The Mammoth Book of Celebrity Murders
Read The Mammoth Book of Celebrity Murders Online
Authors: Chris Ellis
The Mammoth Book of
Murder
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Constable & Robinson Ltd
3 The Lanchesters
162 Fulham Palace Road
London W6 9ER
www.constablerobinson.com
First published in the UK by Robinson,
an imprint of Constable & Robinson Ltd 2005
Copyright © Chris Ellis and Julie Ellis 2005
All right reserved. This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out or otherwise circulated in any form
of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
A copy of the British Library Cataloguing in Publication data is available from the British Library.
ISBN 1-84529-154-9
eISBN 978-1-78033-409-7
Printed and bound in the EU
1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2
Drama at Ford’s Theatre – President Abraham Lincoln
The Stunt that Went Wrong – John Landis
From Manhattan Millionaire to US Manhunt – Robert Durst
In the Family – Marvin Gay v Marvin Gaye
The Death of a Goddess – Marilyn Monroe
The IRA Bomb – Earl Louis Mountbatten
Beauty and the Beast – Dominique Dunne
I Have a Dream – Dr Martin Luther King
The Killing of a Gangster Rap Star – Tupac Shakur
A Callous Roadside Shooting – Ennis Cosby
Sweater Girl in a Tight Spot – Lana Turner
The Mullholland Murder – Christian Brando
The Swinging Twenties – William Desmond Taylor
The Silent Movie Legend – Ramon Novarro
The Intriguing Lucan Case – Lord Lucan
Mark David Chapman – The Murder of John Lennon
Helter Skelter – Charles Manson & The Family
The Millionaire’s Mysterious Murder – Harry Oakes
Media Circus – The Murder of Nicole Brown-Simpson and Ron Goldman
Barry George, prisoner FF5227 – Jill Dando
The Girl on the Red Velvet Swing – Stanford White
No Time for Another Comeback – Sal Mineo
Another Conspiracy – Robert Kennedy
The Farcical Trial of the Funny Fatman – Roscoe Arbuckle
The Life and Death of a Rascal – Carl Switzer
When Life Comes Crashing Down – Charles Lindbergh
The world of the celebrity would appear to be a complex one. Never short on material wealth or the trappings of success, the celebrity leads a busy, often nomadic lifestyle,
travelling, socializing and of course making the money that allows them to maintain their star status. Celebrity is a tag shared by an ever-increasing range of people. The stars of film, television
and sport are now joined by those men and women famous for being the offspring of those in the first category. There are those who are famous for being rich, whose entrepreneurial skills have made
them household names. And there is a more recent addition to this exclusive club, the “it” girl, famous for being seen in all the right places, with all the right people but without any
other generally required qualification. Yet once we, the watching and reading public, get to know someone, we want to continue our media-driven relationship with them.
They are generally familiar to the public, either through newspaper commentary, the television or the gossip magazines. So if they commit a crime or are the victim of one, we tend to feel it as
though it was a member of our own family. The shock value comes from the perception that they have so much more to lose, therefore their lives and lifestyles are more worthy of protection. When O.
J. Simpson was arrested for the murder of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown-Simpson, the world held its breath while this famous football player had his day in court, watched by millions of television
viewers around the world. At times the evidence seemed overwhelming, yet Simpson was exonerated and many people wondered at the way justice had been dispensed in the cosmic glow of his celebrity,
enriched further by the glare of unprecedented publicity.
Within these pages you will find many tales of celebrities who have been accused of murder, but who have walked free, and tales of famous people who have been murdered, often resulting in the
perpetrator becoming more famous than the victim. Typical of this scenario is the murder of Sharon Tate and her house guests by members of the Charles Manson gang. Since his imprisonment more than
thirty years ago Charles Manson has become a cult figure, more infamous than most Hollywood A-listers are famous. He still receives more mail than any other convict in the US penal system.
Mark Chapman sought to find his own place in the history books when he gunned down John Lennon outside the Dakota Building in New York City. Hated by millions for an act that deprived the world
of a musical genius, Chapman’s name is synonymous with premeditated celebrity murder, geared to ensuring one’s own notoriety.
Yet there are other anomalies associated with celebrity crime, beyond the celebrities’ ability to buy the best justice. When a celebrity is murdered the Establishment appear to make
additional efforts to catch the criminal, thus proving their additional worth in society. When popular television presenter Jill Dando was shot outside her London home, the police authority
attached fifty officers to the investigation and a reward of
£
250,000 was offered for information leading to an arrest.
The media play a significant part in maintaining the public’s interest in the lives of the rich and famous, often running stories day after day, affording the case in question significant
advance trial publicity. The advance publicity can be good or bad depending on the spin the media wishes to give it. In many cases the presiding judge has had to enforce a media-gagging order to
help ensure the trial is carried out without the pressure of media prejudices.
The media can be a force for good one minute and fickle the next. Following the conviction of Barry George for the slaying of Jill Dando, the press, having doubts about the legality of the
conviction, sought to present new information in a bid to reopen the case. George remains in prison still hoping for a retrial. However, when gangster rapper Tupac Shakur was gunned down in a
drive-by shooting in Las Vegas, the headlines told a different story. No longer prepared to use the power of the press to secure a conviction, they sought instead to simply draw the public’s
attention to the drug-cultured gang warfare that existed on the mean streets of America’s many cities.
The system of law which prevails in most democratic countries exists in order to provide a fair means of establishing guilt or innocence and a method by which punishment can be consistently and
fairly dispensed. Yet there are many cases here which would suggest there is one rule for the celebrity and another for faceless millions. The inconsistencies are there to be seen – some say
they are coincidental, others that they prove a two-tier system is in operation.
Wherever you find the opposing worlds of celebrity and murder meshed together, you will find the breeding ground of the conspiracy theory. The death of JFK sparked rumours that it was the Mafia,
the Cuban dictator, Fidel Castro, Lyndon Johnson, the Vice President, or even all of them. To many John Lennon was killed by the CIA, to silence him and prevent him from bad-mouthing the government
in respect of its various foreign policies.
Whatever the truth about celebrities, their murderers and their crimes, we the public are drawn to them more than we are to any other type of crime. At the time of writing, Michael Jackson, the
most famous of the Jackson Five, is entrenched in a California court case, over allegations of his relationship with various minors. The world’s attention is focused heavily on this story;
both the press and the television media provide a day-by-day, sometimes hour-by-hour comment on the progress of this trial. Too late for this volume, Phil Spector, the musical maestro who helped
create the sound of the Beatles, is being held pending his trial for the murder of Lana Clarkson. Robert Blake, the actor who played the 1970s detective Baretta, is presently on trial for the
murder of his wife. It is the type of mass coverage that these people would normally dream of, yet delivered within the context of what must seem like the nightmare scenario.
We are yet to see if the celebrity status these people hold will be of benefit to them in a court of law; many believe it will. The press will continue to provide detailed coverage and the
public will continue to absorb as much detail as they can. It is difficult to conclude anything other than that the combined effect of celebrity and the reports filed by the media have a
significant impact upon the outcome of some if not all such trials.
Ann Eden
The year of 1874 was to prove life changing for the Woodward family and all of its many descendants. Mr James T. Woodward took the decision to join the board of directors at
the Hanover National Bank, which, after numerous aquisitions and mergers is now famously known as JP Morgan Chase. After two years of diligent work James was elected president, a position in which
he excelled, keeping him busy for the next 34 years. His nephew, William Woodward, ascended to the grand role after his long-serving uncle finally stood down.