Speaker 1: Welcome to the Great Detectives of Old Time Radio from Boise, Idaho.
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Speaker 1: free for two weeks. All right, Well, now it's time
Speaker 1: for today's episode of Dragnet. The original air date July
Speaker 1: sixth of nineteen fifty and the title is the big frame.
Speaker 2: The story you are about to hear is true, only
Speaker 2: the names have been changed to protect the innocent.
Speaker 3: Dragnet.
Speaker 2: You're a detective sergeant. You're assigned a hit and run
Speaker 2: felony detail. A dead body is found in the streets
Speaker 2: in the early hours of the morning. There's only one clue,
Speaker 2: a set of skid marks on the pavement. Your job
Speaker 2: find the killer.
Speaker 3: Dragnet. The document a drama of an actual crime. For
Speaker 3: the next thirty minutes, in cooperation with the Los Angeles
Speaker 3: Police Department, you will travel step by step on the
Speaker 3: side of the law through an actual case, transcribed from
Speaker 3: official police files, from beginning to end, from crime to punishment.
Speaker 3: Dragnet is the story of your police force.
Speaker 4: It was Monday, April nineteenth, was windy in Los Angeles.
Speaker 4: We were working the day watch out of Traffic Division.
Speaker 4: My partner's Ben Romero. The bosses Lieutenant Calfrey, Commander A
Speaker 4: I D. My name is Friday. It was seven fifty
Speaker 4: five am when I got to the second floor at
Speaker 4: one twenty three South figure O Street. Accident investigation getting
Speaker 4: run following detail morning Joe, George, how is it? Oh,
Speaker 4: it's not much better? Still aching rough lousy thing kept me.
Speaker 5: Up most of the night. Check of that dentis that
Speaker 5: told you about? Yeah?
Speaker 4: I did, says it's a wisdom code this one here.
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, since got to come out. I'm supposed to
Speaker 4: go back to see him the day that's rough.
Speaker 6: Remember a friend of mine had his wisdom teeth out,
Speaker 6: hurt like the devil terrible. Finally pulled him eight for
Speaker 6: five or six days after. Excuse me, Joe, gammicky, bet
Speaker 6: I have.
Speaker 5: A fifty seven yesterday. Okay, most of it down. I'll
Speaker 5: finish it out Friday. Hi, Ben comin yet he's down
Speaker 5: the record, bro, Let's see that joke. Guys.
Speaker 4: M hasn't gone down much. But it's a bad Wisdom Tooth.
Speaker 4: Dennis is gonna have to yanke it bummed down.
Speaker 7: Man.
Speaker 5: That's the first time I ever had any trouble with him.
Speaker 8: I remember a few years back my sister Gertrud had
Speaker 8: trouble with the Wisdom Tooth and packed him. Yeah, all
Speaker 8: side of a face was swarm book kid was in
Speaker 8: terrible pain full week even after they pulled it.
Speaker 5: It's still high. Hi Joe picked up the overnight reports
Speaker 5: down in the records. Mac.
Speaker 8: Yeah, well thanks Ben, this one on top hand. I
Speaker 8: like to have you to check it out. Dead buddy report, Yeah,
Speaker 8: left me a note on him.
Speaker 5: That's about all. Not to pick what's the story, just
Speaker 5: what you're seeing the report. The victim was Edward Raymond
Speaker 5: Stokes seven thirty two. Delinos to the apartment too.
Speaker 8: His body was finding a gutter in there, sixty thirdy
Speaker 8: per month, three o'clock this morning. No witnesses, only one
Speaker 8: piece of evidence.
Speaker 4: Ye see they got it listed the skid marks near
Speaker 4: the body.
Speaker 5: That all that's it? Parent hit and run. Where's the body? Man?
Speaker 5: Neighborhood mortuary out there? Emo Hill's Huner home.
Speaker 8: One of the deputy coroners handled the body, guy named
Speaker 8: Joe Laramore.
Speaker 5: Anybody claim it yet? No?
Speaker 9: Okay, Ben, you ready? Ye's go'na check you later, man.
Speaker 5: Yeah, any help. I've got to Pennon and Rogers on hand.
Speaker 9: Right, how do we manage to draw all the choice ones?
Speaker 9: I know, skid marks and the dead body?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 9: Oh say, I almost forgot. How's your Joe still hurts?
Speaker 9: Steal swollen? What did Denny say? Wisdom tooth? Oh it's miserable. Yeah,
Speaker 9: my wife had the same thing. A couple of years
Speaker 9: back then, has tried to yank the tooth and it
Speaker 9: broke right in too.
Speaker 5: Finally got it out. That's good funny thing about wisdom.
Speaker 5: D what's that?
Speaker 9: After they pull them arts for five or sixth days?
Speaker 4: Eight thirty three am, Ben and I drove out to
Speaker 4: sixty third in Vermont and rechecked the spot where the
Speaker 4: dead body of Edward Stokes had been found. According to
Speaker 4: the report, the body was found two feet west of
Speaker 4: the easterly curb and thirty two north of sixty third
Speaker 4: Street on Vermont.
Speaker 5: We examined the skid marks.
Speaker 4: They showed definite signs of being a lot older than
Speaker 4: twenty four hours.
Speaker 5: The consistency of the rubber was weak, and there were heavy.
Speaker 4: Dirt smudges over them, indicating more aware than they could
Speaker 4: have possibly had since the estimated time of the victim's death.
Speaker 4: We got back in the car and drove to the
Speaker 4: Emerald Hills Funeral Home at Vernon and Denver Avenue.
Speaker 9: Sure he's rotten weather for April, Yeah, he's funeral home.
Speaker 5: Do you ever notice it? What's that? Why do they
Speaker 5: always put awnings over the winds? Never opened? Ra, I
Speaker 5: don't know, you know what we're going on.
Speaker 9: You know where the office is, mister brass played on
Speaker 9: the door over there. That's how a lot. Yes, sir,
Speaker 9: here's somebody. Joe definitely be of the service. Police officers
Speaker 9: like to talk to mister Larimore. I believe he's a
Speaker 9: deputy corner. I'm mister Larimore. He came about the hit
Speaker 9: and run victim. Yeah, that's right, the sergeant Romero. My
Speaker 9: name is Briddy. If we'd like to check the body,
Speaker 9: if you could, certainly, it's back this way when the stands.
Speaker 9: You moved the buddy from the scene of the accident
Speaker 9: here to the mortuhere. Yes, that's right, early this morning.
Speaker 9: Unusual case, cavil. There's two steps downs.
Speaker 5: I can set the door. Yeah, thank you. Why do
Speaker 5: you say it's unusual, mister Larimore, Well here let me
Speaker 5: show you there now.
Speaker 9: For one thing, the victim had a basil skull fracture.
Speaker 9: I don't know about you, gentlemen, but in the hit
Speaker 9: and run cases i've handled, the basil fracture is a
Speaker 9: pretty rare thing. Well, it is possible, isn't it. It's possible.
Speaker 9: Anything's possible. As they say, it's not usual. A few
Speaker 9: other things here too. Yeah, now, that's the victim's knee. Here,
Speaker 9: a single clean cut. Wounds on the head. I've never
Speaker 9: seen anything like it. And hit and run cases I've
Speaker 9: been called him.
Speaker 4: Yeah, a wound on the knee doesn't gibe, does it?
Speaker 4: He was hit by a car. The knees should be
Speaker 4: skinned up quite a bit, exactly. You know how it
Speaker 4: usually is the automobile hits the victim. There's always signs
Speaker 4: that the body was either dragged or thrown, shredding clothing, skin, knees, legs, elbows.
Speaker 5: No sign of that here. You don't think the victim
Speaker 5: could have been killed by hitting running cars?
Speaker 9: No, I don't say that it's possible that it might
Speaker 9: have been a car, but well, let's say it's not
Speaker 9: very probable.
Speaker 5: Has anybody at all inquired about the body of mister Larmor?
Speaker 9: No, No, it's funny, all right, Tom, excuse me a moment. Yeah, sure,
Speaker 9: Well yeah, or are we start?
Speaker 5: I don't know. Maybe we won't have to another lead
Speaker 5: like this. We can turn over to homicide D.
Speaker 9: Yeah, there's a young lady in the lobby. Yeah, she
Speaker 9: wants to claim the body. The girl was shown the body.
Speaker 9: She identified it as that of Edward Raymond Stokes.
Speaker 4: She gave her name as Marian Fuller, the victim's common
Speaker 4: law wife. After she recovered from her shock, she asked
Speaker 4: if she might sit down for a while and rest.
Speaker 4: We took her into one of the offices in the mortuary,
Speaker 4: and Ben got her a glass of water. She told
Speaker 4: us that she had last seen Stokes alive at about
Speaker 4: one am that morning. They had been drinking together at
Speaker 4: a neighborhood bar on Vermont Avenue between sixty third and
Speaker 4: sixty fourth Streets, half a block from where the victim's body.
Speaker 5: Had been found sprawled in the gutter. Why don't you
Speaker 5: sit down over there?
Speaker 10: Be for.
Speaker 5: How long did you know Edward Stilketing's for her?
Speaker 10: In about six.
Speaker 7: Years and I being together pretty much for the last
Speaker 7: couple of years.
Speaker 4: Oh my, do you mind telling us exactly what happened
Speaker 4: while your wood Stokes last night?
Speaker 5: Everything he can remember.
Speaker 7: I can't think his headache killing you.
Speaker 5: Oh, we should try him a sport, it's important.
Speaker 11: Well, I mean I had dinner together at the Spanish Oven,
Speaker 11: placed down on soft fig that was about a quarter eight,
Speaker 11: and he drove out to the brown barrel and remont.
Speaker 11: But I told you about yeah, I mean I go
Speaker 11: there most of the time. He stayed there and drank,
Speaker 11: played little shuffle board.
Speaker 5: Yeah, go ahead.
Speaker 11: Always stayed too long, drank a little too much. I
Speaker 11: started talking with this fella next to me, and he
Speaker 11: got sore. Always got jealous when he was drunk.
Speaker 5: Did any fight with this other man this sport?
Speaker 7: Oh? No, I stopped it. That made any mad. You
Speaker 7: never could drink. I always wanted to pick a fight.
Speaker 5: Who was the other man? You remember?
Speaker 7: No, I don't. I guess I had a lot to
Speaker 7: drink too. He did some guy at the bar headache.
Speaker 5: It's not gonna take much longer, Just a few more questions.
Speaker 7: Organs getting on my nerves.
Speaker 4: What happened after you broke up the argument between Stokes
Speaker 4: and the other man?
Speaker 7: Oh? Nothing. We stayed in the bar.
Speaker 11: Had he played shuffle board most of the time. I
Speaker 11: was one of the booth drinking.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 11: Around one o'clock, I started feeling six, so I went
Speaker 11: outside and sat in the car. I guess I passed
Speaker 11: out there your car, well, I guess I belonged to
Speaker 11: one of the fellows in the bar. I passed out,
Speaker 11: and that's all I can remember.
Speaker 5: Did you sleep in the car all night.
Speaker 10: No, I guess whoever owned it drove me home.
Speaker 5: Well, how do they know where you live?
Speaker 10: I was doing one of our friends.
Speaker 6: I don't know.
Speaker 11: I don't remember anything till this morning. He phoned me
Speaker 11: up and said Eddie was dead.
Speaker 5: Who phoned you, miss far.
Speaker 10: One of our friends.
Speaker 7: I don't remember. I had a rotten headache.
Speaker 5: Well you can do better than that, I.
Speaker 11: Tell you, I don't remember your phone and told me
Speaker 11: Eddie was dead.
Speaker 7: Somebody ran Eddie down.
Speaker 5: All right, where are we going downtown? We'll have a
Speaker 5: stenographer take your statement.
Speaker 7: I got a terrible hangover. I've never had one as
Speaker 7: bad as this.
Speaker 5: Neither is Eddie. Let's go on the way back to
Speaker 5: the office.
Speaker 4: Ben stopped at the drug show and I picked up
Speaker 4: a box of aspring. The wisdom to who was giving
Speaker 4: me trouble again? The clerk at the soda pott and
Speaker 4: fixed something for Marian Fuller's hangover. When we got her
Speaker 4: back to the office and questioned her for more than
Speaker 4: an hour, but she gave us only one additional piece
Speaker 4: of information.
Speaker 5: The victim, Eddie Stokes, had been married before and divorced.
Speaker 4: His ex wife lived out in the valley with their
Speaker 4: two children, and on several occasions she came to see
Speaker 4: Stokes at the Vermont Avenue bar when he failed to
Speaker 4: make the monthly payments for the support of the children.
Speaker 5: Each time they'd argued bitterly.
Speaker 4: We had a police demographer take the floor woman's statment,
Speaker 4: and when she was released ten forty five am, Sergeants
Speaker 4: Rogers and McLennon were assigned to check out the Vermont
Speaker 4: Avenue bar, where Stokes had last been seen alive. Ben
Speaker 4: and I drove out to the valley to the home
Speaker 4: of Catherine Stokes, the victim's former wife. She met us
Speaker 4: on the front porch. Inside, it sounded like one of
Speaker 4: the children was practicing the piano.
Speaker 5: Who told her what had happened last week?
Speaker 10: I think it was yes Thursday, last week Eddie hadn't
Speaker 10: send him money for the kid's support for three months.
Speaker 10: I hated to chase after him like that. There wasn't
Speaker 10: nothing else I could do.
Speaker 5: Where did you meet him?
Speaker 10: Mists That bar used to hang around Oban Vermont called
Speaker 10: a brown bear or something. Oh wouldn't you like to
Speaker 10: come inside?
Speaker 5: Yes? Thank you? You happen to know anybody by the
Speaker 5: name of Marian Fuller?
Speaker 10: Yes, Eddie mentioned he was a man seeing woman like that.
Speaker 5: Do you know anything about her at all?
Speaker 12: No?
Speaker 10: Whenever I saw it, he mentioned he was running around
Speaker 10: with it because he wanted to make me jealous.
Speaker 5: Was your husband a pretty heavy drinker?
Speaker 10: Yes, he was, so I got the divorce. Eddie was
Speaker 10: such a fine boy when we got married, good home.
Speaker 5: You didn't know any of the people he'd been running
Speaker 5: around with lately.
Speaker 10: No, just the full of him on, that's all.
Speaker 5: Can you think of anything at all? It might possibly
Speaker 5: have a bearing on his death?
Speaker 10: No, Eddie was probably drinking, wanted in the street to
Speaker 10: part him. I don't know. Oh, there's the bakery, man,
Speaker 10: I've got to get some bread and a few things.
Speaker 10: Excuse me.
Speaker 5: I think that's about it all, don't you, Joe.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I'll tell you. I'll leave our cardot Miss Stokes
Speaker 4: in case you want to contact us. Funny reason why.
Speaker 10: It was so wonderful when we were married, Eddie and I.
Speaker 10: My folks gave us his house as a wedding prison.
Speaker 10: We got wonderful prisons. Yeah, we had everything we wanted, car,
Speaker 10: nice house, kids, wonderful. We started drinking. Then everything went job.
Speaker 10: Everything I thought, all of a sudden. I never knew why, Yes, ma'am.
Speaker 10: How the men get that way? How do they stand?
Speaker 5: I don't know. We only see a part of it.
Speaker 10: Yeah.
Speaker 5: When they finish.
Speaker 4: Twelve noon, Ben and I drove back into town to
Speaker 4: Vermont the sixty third Street for a meet with Sergeants
Speaker 4: Rogers and McClendon. They told us that they checked out
Speaker 4: the bartender who had been on the night before, and
Speaker 4: also seven of his customers. Their stories were almost identical.
Speaker 4: Each of them remembered seeing Eddie Stokes at the bar.
Speaker 4: Each of them remembered he was playing shuffleboard, that he
Speaker 4: was drinking heavily, and then he left the bar at about.
Speaker 5: One forty five am.
Speaker 4: All of us had the idea that for some reason,
Speaker 4: the bartender and the customers were lying. In most cases,
Speaker 4: it's hard to find two witnesses who tell identical stories,
Speaker 4: let alone seven. For the rest of that afternoon, Rogers, McLennan,
Speaker 4: Ben and I spent our time canvassing the neighborhood. In
Speaker 4: the vicinity of the Brown Barrel tavern four forty five am,
Speaker 4: we talked to the proprietor of a small grocery store
Speaker 4: two blocks down the street from the tavern. He told
Speaker 4: us that he rarely visited the bar, but that he
Speaker 4: thought that the man who ran the butcher shop next
Speaker 4: to his place, mister Eugene Murray, was a regular patron
Speaker 4: of the Brown Barrel.
Speaker 5: So we went next door.
Speaker 7: To the Grand shop. Had a.
Speaker 5: Nice looking mates. And you, yeah, the stakes look good,
Speaker 5: don't they? Two pounds?
Speaker 7: All right?
Speaker 13: Anything else? Now, missus Kidney got some nice besh kidneys today.
Speaker 10: I'll tach kidneys. Put it on the bill, watch mister Murray,
Speaker 10: Yes man.
Speaker 9: Thank you, Yes, gentlemen, and I hug you police officers.
Speaker 9: Mister Murray, like to ask you a few questions. Oh,
Speaker 9: I'm sure glad to help out if I can.
Speaker 5: Have you ever been in the Brown Barrel tavern? Down
Speaker 5: the next block? There?
Speaker 13: Brown Barrel? I'll go there all the time. Say would
Speaker 13: you mind if I fix up another while we're talking?
Speaker 13: The customers going to pick it up in a couple
Speaker 13: of minutes. I don't like to keep waiting.
Speaker 5: Sure, go ahead, I gotta go to the ice block.
Speaker 5: When's the last time you ran in the Brown Barrel,
Speaker 5: mister Murray?
Speaker 7: Last night the movie.
Speaker 5: Picture, we dropped dinn at the Barrel and way home
Speaker 5: for a beer. About what time? Is that pretty close
Speaker 5: to two? What's the matter some kind of trouble? Did
Speaker 5: you notice anything unusual when you're in there? Anybody fighting
Speaker 5: or arguing?
Speaker 13: No, we were only in there a couple of minutes.
Speaker 13: But now that you mentioned that, there was something funny happened.
Speaker 5: What was that?
Speaker 13: Well, a bartender, Carl, and a half dozen of the
Speaker 13: neighborhood gang or back in one of the boots, talking together.
Speaker 13: They seemed kind of nervous, and all of them seem
Speaker 13: to be having a good time.
Speaker 11: You know.
Speaker 13: My wife and I yelled hello at him, but they
Speaker 13: kind of gave us to go by. Then this drunk
Speaker 13: came up to us. Uh, they say, officer, wou'd you
Speaker 13: reach that knife for me?
Speaker 5: Which one did that?
Speaker 13: One?
Speaker 5: Oh? Yeah here? Yeah, yeah, go ahead. Yeah.
Speaker 13: Well, this a drunk came up to us and whispers
Speaker 13: to me, say, you better get out of here.
Speaker 5: There's been a fight. Isn't that a beautiful piece of meat? Well?
Speaker 13: I didn't pay much attention to him. He was pretty drunk,
Speaker 13: could hardly understand him. I I guess they have a
Speaker 13: lot of fights in there anyway.
Speaker 5: Is that all he told you? They'd been Afie yeah,
Speaker 5: that well.
Speaker 13: He came back a couple of minutes later and whispered
Speaker 13: the same same thing.
Speaker 5: You better get out.
Speaker 13: There's been a fight, he said, wife and I just
Speaker 13: laughed at him.
Speaker 5: He said, I know all about it. A guy's been murdered.
Speaker 5: You are listening to dragnet.
Speaker 4: The six PM Ben and I went back to Homicide
Speaker 4: to turn the case over to them. They asked us
Speaker 4: to handle the investigation for another day because they were
Speaker 4: short of men at the moment, because there was still
Speaker 4: a big doubts or whether or not Eddie Stokes had
Speaker 4: really been murdered. Actually, the only solid lead we had
Speaker 4: was the second hand testimony of a drunken witness. That
Speaker 4: and the deputy coroner's doubts that Stokes was actually the victim.
Speaker 5: Of a hit and run.
Speaker 4: Mister Murray, the butcher didn't know the name of the
Speaker 4: man who told him that there'd been a murder, and
Speaker 4: he could give us only a meager description. We brought
Speaker 4: Marian Fuller back in and requestioned her. She stuck to
Speaker 4: her story. She didn't remember anything. She was released again.
Speaker 4: Looked like we were in for a long night. We
Speaker 4: went across the street for a bowl of soup and
Speaker 4: a sandwich. And when we got back, Ben called his
Speaker 4: wife and told her he'd be working late.
Speaker 5: I called my mother working late a king.
Speaker 10: Oh, Joseph, how's your tooth feeling?
Speaker 5: That's a little better, mind, it's still pretty tender. I'm
Speaker 5: gonna go to the dentist tomorrow.
Speaker 10: Yes, you gotta have that attendant to right away. Bad
Speaker 10: teeth can poison your whole system.
Speaker 5: You be sure. And see that dentist.
Speaker 11: Is he a good one?
Speaker 5: Yeah, he's okay.
Speaker 4: One of the fellas down there told me about him.
Speaker 5: I'll see a little later. I don't wait up.
Speaker 11: Yeah, and you don't work.
Speaker 5: Too late, Joseph, you need your rest, Yeah, okay, Man, goodbye,
Speaker 5: all right, Joseph, goodbye, Joe. Yeah. Just talk to that
Speaker 5: butcher's wife on the phone, Miss Murray.
Speaker 9: What'd she has to say? Ask you the same questions
Speaker 9: we asked Murray? She couldn't add much, the same story, queen.
Speaker 8: Yeah, mat Rogers and mcclennan just called. And it's still
Speaker 8: out at that bar now. Finally got somebody to talk
Speaker 8: a little well again. The bar boy out there, he
Speaker 8: says there was a fight happened about one doesn't remember
Speaker 8: who was fighting not much half bar boy's name is Milner,
Speaker 8: he told Rogers. He went outside about twenty minutes to
Speaker 8: two to put the garbage out. He saw the fullow
Speaker 8: woman asleep.
Speaker 5: In that car. You get the license number? No, said
Speaker 5: there was a ticket on the windshield.
Speaker 4: Ben and I checked with the sergeant of the watch
Speaker 4: at seventy seventh Street Division. He told us Unit one
Speaker 4: to eleven was assigned to the area where the Brown
Speaker 4: Barrel was located. And checking their worksheet, we found that
Speaker 4: Unit one eleven had issued a hang on citation the
Speaker 4: night before to a car park near sixty three thirty
Speaker 4: and one a half Vermont Avenue, the address of the
Speaker 4: Brown Barrel tavern. We checked the license number through DMV
Speaker 4: and found that the car was registered to a William R. Huddy,
Speaker 4: fourteen Naylor Street. We drove out to the Naylor Street
Speaker 4: address and talked to Huddy's wife. She told us he
Speaker 4: was playing in a shuffleboard tournament that night at a
Speaker 4: bar down on South Olive Street.
Speaker 5: Eight fifty five pm. We checked in at the bar.
Speaker 5: Boy ken, Oh, yes, sir, what'll it be.
Speaker 4: You know, if there's a William Huddy in here, he's
Speaker 4: supposed to be playing a shuffle board game here tonight.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I know how good.
Speaker 5: He's with the Highland Park team. Man. Let me see, Yeah,
Speaker 5: that's him up now out on the blue shirt. Thank you, Ben,
Speaker 5: I said, Bell.
Speaker 3: Good way, make it another three?
Speaker 5: That cleans him? Good one? Bell? Yeah, that's pretty close.
Speaker 5: Speat that one?
Speaker 10: Nice?
Speaker 5: Excuse me?
Speaker 12: Yeah?
Speaker 5: Are you William Honey? Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 9: Police officers would like to talk to you a minute.
Speaker 9: Oh what a buff I think to asked you a
Speaker 9: few questions. You stepped over here, man, Yeah, all right.
Speaker 5: Were you with the Brown Bell tavern out on Vermont
Speaker 5: last night?
Speaker 10: Yeah?
Speaker 5: I was.
Speaker 12: Why what's the matter?
Speaker 5: You know Marion Fuller?
Speaker 12: Yeah, she hangs around the place. She goes with a
Speaker 12: guy named Eddy. Did you drive her home last night? Yes,
Speaker 12: a matter of fact, I did. She passed out my car.
Speaker 12: It's a nice kid, but she drinks a lot.
Speaker 5: I drove her home. Do you mind telling us what
Speaker 5: happened at the bar last night when you were there?
Speaker 10: All?
Speaker 12: Well, I come in about nine o'clock and I stopped
Speaker 12: playing shuffle board with a couple of guys. This guy
Speaker 12: Eddie Soil was one of them. Yeah, they got no beef.
Speaker 12: With the guy at the bar over Marry and there's nothing.
Speaker 12: Big guy left after a while, Go ahead, what's about all?
Speaker 12: I left the place around one thirty and they said
Speaker 12: he was beefing with some merchant semen about that time.
Speaker 5: Was the poor girl still to buy at that time?
Speaker 13: No?
Speaker 12: When I went outside, I saw a sleep on my car,
Speaker 12: so I drove a home. I left her off and
Speaker 12: then come back to the bar. That's when they told me.
Speaker 12: Told you what When I said Eddie had a fight
Speaker 12: with this merchant seaman, I said, be better if we
Speaker 12: kept it quiet. Who told you that? Call a bartender
Speaker 12: and I got the real story from one of the fellas.
Speaker 12: I was playing shuffle board with William mccartty.
Speaker 5: Would he tell you?
Speaker 12: And we said that when Eddie Stokes left, the merchant
Speaker 12: seaman followed him out. He said he chased Eddie. McCarty
Speaker 12: went out about five minutes later. Yeah, well the merchant
Speaker 12: seamen was gone and Stokes was lying in the gutter
Speaker 12: down the street. Did mccartty look at him, Yeah, he
Speaker 12: said Stokes looked pretty bad, so he looked like he
Speaker 12: was dead. But I I would believe that when on
Speaker 12: this McCarty always exaggerates.
Speaker 5: Ten fifteen pm.
Speaker 4: We had William Huddy come back to the office with us,
Speaker 4: where we questioned him further and took his statement. Then
Speaker 4: we had his friend Leo McCarty brought in along with
Speaker 4: the bartender at the Brown Barrel tavern and the customers
Speaker 4: that he'd framed his story with. McCarty was the first
Speaker 4: to give us the straight story, and then the others followed.
Speaker 4: The bartender Carl Jansen, who also owned the bar, was
Speaker 4: the last to break How about it, Jensen, why didn't
Speaker 4: we get a straight story to begin with?
Speaker 5: What about the publicity? I would that look? A murderer
Speaker 5: around my place could work.
Speaker 4: Out worse than that. Mister Janson, you've been withholding evidence.
Speaker 4: You talk these people into the same deal.
Speaker 9: I'd protect myself, newspapers, all the scandaled recommends business.
Speaker 5: I had to keep it quiet. It's not my fault
Speaker 5: that Stokes has killed. I didn't do it. I'm not
Speaker 5: to blame. No, But you know who is to blame?
Speaker 6: Now?
Speaker 5: How about it? Who is he?
Speaker 9: He works on the ships, comes in here most of
Speaker 9: the time when he's important. What's his name, Henry Baxter?
Speaker 5: Okay? Some of his paychecks Ben you better get the
Speaker 5: captain there.
Speaker 4: Yeah, hit't run, Phelony Friday.
Speaker 5: Oh yeah, no, just a minute for you, Jansen.
Speaker 9: Thank you, yes, oh yes, just a minute, sergeant. Yeah,
Speaker 9: it's my wife. She's at the bar now. She thought
Speaker 9: you ought to know. You know, Henry Baxter. Freea says
Speaker 9: he just came in.
Speaker 4: I talked to Jansen's wife and told her to lay
Speaker 4: Baxter as long as possible without arousing his suspicions. Eleven
Speaker 4: twenty five pm, Ben and I and mister Jansen, along
Speaker 4: with Rogers and McLendon, drove out to the Brown Barrel
Speaker 4: tavern on Vermont.
Speaker 5: When we got there, Baxter was gone.
Speaker 4: Missus Jansen told us he was pretty drunk by the
Speaker 4: time he left the bar.
Speaker 5: She'd watched him go down.
Speaker 4: One block across the street and then enter a small
Speaker 4: nightclub on the opposite side called the Pink Shamrock, eeping
Speaker 4: an eye on the place, and as far as she knew,
Speaker 4: Baxter was still inside. We went down the street to
Speaker 4: the nightclub. Rogers and McLennon covered the back entrance. We
Speaker 4: got inside in the middle of a floor show. The
Speaker 4: blonde was doing some kind of a dance. Can you
Speaker 4: sparty miss Jansen, h I don't see yet. How about
Speaker 4: over on this side, back in the corner there, No.
Speaker 5: It was not there. It was so dark and I
Speaker 5: can't see too well. And there's a re erected to
Speaker 5: the place he could have slipped out that way.
Speaker 7: Kenny, did you take it soon?
Speaker 10: Your poto brat?
Speaker 5: No, no thanks. Maybe we better check with the waiter
Speaker 5: bit on, SI man over there at that table where yeah, yeah,
Speaker 5: I mean almost positive where I lack that. I step
Speaker 5: razy just behind it to see. Yeah, yeah, that's him.
Speaker 5: That's him, all right from on bench. You stay right here,
Speaker 5: mister Johnson, your bet.
Speaker 13: Right.
Speaker 6: I waited in the cocatte little waiters.
Speaker 5: None of coka. You ain't even give me back to yeh.
Speaker 5: That's say what police officers like to talk to you.
Speaker 8: Yeah, oh yeah, outside I said nothing, and let's see
Speaker 8: a show.
Speaker 5: Let's go outside. Come on, I want him. What's the
Speaker 5: beef anyway? You know what to do? Sure?
Speaker 1: I know what that?
Speaker 5: Come on allows you? Punk got his stokes trying to
Speaker 5: give me a bad time. Now you know it's what
Speaker 5: a bad time is. Thanks you come on as you
Speaker 5: punk Stokes.
Speaker 6: I showed him how it's done to keep your boy stock.
Speaker 13: I slugged him, hounded his hat on the curb he
Speaker 13: was talking over in the water out. Come on, I'll say, hey, everybody,
Speaker 13: I killed that he stokes.
Speaker 4: I killed him.
Speaker 9: That's gid him money here yea, okay, how's that tooth
Speaker 9: feel you?
Speaker 5: It seems okay. Better have a donnage yanked out first.
Speaker 5: Anymore they call hold off a while.
Speaker 2: The story you have just heard was true, only the
Speaker 2: names have been changed to protect the innocent.
Speaker 3: On July thirtieth, trial was held in Superior Court, Department
Speaker 3: eighty seven, City and County of Los Angeles, State of California.
Speaker 3: In a moment the results of that trial, Henry John
Speaker 3: Baxter was tried and convicted in Superior Court of manslaughter.
Speaker 3: He received the sentence as prescribed by law and is
Speaker 3: now serving as term in the state penitentiary. You have
Speaker 3: just heard Dragnet, a series of authentic cases from official files.
Speaker 3: Technical advice for Dragnet comes from the Office of Chief
Speaker 3: of Police w WA Wharton, Los Angeles Police Department, Sharah
Speaker 3: Berner Stars and Sarah's Private kper. Next on NBC, this is.
Speaker 14: Andrew Ryans with OTR Westerns dot Com, where we stream
Speaker 14: live Old Time Radio Westerns twenty four hours a day,
Speaker 14: seven days a week, with a special twist, you select
Speaker 14: the tracks that get to be played. We've got a
Speaker 14: thousand different episodes from shows like Gunsmoke, Tales of the
Speaker 14: Texas Rangers, Escape, Genautry, and many more. Come check us
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Speaker 14: OTR Westerns dot com slash live. You're listening to the
Speaker 14: great detectives of Old time Radio with Adam Graham. And
Speaker 14: now let's get back into the show.
Speaker 1: Welcome Back. The Big Frame is one of those episodes
Speaker 1: I like as a radio episode, but I really adore
Speaker 1: as a television episode. Some of these I think the
Speaker 1: radio version is superior, but the TV version often has
Speaker 1: some things going for it, because the one thing about
Speaker 1: Jack Webb is when it came to radio and television,
Speaker 1: he was very skilled at finding ways whichever medium he
Speaker 1: was operating in to really make a show stand out,
Speaker 1: and The Big Frame is one of his better ones.
Speaker 1: It's a season three episode when it makes it to television,
Speaker 1: and there are some key differences just in the way
Speaker 1: things that are shot. Some very good shots, including the
Speaker 1: sh shuffle board scene, plus one big contrast with the
Speaker 1: radio episode and the TV episode is how the whole
Speaker 1: two thing gets resolved, and with Frank Smith at his
Speaker 1: partner at that point, he's actually able to do Ben
Speaker 1: Romero's part and the part of Joe's mother, who is
Speaker 1: no longer on the show. It'll be a while till
Speaker 1: we get to play those on video theater since it's
Speaker 1: a season three episode, But if you're curious and you
Speaker 1: have a little less than half an hour, you can
Speaker 1: check out the big frame on YouTube and see how
Speaker 1: it worked on television. Of course, that's not to say
Speaker 1: the radio version was bad, certainly by no means as
Speaker 1: an entertaining and enjoyable tale. And one thing I noted
Speaker 1: in here was Sheldon Leonard on Dragnet, and he's not
Speaker 1: generally an actor you would associated with it, just because
Speaker 1: he tended to play the more traditional sort of villains
Speaker 1: on shows like The Saint and on Richard Diamond, and
Speaker 1: here he plays a much more plain spoken character. Was
Speaker 1: still a bit from the wrong side of the tracks.
Speaker 1: The other thing it was somewhat of audity to me
Speaker 1: was a late night parking violation that ends up being
Speaker 1: a key clue. It's odd to me because a lot
Speaker 1: of the parking laws, particularly as it pertains to metered
Speaker 1: areas and things like that, aren't enforced well. I guess
Speaker 1: major public safety issues still might be, but without that
Speaker 1: parking ticket a murderer might have gotten away. At any rate.
Speaker 1: Another solid episode of Dragging that in the books, and
Speaker 1: another week of the Great Detectors of Old Time Radio.
Speaker 1: I do want to announce that starting in September we'll
Speaker 1: be doing two episodes of video Theater, with one episode
Speaker 1: being Dragnet in one episode being something else. So that'll
Speaker 1: start in September, so you'll be getting a monthly dose
Speaker 1: of video Dragnet this month. And tomorrow it's another episode
Speaker 1: of the Adventures of Ellery Queen, so you want to
Speaker 1: be sure and watch that, and then on Monday join
Speaker 1: us back for the Saint and next Saturday another episode
Speaker 1: of Dragnet. In the meantime, sendra comments to Box thirteen
Speaker 1: at Great Detectives dot net, follow us on Twitter at
Speaker 1: Radio Detectives, and become one of our friends on Facebook, Facebook,
Speaker 1: dot com, slash Radiodetectives From Boiseiudah. This is your host,
Speaker 1: Adam Graham signing off