The Mammoth Book of Bizarre Crimes (31 page)

Eliot Ness, one of the so-called “Untouchables” who brought Al Capone to justice, was Cleveland’s director of safety. He deployed unprecedented manpower in his attempts to solve the murders, but the killings went on, numbering at least twelve up to April 1938. The killing of a woman whose body was found on the shore of Lake Erie was the last, although five murders in Pittsburgh between 1939 and 1942 were also laid at the door of the “Mad Butcher”.

In common with most of his victims, the murderer remained anonymous. It was rumoured that Eliot Ness had a secret suspect. This individual, believed to be Dr Francis Sweeney, initiated what amounted to a hate campaign against Ness, bombarding him with a stream of letters and postcards.

Sweeney was a practising physician in Cleveland and there is a well-documented record of his descent into alcoholism and mental illness. Crime writer James Jessen Badal comprehensively reviewed the evidence against Sweeney in his book on the murders published in 2001. Ness believed the doctor fitted the profile of the murderer and Badal thought his taunting of the authorities and obsessiveness conformed to our modern understanding of serial killers. It is fair to say though that the jury is still out on the identity of the “Mad Butcher”.

Devil With Two Faces

“The Ogre of the Ardennes”, as Michael Fourniret was called by the press, confessed to seven rape murders in France. He was aided by his wife, Monique Olivier, who procured his victims.

The deadly duo combined forces in 1987 when Fourniret was released from prison, having served a sentence for sexual assault. He advertised for a pen pal and Monique responded. They struck a deal whereby she would supply him with virgins to murder.

Fourniret was obsessed with the idea of virginity, claiming to have been traumatized when he discovered that his first wife betrayed him by not being a virgin bride. Their murder spree began in December 1987 when Monique stopped seventeen-year-old Isabella Lavike in Auxerre and asked for directions. The teenager responded by getting into Monique’s vehicle to guide her. On the way, they stopped to pick up Fourniret, posing as a hitch-hiker. The girl was raped and murdered and her body thrown into a well. This modus operandi was successfully repeated with victims being variously strangled, shot and stabbed. Several of the bodies were buried in the grounds of Fourniret’s house at Santou, near Sedan.

Monique was in thrall to the man she called “My Beast” and wrote to him saying, “It is with pleasure that I will execute your orders.” Their exploits came to an end in 2003 following the attempted kidnapping of a seventeen-year-old girl in Belgium. The intended victim, bundled into the back of Fourniret’s van, managed to break the binding around her wrists and escape.

Police identified the vehicle from the girl’s description and found hair in it that matched the DNA of the girl who had been abducted and murdered earlier. First Monique confessed and then Fourniret. He showed no remorse and clearly believed himself to be a superior intellect. While in custody, he spent his time re-writing the works of some of France’s classic authors.

The two were tried for murder at Charleville-Mézières. Fourniret demanded that the jurors should have been “virgins
when they married”. In court, lawyers described him as a “dangerous narcissistic pervert”. The press had already called the duo a “Devil with two faces”, a master and slave who raped and murdered at least seven girls aged between twelve and twenty-one over a twenty-year period. They were sentenced to life imprisonment following conviction at Charleville-Mézières in 2008.

The Easter Murder

A murderer taunted police by sending them coded messages that they could not decipher. He also left fingerprints at the crime scene, which were the only code detectives needed to catch him.

What became known as “The Easter Murder” occurred at Burnage near Manchester in the UK in April 1962. A neighbour noticed that the door to William Nelson’s flat had been open for a couple of days and, fearing that something might have happened to him, called for help. The forty-eight-year-old railway telegraphist was found dead in his bed. His body was covered with bedclothes and, when these were drawn back, it was revealed that he had been severely bludgeoned about the head.

The pathologist determined that he had been struck nine times with a heavy implement probably while he lay asleep. There were some curious features at the crime scene. Apart from thumbprints on the bedhead, there were unusual blood patterns on the sheet and a clear palm print on the pillow. The person who left the handprint had distinctive lines on the palm, which when impressed with blood on the pillow formed an “E” shape.

William Nelson was an old soldier and it was surmised that he might have taken an old army mate back to his flat who robbed and killed him. Not much headway was made by detectives until 23 June when a letter was received at police headquarters in Manchester. This was written in code and referred to the murder of William Nelson. A few days later, another communication was received, comprising a detailed
plan of “The flat of the late William Nelson”. Clearly the murderer was playing a game with the police.

On 13 August, a man calling himself Frank and plainly drunk, dialled 999 and was put through to police HQ. He taunted officers with the boast, “I did it. Come and get me. . .” The call was traced to a phone booth at Manchester’s Piccadilly Station and minutes later, the caller, Frank Goodman, was in custody.

His fingerprints were taken and found to match those left at the crime scene. Twenty-two-year-old Goodman, an unemployed fitter, said he met Nelson in a pub and the old soldier took him back to his flat. Goodman admitted killing him. He also decoded his message, which amounted to another confession to attempted murder. Two weeks before he killed Nelson, he attacked a man on a train, robbed him and threw him out of the carriage. The victim of this attack was Dennis Cronin who had ended up in hospital with severe head injuries.

A search of Goodman’s home yielded the murder weapon, which proved to be a long, heavy threaded bolt. It was this implement that had left the unusual bloodstains at the scene of William Nelson’s murder. The palm print with its “E” shape impression proved to be a virtual signature as far as Goodman was concerned.

He was charged with murder and appeared at Manchester Crown Court in December 1962. He pleaded not guilty to capital murder but guilty to murder. The distinction lay in changes in the law abolishing the death penalty for most types of murder but the ultimate penalty still applied for capital murder which included killing in the furtherance of theft.

The hearing lasted two minutes and Goodman was sentenced to life imprisonment. The charge of attempted murder was not pursued. Dennis Cronin died of his injuries three years after he had been attacked.

Wedding Night Killer

Basil Laitner was a wealthy solicitor and his wife, Avril, was a medical practitioner. Basil and Avril Laitner celebrated the marriage of their eldest daughter on 24 October 1983 with a
reception held in a marquee at their home in Dore, Sheffield, in the UK.

Just hours after the guests had left, the Laitners and their son Richard were stabbed to death. Their eighteen-year-old daughter, Nicola, was raped but otherwise unharmed and was able to give police a description of her attacker. He was a man already known to the police who had escaped custody while attending Selby magistrates court a month previously.

Arthur Hutchinson was charged with alleged offences of rape and theft. During the course of his escape at Selby he had cut himself. This was to prove significant for detectives investigating the murders at Sheffield. Hutchinson had a rare blood group and blood of the same type was found on the bed in the room where Nicola had been assaulted. Also, his palm print was found on a champagne bottle in the wedding reception marquee and, if further evidence was needed of his presence in the house, it was provided by his teeth. He had taken a bite out of a piece of cheese in the Laitner’s refrigerator, leaving an identifiable dental impression.

Forty-three-year-old Hutchinson was a man with a colourful lifestyle. One of a family of eight born in Durham, he had worked as a trainee miner, farm labourer and as an entertainer at circuses and fairgrounds. He had been married twice and had a record of offences involving indecent assault and theft. His life was that of a petty criminal and he was known as a man with a strong sexual appetite.

He tried to evade capture after the murders by keeping on the move, travelling from one northern town to another. He also changed his hairstyle to alter his appearance. The police finally caught up with him at Hartlepool where he was arrested on 5 November 1983. He commented to officers, “I should have stayed in my fox-hole, shouldn’t I?” He denied being at the Laitner’s house and denied the killings.

“The Wedding Night Killer”, as he had been called by the press, was sent for trial at Durham Crown Court in September 1984. He told a fanciful story, relating that he had met Nicola Laitner in a public house in Sheffield two nights before the murders. She invited him back to the house after the wedding
reception and he alleged that she willingly responded to his sexual advances. He left at about 11.00 p.m. but returned later because he had left his coat behind. On entering the house, he said he was attacked by Nicola wielding a knife who explained that her parents had been killed by intruders.

Defence counsel claimed that Hutchinson lied repeatedly because he thought it would protect his innocence. Nicola Laitner denied that she had invited him to her home. She said she heard her mother’s screams and then the intruder came into her bedroom and said, “Scream and you’re dead.” He ordered her downstairs and into the marquee where he handcuffed her and committed rape.

The jury took four hours to consider their verdict and decided unanimously that Hutchinson was guilty on all charges. The man in the dock showed no emotion on hearing the verdict. Mr Justice McNeill told him that he was, “. . . arrogant, manipulative, had a self-centred attitude towards life, and a severe personality disorder which is not amenable to any form of treatment.” He sentenced him to life imprisonment and recommended that he should serve at least eighteen years.

The apparently lenient sentence provoked fierce headlines in the tabloid press. The
Sun
led with, “Only 18 Years! Storm as wedding massacre monster gets soft sentence.” The Chairman of the Police Federation described the sentence as “far too low for the atrocious crimes committed”. One question that was not resolved was Hutchinson’s motive. It was suggested that he acted as he did against a wealthy family because he was an individual who had struggled and achieved very little in his life.

“. . . Beyond Good And Evil”

The “Night Stalker” terrorized Los Angeles in 1985, leaving a trail of rape and murder in his wake. His calling card was a scrawled satanic symbol left at the crime scene, denoting that he was a devil worshipper.

In six months, this man had murdered thirteen times and raped eleven other victims. The killer chose suburban locations
close to main roads and struck at night when his victims were asleep; a modus operandi that earned him the title of “Night Stalker”. He gained entry to apartments through unlocked windows or insecure doors. He countered any possible resistance by killing male occupants before sexually assaulting their female partners.

The stalker’s killing methods were brutal, including, throat-cutting, multiple stabbing, shooting and mutilation. A number of victims survived and told police of a black-clad intruder with a gaunt face and rotten teeth. He frequently made reference to the devil and told one victim to, “Swear upon Satan that you won’t scream for help.”

Fearful citizens began to arm themselves, buying guard-dogs and installing surveillance equipment. Perhaps because of increased security, the “Night Stalker” travelled to San Francisco in August 1985 and continued his killing there. He kept on the move and attacked a woman in her apartment in a small township south of Los Angeles and shot her partner. By a stroke of luck, his assault victim spotted him leaving the area in a rusting orange-coloured Toyota car.

Identification of this car proved to be the undoing of the “Night Stalker”. It was found abandoned and detectives were able to get fingerprints from it. Within hours, the serial killer was identified from police records as twenty-five-year-old Richard Ramirez. Mug-shots of the stalker soon appeared on television screens and in newspaper reports.

On 31 August, Ramirez was spotted by an alert member of the public in a liquor store in a Los Angeles suburb. A hue and cry ensued and the killer was chased through streets and gardens before being overpowered by a construction worker. When the police arrived, Ramirez, fearing for his life, asked them, “Save me before they kill me.” He was arrested and taken away as an angry mob bayed for blood. He also said to the officer who arrested him, “Shoot me, man – kill me. I don’t deserve to live.”

It took four years before the judicial system was ready to put Ramirez on trial. In September 1989, he smirked and sneered at the testimony given by some of his victims. He appeared
before the court showing his palm on which was marked an inverted pentagram, his symbol of devil worship, and, at times, shouting, “Heil Satan”.

On 20 September, Ramirez was found guilty on various counts; thirteen murders and numerous felonies including rape, sodomy and burglary. Before being sentenced, he told the judge, “I am beyond your experience. I am beyond good and evil, legions of the night breed – repeat not the errors of the Night Prowler and show no mercy.” He received twelve death sentences and life sentences of imprisonment of over a hundred years. He joined the other death row inmates in California’s penal system where no death sentence has been carried out for nearly twenty years. Meanwhile, the “Night Stalker” receives offers of marriage from women who admire his sweet nature.

The Diabolical Lovers

A Belgian couple, Peter Uwe Schmitt and Aurore Martin, conspired to murder each other’s spouses and collect the insurance money.