In 1921, Dr. Richard Brumfield was a dentist with a respectable practice in the small town of Roseburg, Oregon. He had moved there several years before from Chicago where he attended dental school. Prior to his becoming a dentist, he was a school principal in Indiana. With his many years of education and refined […]

. Click Here to Read Part One — Or Click Here to Read All in One with Bibliography The Investigation After Baker left, the two men loosened their ropes and discovered Gaw’s body while searching for a telephone to call police. Detectives and lab supervisors were able to piece together that Gaw’s killer must be […]

  This is part one of a two part story that is 9,500 words long.  A all-in-one post is available here.   Author’s Note: “Texas Jim” Baker was a serial killer who used poison and pistols to murder nine men around the world between 1924 and 1929. After he was captured in February, 1930, for […]

Ed Hagen was a former semi-professional boxer and hero policeman turned bootlegger. He was caught in April of 1919 trying to break into a government liquor warehouse. He was sentenced to two years in McNeil Island Federal Penitentiary. He appealed his sentence but eventually lost and began serving his sentence in March, 1921. The article […]

. Fighting Frederick Hansen “Fighting” Frederick Hansen, first mate on the SS ROLPH,  picked up a crew at Vancouver to haul lumber to Melbourne in 1920. The vessel was owned by James Rolph Jr., the mayor of San Francisco and future governor of California. Hansen had been convicted of killing a seaman in 1917 and […]

  I am really proud [because of its rarity] of today’s mugshot of Lloyd Sampsell, a career bank robber whose amazing escapades spanned three decades. This is the only mugshot of him to known exist on the internet, outside of an FBI wanted circular. From the early 1920s to 1952 Lloyd Sampsell was one of […]

  Roy G. Gardner (January 5, 1884 – January 10, 1940) was once America’s most celebrated outlaw and escaped convict during the Roaring Twenties. During his criminal career, he stole over $350,000 in cash and securities. He also had a $5,000 reward placed on his head three times in less than a year during his […]

. Today’s mug shot belongs to Tulsa bank robber Coney Coffey. Coffey robbed a bank in Tulsa in 1924 and was sentenced to 25 years in prison. While in prison, he contracted tuberculosis. He escaped twice in 1934 by tunneling underneath the tuberculosis wing of the Oklahoma State Penitentiary hospital with 7(?) other prisoners. During […]

. 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 […]

  Originally Titled: “The Crime in Room 406,” by Sgt. Thomas Harvey, as told to Fred H. Thompson, True Detective, Sept. 1930. Want to Read This Story Later On Your Tablet? Download PDF file of The Murder in  Room 406 . “Something terrible has happened over at Hotel Hollis!” These were the words that greeted […]