Though Murder Has No Tongue

Jessen Badal James

Description

The unfortunate victim of a frightened city desperately in need of a scapegoat. Though Murder Has No Tongue tells the story of Frank Dolezal, the only man actually arrested and charged with the infamous "Torso Murders" in Cleveland, Ohio, during the late 1930s. Dolezal, a fifty-two-year-old Slav immigrant, came to the attention of sheriff 's investigators because of his reputation as a strange man who possessed a stockpile of butcher knives. According to rumors, he threatened imagined transgressors and had a penchant for frequenting bars in the seedy neighborhood where the dismembered bodies of victims had been discovered. Dolezal was arrested in July 1939 and never saw freedom again.Convinced that they had captured the "Mad Butcher of Kingsbury Run," sheriff's deputies interrogated Dolezal for two days under harsh conditions. Sheriff Martin O'Donnell called a press conference and announced that the long hoped-for break in the torso killings had finally come: Dolezal had admitted to the January 1936 murder and dismemberment of Flo Polillo, one of the early victims of the Mad Butcher. During the next six days, Dolezal was questioned further, given a lie detector test, beaten, and generally mistreated. Ultimately he was arraigned on firstdegree murder charges that were quickly dropped because he was denied legal representation.At his second arraignment in July, Dolezal was bound over on manslaughter charges. Within a month, he was dead-found hanged in his cell. His mysterious death was ruled a suicide. But was it?In Though Murder Has No Tongue, James Jessen Badal tells a gripping tale of justice gone wrong. It is also a modern story of forensic analysis as compelling as an episode of CSI. Using police and sheriff reports, inquest testimony, autopsy and archival photographs, unpublished notes from the primary investigators, and analyses from some of today's top forensic anthropologists and medical examiners, Badal establishes the facts, dispels rumors, and presents a thorough examination of the real reasons behind Frank Dolezal's mysterious death.

Sujets

• True crime

Informations

• Publié par: The Kent State University Press
• Date de parution: 20 janvier 2014
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781612778839
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 44 Mo

Extrait

Though Murder Has No Tongue † † †

Though M H U a R s D N E o R T th O e lo N st vi G ctim U of E cleveland’s mad butcher † † † James Jessen Badal withanafterwordandappendixbycathleena.cerny,m.d. b l a c k s q u i r r e l b o o k s k e n t, o h i o

BLACKSQUIRRELBOOKS The Black Squirrel Books imprint includes new nonfiction for the general reader as well as re prints of valuable studies of Ohio and its people, including historical writings, literary studies, biographies, and literature.

©2010by The Kent State University Press, Kent, Ohio44242 a l l r i g h t s r e s e r v e d

isbn978-1-60635-062-1 Manufactured in the United States of America

Frontispiece: August24,1939: one of two photographs taken of Frank Dolezal’s corpse lying in a corridor in the county jail. The unknown photographer who snapped this picture obviously had a

better eye for gloomy atmosphere than “crime scene” documentation. Courtesy of the Cuyahoga County Coroner’s Office.

Library of Congress CataloginginPublication Data are available at the Library of Congress.

British Library CataloginginPublication are available.

1413121110

54321

For veteran Cleveland newspaper reporter Doris O’Donnell Beaufait: for her friendship, encouragement, and unswerving devotion to the truth

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For murder, though it have no tongue, will speak With most miraculous organ. —William Shakespeare,Hamlet, act II, scene II, lines521–22.

First principles, Clarice. Simplicity. Read Marcus Aurelius. Of each particular thing ask: what is it in itself? What is its nature? What does he do, this man you seek? —Hannibal Lecter inThe Silence of the Lambs by Thomas Harris

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Preface xi Acknowledgments xv

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Part1: Chaos 1 The Maelstrom3 2The Bricklayer, the Cop, and the Private Eye12 3 History through a Glass Darkly30 4 Violent Death on a Hot Afternoon58

Part2: Revelations 5 An Interlude: Mary Dolezal67 6Behind the Veil74 7 CSI Mercyhurst and Beyond99

Part3: Reckoning 8All in the Family113 9Conspiracy and Coverup126 10Fearful Symmetries and Damning Coincidences132  11Conclusions, Fragments, and Loose Ends164

Epilogue: The Tragic Story of Anna and Joseph Nigrin175 Afterword:GaylordSundheimby Cathleen A. Cerny, M.D.180

Appendix:ChronologyandSummaryofHistoricalDocuments  Regarding Francis Sweeney, M.D.by Cathleen A. Cerny, M.D.193 Bibliography211 Index213