The Black Dahlia:
A mesmerizing telling of the story that hollywood has sought to hide and bury for decades
Elizabeth Short, an aspiring Hollywood glamour girl with aspirations of fame and success in movie land with a mysterious demise which earned her the name the Black Dahlia She was born in Boston in July 29 1924 and was raised in New England and in Florida. She led a rather difficult childhood. Elizabeth’s mother left in a very difficult situation after the father of the family left the house. However, Elizabeth did not lose hope and she always dreamt that one day she will be stars.
In a year of 1942 Elizabeth received a letter from her estranged father who after the death of his wife was living in Santa Monica, California. At 18 she decided to go back to him in the hope that a new chapter could be turned over in their relationship. However, the two were to reunite but this time around it was extremely sour. As soon Elizabeth could, she left and started a wandering life, from city to city, in search of a place where she would be able to start a career in the time when people were not very forgiving to young women who dared to have aspirations. One of her past was in Florida where she was engaged to a handsome Army Air Force officer Major Matthew Gordon Jr., of this she was engaged even though was killed in a plane crash when the ring was yet to be worn.
Beginning July of 1946, Elizabeth was already in Los Angeles. She was 22 years-old, but she believed in her dreams of stardom which Hollywood could provide her with. Yet she ended up as a waitress and a tenant of a dingy room located at the back of a bar. Many gazed at her beauty, and the passion and intelligence shown by her beautiful appearances, but what made her famous was the mystery of the killing of this beautiful woman.
Elizabeth was murdered and her body mutilated; she was found dead on slow January 15, 1947 in an empty lot around Leimert, Los Angeles. The scene was horrific: her upper was chopped off and disemboweled, the blood was taken out very meticulously, and her body was arranged. Killer had cut a Glasgow smile”” he had slit from the corners of her mouth to her ears. She’s been washed beyond recognition; with her innards folded and stuffed inside her stomach like some special packaging material. The murder spree committed savagely upset the nation, and soon the press christened her the ‘Black Dahlia’.
The local police started a big manhunt and in few months interviewed over 150 likely culprits and left many trails but never caught any of the culprits. This case attracted lots of attention and many newspapers blew up Elizabeth’s life as well as the circumstances that led to her death. Greetings were said about her being an actress who auditioned for America’s Next Top Model but there was no proof of her acting.
Until now, the murder of Black Dahlia was a material for books and favorite films, hundreds of thousands of theories and ornament of thousands of detective-lovers, being one of the most famous still unidentified murders in the United States of America. Even today fans and mystery, cinema, and people who believe that the story of Elizabeth Short telling a dark part of the Hollywood saga come to Los Angeles to solve the mystery, to experience a tragedy that has killed the beautiful woman.
Grand Jury and Aftermath
By the time spring of 1947, the police had not been able to move forward in the investigation to solve the murder of Elizabeth Short, hence the case was closed as cold case. Sherlock Holmes ‘faithful’ companion, Sgt. Finis Brown, one of the detectives, blamed and said that the investigation had come to standstill due to the press, blamed journalists for meddling with details and spreading rumors.
On the 20th of September, 1949, a grand jury sat to look into the ineffectiveness of LAPD ‘s homicide section, whose failure to solve many murder cases, particularly those of women and children, Short was not exceptional. After grand jury, detectives decided to investigate Short’s past once more, trying to establish her movements throughout several states and interrogating people who knew her. But, surprisingly these attempts have not paid any fruitful results in finding any major leads.
Suspects and Confessions
The Black Dahlia story stirred a lot of publicity that brought in a host of confessions and the greater part of them were proven to be bogus. You tube crime dramas The prosecutor was of the opinion that 60 people initially admitted to the killing of Liz whilst, at some point, over 500 people stepped forward, including some who were born after the commission of the crime. Detective Sergeant John P. St. John, who worked on the case throughout his career, said that many people accused their relatives as a murderer.
Ralph Asdel, one of the detectives involved in the case right from the start said that he spoke to the man he was certain was Short’s killer – a man spotted near the abandoned lot where her body was found. Although, this man was trailed to a local restaurant where he works, he was absolved of suspicions that were over him.
It has in the past been suggested that the murderer might have been a number of individuals such as a doctor, Walter Bayley, the publisher of Times, Norman Chandler among others. Croatian born George Hodel who has been posthumously identified as the black Dahlia murderer has continued to receive a lot of attention today, his son Steve Hodel a detective with the LAPD has insisted that his dad was the man responsible. Steve Hodel offered the latter as some sort of proof, citing his father’s medical knowledge among different circumstances; besides, there was a tapped call where George Hodel supposedly admitted to murdering Short.
There are also other suspects like Leslie Dillon and Mark Hansen which have also been mentioned and completely theories on their involvement. Criminalist and authors have linked the work to other horrible crimes such as the Cleveland Torso Murders and the Lipstick Murders for which there is no concrete evidence.
Theories and Potentially Related Crimes – …
Due to the savageness of the murder of Short and the inability to solve it ever, theories has been propagated that it is connected with other unsolved murders of young women of Los Angeles in 1940s. These include the murder of orea elizabeth murray, georgette elise bauerdorf and other women in similar circumstances bURLINGTON DC. Although much attention has been given to investigations and theories on the possibility of association between these cases, no clear evidence shows this correlation.
There are also theories on speculations of correlation between Short’s murder and other criminals such as the Cleveland Torso Murders and the Lipstick Murders in Chicago. Although these theories are existent in crime books, among law officials, these theories have not been proven.
Rumors and Factual Disputes
Due to the enormous interest people had in the case many rumors and contradictory reports regarding Short’s life and death emerged. Some of the details about her include alleged involvement in prostitution, which have been touched in the course of the investigation and discredited. Even the moniker ‘Black Dahlia’ has been an issue of controversy for some people have suggested that the said moniker was one she used during her lifetime while others have said that it was a concoction of the local media.
It is in this regard that many aspects of the case remain unknown while other elements, such as the absence of the killer or killers’ identification and the myths created by the media, is still mysterious to date.
