. Originally published: “The Mad Butcher of O’Farrell Street,” by Mitchell Chaindown, Front Page Detective, April, 1956. San Francisco, December 25-28, 1955 The sound was a shriek that started high and piercing and ended in a gurgle that was scarcely audible. The man leaped from his bed and ran out into the hallway of the […]

. Originally Published as: “Want to See an Execution?” by Allen Rankin, Front Page Detective, April, 1956. It was a bright moonlight night. I was 22, and, as I cruised out the Wetumpka Highway in the new family car, I clicked on the radio. Kay Kyser was playing Stardust. I had a heavy date—to see […]

  Originally Titled: “Fiendish Plot of the Pistol Packin’ Mama,” by Jack Harrell, Front Page Detective, March, 1944. Note: This full-length feature story lacks clarity in some passages, but if you power through, it all comes together in the end. Wyoming, July, 1934 LIKE MANY ANOTHER successful city businessman, Sewell Combs—”Charlie” to his friends—hankered for […]

  On the morning of April 1, 1935, at 3:55 o’clock, Patrick Murray, a subway conductor on the Brooklyn-Manhattan Transit lines, arrived home from his night’s work. As soon as he entered the hallway of the two-story frame dwelling on Marine Avenue, Brooklyn, he noticed something unusual—the light in the hallway had not been extinguished. […]

  At the bottom of this article is a link to a 1905 newspaper story that is quite long and detailed, but was published before Hoch was executed in 1906.   Article: “Bigamist Blue Beard Johann Otto Hoch: 50 Possible Murdered Wives,” Celebrated Criminal Cases of America, Thomas A Duke, 1910. Johann Hoch was born […]

. July 1, 1934 Jefferson & Jefferson County, Wisconsin Earl Gentry was dead. It looked like he had been “taken for a ride” and polished off with typical gangland efficiency. Not a soul mourned the passing of this self-styled gangster with the itching trigger finger, brass knuckles and concealed stiletto. He had won the sobriquet […]

. Originally Published: “Torture House,” by Detective Lieutenant William Oeltjen, as told to Frederic Lord, True Detective Mysteries, Feb., 1930.   Recently, while in my office in Louisville I was pondering on the dullness of life–in particular, of a detective’s life—when’ a question was put to me by a friend who had dropped in for […]

. It was a happy mother who wheeled Baby Corinne Modell’s perambulator (baby carriage) to the front of the Modell’s Upholstery Store at 116 South Sixtieth Street, Philadelphia, the afternoon of May 5th, 1924. Corinne, ten weeks old had easily won the blue ribbon at a neighborhood baby contest. Admiring neighbors gathered to pay tribute […]

  He boasted of his success as a ladies’ man. “Give me just two weeks with any woman in the world and she will give me the key to her heart,” he flaunted. “After all, I can’t be blamed for marrying all these women. What’s a popular man going to do? I have to please […]

  First Published: “The Corpse in Coffee Creek-Secrets of Ohio’s Tragic Triangle,” by Detective Otto H. Diskowski, Homicide Squad, Cleveland Police Department, as told to R. Rodgers, True Detective Mysteries, May, 1938.  Want to read this story later on your tablet? Download PDF File of The Corpse in Coffee Creek CHARLES SALWAY SLOWLY MADE HIS […]