. 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 […]

. The Harry Thaw & Stanford White case of 1906 is perhaps one of the most famous cases of the 20th Century in terms of newspaper coverage and books written. The case had all the elements a lasting true crime story requires: high society, famous people, sex, jealousy, and cocaine. The following story was published […]

Summary: Student with poor grades murders one woman, injures two others including his English Tutor. Story 1: “Tucson Youth Goes Wild, Kills Woman,” by Dominic Crolla, Tucson Daily Citizen, May 16, 1964 pages 1 and 6. A bitter argument over his poor marks in English triggered a wild rampage early today by an enraged 16-year-old […]

  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 […]

  There is a great link to an 1896 article from The San Francisco Call about the case at the end of the article. San Francisco, 1896 Joseph Blanther was born in Rankerburg Steirmart, Austria, in 1859. When nineteen years of age he was made a Lieutenant in the Austrian army, and a few months […]

In 1962, Queens County, New Yorker Armando Cossentino, 19, and his 36 year-old lover, Jean Difede, murdered her physician husband, Dr. Joseph Difede in order to collect on his $72,000 life insurance policy. They were arrested not long after and went on trial early that summer. Armando was sentenced to die in the electric chair […]

This is what happens to people who have poor impulse control. John Wolker is a German, fifty-two years of age, and a carpenter by occupation. He is of medium height and rather lean in form. By his first wife he had two children, whom he boarded out in care of a sister prior to his […]

This is Rex Brinlee Jr. He was a Tahlequah, Oklahoma plumber and operator of a night club, called “The Library Club,” in 1971 when he was the chief suspect in the theft of a pick-up truck from a used car-lot. A witness in that case, Don Bolding, of Bristow, was set to testify against him. […]

  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 […]

Matt Rollinger is a Luxemberger, thirty-four years of age, married, three children, and a cabinet-maker by occupation. Boarding at his house was a man whose intimacy with Mrs. Rollinger gave rise to rumors which reached his ears, and finally he became convinced of their truth. One morning after witnessing more than he could withstand, he […]