
right. With the help of his
lawyers, they began drafting a confession using

464
00:38:20.880 --> 00:38:24.280
the Chicago Tribune article as a guide
quote. As it turned out, the

465
00:38:24.400 --> 00:38:29.320
Tribune article was very helpful as it
provided me with a lot of details I

466
00:38:29.400 --> 00:38:34.360
didn't know. My attorneys rarely changed
anything out right, but I couldn't tell

467
00:38:34.400 --> 00:38:37.719
by their faces if I had made
a mistake, or they would say,

468
00:38:37.360 --> 00:38:42.360
now, Bill, is that what
really happened that way? Then I would

469
00:38:42.400 --> 00:38:46.119
change my story because obviously it went
against what was known in the Tribune.

470
00:38:46.559 --> 00:38:52.559
So he had to do a confession. And then this article. Yes,

471
00:38:52.639 --> 00:38:57.880
because he made a confession and it
went against what the Tribune said, So

472
00:38:58.239 --> 00:39:04.559
he changed his confession to match the
newspaper, this all sounds really, really

473
00:39:04.679 --> 00:39:07.960
shady. Both William and his parents
signed a confession. The parties agreed to

474
00:39:08.039 --> 00:39:13.760
the date of July thirtieth for William
to make his official court confession. On

475
00:39:13.960 --> 00:39:16.239
that date, the defense went to
the prosecutor's office, where there were several

476
00:39:16.360 --> 00:39:22.199
reporters. They were gathered around to
ask William questions, and the prosecutor himself

477
00:39:22.280 --> 00:39:28.719
made a speech. William looked bewildered
and gave a noncommittal answer to report his

478
00:39:28.880 --> 00:39:34.079
questions. He later blamed the prosecutor, saying, quote, it was the

479
00:39:34.199 --> 00:39:38.280
prosecutor himself. After assembling all the
officials, including attorneys and policemen, he

480
00:39:38.400 --> 00:39:44.280
began a preamble about how long everyone
had waited to get a confession from me,

481
00:39:44.840 --> 00:39:47.679
but at last the truth was going
to be told. He kept emphasizing

482
00:39:47.719 --> 00:39:51.559
the word truth, and I asked
him if he really wanted the truth.

483
00:39:52.079 --> 00:39:55.119
He assured me that he did.
Now the prosecutor made a big deal about

484
00:39:55.199 --> 00:40:00.519
hearing the truth. Now I was
forced to lie to save myself. It

485
00:40:00.599 --> 00:40:04.800
made me angry, so I told
him the truth and everyone got really upset.

486
00:40:07.079 --> 00:40:09.960
Yeah, because I feel like what
he told them isn't what they wanted

487
00:40:10.000 --> 00:40:15.679
to hear, so the prosket withdrew
the previous agreement sentence of one life term

488
00:40:16.559 --> 00:40:23.000
with a few minor charges, and
changed to three terms to run consecutively and

489
00:40:23.159 --> 00:40:28.079
threaten William with the death penalty.
You want to go to trial. Yeah,

490
00:40:28.159 --> 00:40:30.320
you want to go to a trial
because if you do and you loose,

491
00:40:30.639 --> 00:40:32.960
I'm gonna kill you. Yeah.
They threatened to charge him with a

492
00:40:34.039 --> 00:40:37.639
murder of someone named a Stealcaree,
even though William was attending the Gobalt School

493
00:40:37.679 --> 00:40:44.599
for Wayward Boys in Indiana at the
time. William's own attorneys were really angry

494
00:40:44.639 --> 00:40:52.599
at their client for the plea bargain. The Chicago Tribunes headline ride quote mute

495
00:40:52.960 --> 00:41:00.360
heron's faces trial killer spurns mother's fervent
plea to talk. Prosecutor announced that he

496
00:41:00.559 --> 00:41:07.360
would press ahead to try William with
the deaths of Susanne and Francis. William

497
00:41:07.400 --> 00:41:12.480
agreed with a new plea agreement.
So William publicly confessed in the prosecutor's office,

498
00:41:13.199 --> 00:41:16.239
and he talked, answered questions.
He even re enacted parts of the

499
00:41:16.320 --> 00:41:22.760
murderer. He did. Yes that
he confessed too. One of the police

500
00:41:22.800 --> 00:41:27.800
officers that was really nice. To
him before changed his opinion on William and

501
00:41:27.880 --> 00:41:34.079
believed he was culpable when he heard
how familiar William was with victim Francis Brown's

502
00:41:34.119 --> 00:41:39.119
apartment the way he described it and
re enacted the murderer. William says he

503
00:41:39.239 --> 00:41:43.159
just confessed to save his life.
I don't know, I don't know.

504
00:41:43.760 --> 00:41:46.639
In his confession, William stated that
he disposed of the hunting knife, which

505
00:41:46.840 --> 00:41:52.519
he had used to cut up Susanne, on an elevated subway track near the

506
00:41:52.559 --> 00:41:58.199
scene of the murder. The police
never searched the track, so he could

507
00:41:58.239 --> 00:42:01.679
have it's probably still sitting there.
When the reporters heard about this, they

508
00:42:01.800 --> 00:42:06.320
inquired to the trek crew if they'd
found a knife. They had found a

509
00:42:06.360 --> 00:42:12.159
knife on the tracks, and they
kept it in a storage room, So

510
00:42:12.280 --> 00:42:15.639
these reporters were like, fuck,
yeah, we got a story here.

511
00:42:15.000 --> 00:42:19.960
The reporters determined that the knife belonged
to Guy Roderick, which I told you

512
00:42:20.119 --> 00:42:22.800
he'd stolen from a guy named Guy. Oh yeah, yeah. What he

513
00:42:22.840 --> 00:42:29.079
had stolen before was the Colt police
twenty two caliber gun, which was found

514
00:42:29.119 --> 00:42:34.599
in William's possession on July thirty first. He positively identified the knife as his

515
00:42:35.440 --> 00:42:38.960
William acknowledged that he threw the knife
there from the train, claiming he didn't

516
00:42:39.000 --> 00:42:44.840
want his mother to see it.
Okay, okay. He took full responsibility

517
00:42:44.920 --> 00:42:47.880
for the three murders. In August
seventh of nineteen forty six, as I

518
00:42:47.960 --> 00:42:53.360
said, the prosecution had him reenact
the crime previously if some of the victims.

519
00:42:53.639 --> 00:43:00.400
He re enacted the crime of Suzanne's
in public again in front of the

520
00:43:00.480 --> 00:43:04.400
press. So that's two he re
enacted, because one was Francis's murder.

521
00:43:04.599 --> 00:43:08.960
On September fourth, William's parents and
the victims families attending the Chief Justice,

522
00:43:09.320 --> 00:43:16.639
Justice Ward presided and William admitted his
guilt on burglary and murder charges. That

523
00:43:16.840 --> 00:43:22.400
night, William tried to hang himself
and his south. He timed it to

524
00:43:22.800 --> 00:43:25.599
coincide with the shift change of the
prison guards, but he was discovered before

525
00:43:25.639 --> 00:43:30.400
he died. Apparently he was just
realized he's so fucked. Yeah. Regarding

526
00:43:30.440 --> 00:43:34.320
the murders, he said, quote, everyone plead I was guilty. If

527
00:43:34.360 --> 00:43:37.599
I weren't alive, I thought I
could avoid being a judge guilty by the

528
00:43:37.679 --> 00:43:42.039
law and thereby gained some victory.
But I wasn't successful even at that.

529
00:43:42.920 --> 00:43:45.280
Before I walked out into the courtroom. My counsel told me to just enter

530
00:43:45.360 --> 00:43:49.519
the plea of guilty and keep my
mouth shot. Afterwards, I didn't even

531
00:43:49.559 --> 00:43:52.039
have a trial. Well, that's
what happens because you took and took a

532
00:43:52.360 --> 00:43:57.480
deal out. I'm just staying,
don't cry about not having a trial and

533
00:43:58.039 --> 00:44:01.360
when you're taking a plea deal.
On September fifth, after further evidence was

534
00:44:01.559 --> 00:44:07.320
written into the record and the prosecution
and defense made some closing statements for the

535
00:44:07.400 --> 00:44:12.760
sentencing, he was sentenced to three
life terms. He was transferred to Statesville

536
00:44:12.800 --> 00:44:20.440
Prison from the Cook County Jail.
Sheriff Michael McAuley asked William if Susanne suffered

537
00:44:20.760 --> 00:44:22.840
when she was killed, and William
answered, quote, I can't tell you

538
00:44:22.920 --> 00:44:27.639
if she suffered. I didn't kill
her. Tell mister Dagnan to please look

539
00:44:27.760 --> 00:44:31.320
after his other daughter because whoever killed
Susanne is still out there. Stop it,

540
00:44:31.440 --> 00:44:37.960
dude. Soon after all this arrest
and stuff, his parents and younger

541
00:44:38.000 --> 00:44:45.840
brother changed their last names to Hell. His parents divorced. Can you blame

542
00:44:45.000 --> 00:44:49.880
him? No? So he was
housed at Stateville Prison and Julia, Illinois,

543
00:44:50.320 --> 00:44:54.239
where he learned several trades, including
television and radio repair. He became

544
00:44:54.280 --> 00:44:59.400
the first prisoner in Illinois history to
earn a four year college degree. On

545
00:44:59.519 --> 00:45:02.719
February six, nineteen seventy two,
got a Bachelor's of Arts. He also

546
00:45:02.800 --> 00:45:09.599
aided other prisoners educational progress by helping
them earn their GEDs, and he became

547
00:45:09.760 --> 00:45:15.719
what is commonly known as a jailhouse
lawyer. In nineteen seventy five, he

548
00:45:15.800 --> 00:45:22.280
was transferred to a minimum security correctional
center in Vienna, Illinois, and then

549
00:45:22.320 --> 00:45:25.599
he was transferred to another minimum security
in nineteen ninety eight. He resided in

550
00:45:25.760 --> 00:45:30.360
the hospital work because he suffered from
diabetes and I left him with some swollen

551
00:45:30.440 --> 00:45:35.719
legs and limited eyesight. He ended
up being confined to a wheelchair. He

552
00:45:36.599 --> 00:45:40.599
tried really hard to get clemency,
but he died in twenty twelve with the

553
00:45:40.599 --> 00:45:45.480
age of eighty three. Oh damn, he spent all that time. So

554
00:45:45.679 --> 00:45:50.559
let me tell you what's happened as
far as the case goes and the things

555
00:45:50.599 --> 00:45:54.719
of his innocence. The first person
that really supported his innocence besides his family

556
00:45:54.880 --> 00:46:02.159
or friends was Josephine Ross's daughter Mary
Jane. She just didn't believe he did

557
00:46:02.239 --> 00:46:09.360
it. Really, there were twenty
nine inconsistencies with William's confession and the facts

558
00:46:09.360 --> 00:46:14.719
of the crime. Oh, that's
not good. Twenty nine. He actually

559
00:46:14.760 --> 00:46:21.400
had two polygraph exams. Both were
declared inconclusive. However, in looking back

560
00:46:21.480 --> 00:46:27.760
at them now, it seems as
if most people believe that he passed them.

561
00:46:28.159 --> 00:46:32.880
Really, as far as handwriting evidence
goes, that's been examined even by

562
00:46:34.000 --> 00:46:37.079
the FBI, and they concluded that
the two messages, one was in lipstick

563
00:46:37.119 --> 00:46:42.320
and one was at ransom note didn't
match each other with the handwriting and they

564
00:46:42.400 --> 00:46:49.119
didn't match williams. Oh damn that
fingerprint evidence the door jam that's with a

565
00:46:49.239 --> 00:46:53.679
smudge. Now, no, doesn't
really remember the only nine out of twelve

566
00:46:53.840 --> 00:47:00.360
points. Yeah, that's not enough
they've decided. And I was talking about

567
00:47:00.360 --> 00:47:05.119
the confession, like the twenty nine
and consistencies. We know, we know

568
00:47:05.559 --> 00:47:12.280
that a lot of people are wrongly
convicted on false confession. And as I

569
00:47:12.360 --> 00:47:15.679
said, some of the details they
didn't match right. And since they beat

570
00:47:15.800 --> 00:47:19.960
up Hector the janitor, and they
did that to him, he was only

571
00:47:20.239 --> 00:47:24.159
like seventeen year old boy. He
may have caved and just confessed so they

572
00:47:24.199 --> 00:47:28.760
would stop doing what they were doing. I don't know, there's a lot

573
00:47:28.880 --> 00:47:32.280
of people that believe he's innocent because
he was just a thief. Yeah,

574
00:47:32.639 --> 00:47:37.440
but then there's a gun he shot
at that woman and it matched. So

575
00:47:37.119 --> 00:47:42.480
I don't know. But there were
other suspects, yeah, and you know

576
00:47:42.599 --> 00:47:45.519
about them. Yeah. One was
Richard Russell Thomas. He was a male

577
00:47:45.639 --> 00:47:52.599
nurse. He sometimes posed as a
surgeon. Oh. He wasn't from Chicago,

578
00:47:52.639 --> 00:47:55.679
though he lived in Phoenix, Arizona. However, he was in Chicago

579
00:47:55.960 --> 00:48:01.079
when Suzanne was murdered, and he
had been imprisoned for Arizona for molesting one

580
00:48:01.119 --> 00:48:08.559
of his daughters. So yeah,
he had previously been convicted of extortion,

581
00:48:08.719 --> 00:48:14.079
so that kind of goes with the
ransom note, right, and his handwriting

582
00:48:14.159 --> 00:48:19.039
was said to be quote very similar
to that of the ransom note. He

583
00:48:19.159 --> 00:48:22.960
and he also even confessed to killing
Susanne. He confessed, but then he

584
00:48:23.039 --> 00:48:27.599
recanted it after William was arrested.
He's like, oh wait, never was

585
00:48:27.639 --> 00:48:30.480
signed. Yeah, He's like,
I didn't William did, Yeah, so

586
00:48:31.360 --> 00:48:36.559
maybe someone else did it. I
don't know for Susanne at least, right,

587
00:48:36.960 --> 00:48:40.039
because he just said they said that
the lipstick didn't match. I don't

588
00:48:40.039 --> 00:48:43.559
know, But then what are the
odds of all that happening, because I

589
00:48:43.920 --> 00:48:46.079
was thinking too when you were telling
me about these victims. It seems kind

590
00:48:46.119 --> 00:48:49.840
of strange that he kills a six
year old and then he kills like two

591
00:48:49.880 --> 00:48:52.880
grown women, right right, Like
killers don't usually vary up their victims and

592
00:48:53.239 --> 00:49:00.480
going through like the window and kidnapping. That's taking her and kidnapping and remembering

593
00:49:00.639 --> 00:49:04.199
versus. Yeah, exactly right.
The other one's like, oh, slit

594
00:49:04.239 --> 00:49:07.519
her throat and whatever. So I
don't know. This is making me feel

595
00:49:07.599 --> 00:49:09.400
kind of uneasy. There might have
been two killers. Yeah, it might

596
00:49:09.480 --> 00:49:13.519
have been. I don't know.
I don't know, but we'll never know.

597
00:49:13.719 --> 00:49:16.320
I'll never know because William got convicted
of it and he served till he

598
00:49:16.440 --> 00:49:20.920
was eighty three years old. Yeah
that's a long ass time. Maybe he

599
00:49:21.000 --> 00:49:22.800
killed some of them, Yeah,
maybe he did. Who knows? I

600
00:49:22.880 --> 00:49:28.679
don't. I don't either, But
that's the story of William Harrons. Harrons.

601
00:49:29.000 --> 00:49:30.360
So I want to thank you guys
all take the time, listen to

602
00:49:30.599 --> 00:49:35.800
us, reach out to us by
email, contact at crumbs Consequence dot com,

603
00:49:35.880 --> 00:49:37.440
and let us know did he do
it? Yeah? What do you

604
00:49:37.519 --> 00:49:42.239
think? I don't know. I
don't know. Either. I'd like to.

605
00:49:42.280 --> 00:49:44.800
I'd like to say, oh,
yeah, I'm glad the asshole's burning

606
00:49:44.840 --> 00:49:46.519
in hid but I don't know.
Sure, I mean, I can't.

607
00:49:46.559 --> 00:49:50.239
I can't say that. I know, right, I don't like that.

608
00:49:50.519 --> 00:49:52.159
I don't either. I'd like to
be able to say some of the horrible

609
00:49:52.280 --> 00:49:55.440
human being. Yeah, I don't
know if he was, I don't know.

610
00:49:55.920 --> 00:50:00.559
Okay, all right, and you
want to do the close, sure

611
00:50:00.039 --> 00:50:05.480
I can do that. You can
find us on social media at Facebook and

612
00:50:06.079 --> 00:50:09.599
Instagram and at Hardcore True Crime.
Sorry fucked that all up, but you

613
00:50:09.719 --> 00:50:14.800
get what I mean. And then
if you would like to join our Patreon

614
00:50:14.960 --> 00:50:20.800
where you get an extra weekly episode
and you can get this episode early release

615
00:50:21.039 --> 00:50:27.920
and add free, go to Patreon
dot com slash TNT Crimes. You can

616
00:50:27.960 --> 00:50:31.000
also find it information about it on
our website, Crimes and Consequences dot com.

617
00:50:31.440 --> 00:50:36.639
Or you can subscribe through your Apple
podcast app if that's the way you

618
00:50:36.760 --> 00:50:40.639
listen, and you will have access
to so many episodes. So if you

619
00:50:40.679 --> 00:50:44.199
can't get enough of us, do
what you can't tell? We've done so

620
00:50:44.400 --> 00:50:47.280
many, so many, so many, so any time to go home?

621
00:50:47.440 --> 00:50:51.559
It is until our next episode.
Don't kill each other by