Celebrity Crime

March 4, 2007

More than seven decades after his execution for committing "the crime of the century," Bruno Richard Hauptmann still has his defenders and sympathizers.

by Lona Manning

As Bruno Richard Hauptmann counted down the days to his execution at the State Prison in Trenton, N.J., his wife Anna went on the lecture circuit, asking her fellow German immigrants to donate to the Hauptmann defense fund. Her husband was not guilty of the "Crime of the Century," she pleaded -- he had not kidnapped and murdered the little Lindbergh baby.

Many checks were mailed directly to Hauptmann at the Death House. He realized that the donors who sent only one dollar didn't necessarily believe in his innocence, they wanted him to endorse the check so they could have the autograph of the man condemned for killing the child of the world-famous aviator, Charles Lindbergh.

But he's acquired a host of new supporters in the decades since he died in the electric chair. Conspiracy theories abound about the Lindbergh kidnapping case, and many people unfamiliar with – or dismissive of – the evidence, believe Hauptmann was framed.

April 14, 2003

JonBenet Ramsey

by Ryan Ross

Copyright by Ryan Ross. 2003. All rights reserved.

Related Story: The Murder of JonBenét Ramsey by JJ Maloney and J. Patrick O'Connor

Editor's Note:

On July 9, 2008, Boulder County District Attorney Mary Lacy stated that DNA tests conducted by Bode Technology Group revealed that skin cells left behind on JonBenet Ramsey's long underwear point to a killer other than the girl's parents, John and Patsy Ramsey, or her brother, Burke. Mrs. Ramsey died of ovarian cancer in 2006 at age 49.

"To the extent that we may have contributed in any way to the public perception that you might have been involved in this crime, I am deeply sorry," Lacy wrote in an exoneration letter to John Ramsey, who now has remarried and lives in Michigan. "No innocent person should have to endure such an extensive trial in the court of public opinion."

Early in the investigation into the 6-year-old pageant star's brutal murder on Christmas night in 1996, Lacy said that Boulder police discovered male DNA in a drop of blood on JonBenet's underwear that did not match any members of JonBenet's immediate family. The tests conducted by Bode Technology Group, Lacy said, revealed the same DNA that was found previously in the drop of blood was present in three places on JonBenet's long underwear.

Lacy stated that Boulder investigators now hope they'll eventually find a DNA match in the ever-expanding national DNA databank, a sentiment echoed by John Ramsey. "I think the people that are in charge of the investigation are focused on that, and that gives me a lot of comfort," Mr. Ramsey said in an interview with a Denver TV station. "Certainly we are grateful that they acknowledged that we, based on that, certainly could not have been involved."

Even if a DNA match is eventually made, it does not mean that the DNA from this contaminated crime scene will reveal it to be that of JonBenet's killer, although it possibly could. For now, all that is known, is that it is not the DNA of John, Burke, or the late Patsy Ramsey. In the meantime, the JonBenet case will continue unsolved and will remain one of the most botched crime investigations in the annals of U.S. law enforcement.

It's time for closure. More than six years have passed since JonBenet Ramsey was killed. Most all the evidence is in. The principals have had more than enough time to ponder, scrutinize, and digest. The grand jurors have long since heard, deliberated, and gone home without a peep. The new district attorney isn't up to the job. The media are desperate for a climax — any climax.

The public — misled by assorted media jackals clamoring for microwave justice — pines for a murder trial that will never happen, all but resigned to an O.J.-esque outcome in which there is no closure, and where doubts and suspicions linger as long as memory allows.

Some have moved on. Others will perpetuate the hand wringing about how the system failed.

No one will be satisfied. And the truth will remain buried.

But there is a way out of the morass. The mysterious 1996 killing of beauty queen JonBenet Ramsey of Boulder, Colo., doesn't have to be another O.J. There is still time. The police blunders were not fatal. The right laws are on the Colorado books. Secret statements by prosecutors suggest the evidence is strong. All that's needed now is a strong Colorado governor willing to intervene by appointing a special prosecutor to take over the case.

Even if Gov. Bill Owens does appoint a special prosecutor, getting to the bottom of the mystery is not going to be easy. The key players all bring ample flaws to the table. The process has more potholes than pavement. And given the track record of events since the night JonBenet was killed, more blunders by those responsible for ensuring justice are likely.

But it can happen nonetheless, and it won't take a miracle.

Rubin "Hurricane" Carter

The movie The Hurricane portrays Rubin "Hurricane" Carter as a black man wronged by a racist justice system. But Carter is a fraud and so was the movie, from beginning to end.

by Lona Manning

Most people who know about the Hurricane Carter case only know the Hollywood version presented in the movie starring Denzel Washington. The Hurricane, released in 1999, features crooked, lying, racist cops and frightened witnesses who won't come forward. Carter himself is brash but noble, persecuted his whole life by one obsessed detective who keeps sending him to jail.

The real Rubin Carter and the real Lafayette Grill murder case are nothing like the movie. This movie bills itself as being about hope and redemption. The movie, in terms of Carter and the actual murders at the Lafayette Grill, is a fraud from beginning to end, full of errors, distortions and fictions, large and small. Some events were invented to add dramatic excitement, but most of the distortions and misrepresentations appear to be attempts to place a halo over Carter's head and paint horns and a tail on the police. If this was director Norman Jewison's attempt to right one of the legions of wrongs of a justice system riddled with racism, he picked the wrong case. Once Jewison had made that mistake in judgment, his need to fabricate the truth took over.

Edgar Smith

Edgar Smith, with William F. Buckley Jr. blithely playing his stooge, wrote his way to freedom from the Death House in Trenton State Prison in 1971, becoming the most famous death-row prisoner of his time. Fourteen and-a-half years earlier, Smith -- at age 23 -- had bludgeoned to death 15-year-old Vickie Zielinski in Mahwah, N.J. Less than five years after his release from prison, Smith kidnapped a petite but scrappy young mother who miraculously managed to escape from Smith's car with a knife stuck in her side.

by Lona Manning

Sixty-nine year-old Edgar Smith lives an anonymous existence as one of almost 160,000 inmates in the California penal system. At one time, however, he was the most famous prisoner in the United States. His story begins on the other side of the country and almost half a century ago, in the peaceful town of Mahwah, N.J. In 1957, Smith was sentenced to die in the electric chair for the murder of Vickie Zielinski, a pretty young cheerleader whose savagely bludgeoned body was found in a sandpit. The crime and the trial drew national attention. Smith claimed he was innocent and named another man as the killer, but he was found guilty and sent to the Death House in Trenton State Prison. From his prison cell, Smith managed to stave off execution with a series of appeals, and even wrote a book giving his version of the case. He began to correspond with columnist William F. Buckley Jr., who helped him overturn his conviction and negotiate a plea bargain instead of a second trial. At the time of his release in December 1971, he was the longest-serving prisoner on death row in the United States. 

Smith's successful transition to the world outside the 20-foot walls of Trenton State Prison lasted only as long as his fame. By 1976 he was in California, broke and drinking too much. That's when a woman named Lefteriya Ozbun discovered the real Edgar Smith, and miraculously lived to tell about it.

Sept. 17, 2009 Updated May 8, 2013

Micheal Jackson

The King of Pop could not fall asleep and then he could not wake up. For his role in Michael Jackson's death, Dr. Conrad Murray was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter on November 7, 2011. On November 29, 2011 he was sentenced to four years in prison.

by Don Fulsom

Two days before Michael Jackson’s death on June 25, 2009, the American Association of Nurse Anesthetists warned hospitals to restrict access to Propofol because some doctors and nurses were addicted to the substance.  Mainlining Propofol for recreational reasons is known as “dancing with the white rabbit.”

That phrase derives from the potent liquid’s milky color and its comparison to the hallucinogenic drugs of the 1960s, according to the Wall Street Journal—which says Propofol brings on “a brief but captivating high as the sedation wears off.”  In 1967, Jefferson Airplane recorded a psychedelic Grace Slick song called "White Rabbit,” with references to a character in Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland as metaphors for drug-induced experiences.

Propofol, also known as Diprivan, is a heavy-duty general anesthetic.  It can reportedly make a 10-minute nap feel like you’ve slept a full night.  It is readily available in hospitals, which makes it appealing to certain medical professionals who want to catch 40 winks quickly and effectively during a long shift. That’s called “pronapping.”

July 24, 2005

Marilyn Monroe

Since Marilyn Monroe died in 1962, an unabated stream of books, articles and documentaries have attempted to link her death to then U.S. Atty. Gen. Robert F. Kennedy -- despite the complete lack of any credible evidence.

by Mel Ayton

The purported affair between Marilyn Monroe and Robert Kennedy as well as claims he may have had the actress murdered have once again been resurrected with the publication of Matthew Smith's book Victim (2004) and the 2005 broadcast of the BBC's television series "Secret Map Of Hollywood." Their stories follow on from Donald Wolfe's startling allegations in his 1998 book The Assassination of Marilyn Monroe.

The myth about the RFK/Monroe affair has entered popular culture and has never been seriously questioned. It is accepted my many writers and authors and has been repeated in television documentaries ever since the publication of Anthony Summers' book Goddess in 1986. The possibility that the Kennedys and/or the CIA/Mafia/FBI murdered the actress has also become part of the myth.

Consequently, the American and British publics have become convinced that President Kennedy's brother Robert had a brief affair with the movie actress in the months leading up to her death and may have had a hand in her death.

July 11, 2009 Updated Feb. 23, 2010

Frank Sinatra

Both Nixon and Sinatra had deep ties to the Mafia. It was only natural that after President John Kennedy dumped Sinatra that Ole Blue Eyes hooked up with the biggest politician in the Mob’s pocket. Sinatra hung around with Nixon and Vice President Agnew so much he even acquired a Secret Service code name, “Napoleon.”

by Don Fulsom

John Kennedy banished Frank Sinatra from Camelot when the singer’s Mafia ties clashed with the President’s crackdown on organized crime. But those well-documented ties didn’t keep President Richard Nixon—a big recipient of Mob payoffs—from wooing the popular crooner away from the Democratic Party.

The courtship actually started with Nixon’s unsavory vice president, Spiro Agnew—who first got together with Sinatra during the Thanksgiving holiday in 1970. They enjoyed each other’s company so much that Agnew became a regular houseguest at Frank’s (Palm Springs) place, and made 18 visits in the months that followed. 

 The two men played golf together, dined out, talked through the night in Frank’s den, and on one occasion watched the porn movie Deep Throat together.  Frank’s guest quarters, once remodeled for John F. Kennedy, were eventually renamed “Agnew House,” according to Anthony Summers and Robbyn Swan in Sinatra:  The Life.

August 19, 2009

Ellen Rometsch  

The most potentially damaging woman in the President’s stable of beautiful sex partners was Ellen Rometsch, a 27-year-old pricey Washington hooker and Elizabeth Taylor look-alike. Born in what had become East Germany, Rometsch was also a suspected spy.  If exposed, the Kennedy-Rometsch affair could have become a major national security issue.  For a steep price, J. Edgar Hoover kept the lid on it.

by Don Fulsom

Had the American public known in 1963 what they know now about John F. Kennedy’s scores of sexual escapades, would he have been able to survive in office?  Though he was charismatic and capable, probably not.  Particularly if it were known that one of the President’s girl friends was—as is now reputed—a White House intern.  And even more especially, if it were known that one of his bedmates were a prostitute and a reputed Soviet Bloc spy.

The intern, Mimi Beardsley Alford, then 19 and now 66, is penning a memoir—Once Upon a Secret—that claims she had an affair with President Kennedy from June 1962 to November 1963.

With several other White House staffers as always-willing sex partners, the President never had far to go for a fling.  Aside from Mimi, there were: Pamela Turnure, Jackie Kennedy’s appointments secretary; White House press aide Priscilla Weiss, code named “Fiddle” by the Secret Service; and press aide Jill Cowan, code named “Faddle.”  Jack frequently romped with Fiddle and Faddle—as a nude threesome—in the White House swimming pool.