Speaker 1: You're listening to American Shadows, a production of I Heart
Speaker 1: Radio and Grim and Mild from Aaron Manky. Mrs Laughlin
Speaker 1: Smith was heading to bed on the night of March
Speaker 1: nine when she heard some sort of skirmish in the
Speaker 1: apartment next door. Her neighbor, mister Fink, had no family
Speaker 1: and kept to himself. As an older man living alone,
Speaker 1: he often expressed worry over his safety, a concern everyone
Speaker 1: living in their low income housing shared. Like many of
Speaker 1: the others there, he was an immigrant, having come from
Speaker 1: Poland several years earlier. A quiet and reliable, Fink operated
Speaker 1: the local laundromat. He always paid on time, never caused trouble,
Speaker 1: and didn't have visitors, which made the noise, especially late
Speaker 1: at night, highly unusual. Smith listened intently. To her knowledge,
Speaker 1: her neighbor always locked his door even when he was
Speaker 1: home alone, and never opened the windows. When the scuffle
Speaker 1: stopped and the gunshots began, she called the police, certain
Speaker 1: that someone had broken into his apartment. Patrolman capt'n Maine
Speaker 1: responded to the call at ten thirty that night. No
Speaker 1: one answered. When he knocked and called out. He tried
Speaker 1: the door and found it locked, and the windows were
Speaker 1: all shut tight. Even if they had been unlocked, the
Speaker 1: openings were far too small for any adult to pass through.
Speaker 1: Cap'n Bane began to suspect that Fink may have killed himself,
Speaker 1: and by this time the neighbors had come out to
Speaker 1: see what was happening. One noticed the transom window above
Speaker 1: the front door had been broken. Like the other windows,
Speaker 1: the transom was too small for an adult to squeeze through.
Speaker 1: Too small for adults, maybe, but not for one of
Speaker 1: the neighborhood's children. A couple of men hoisted a boy
Speaker 1: up and he climbed through. He quickly ound the key
Speaker 1: on a hook near the door and let Paton Maine
Speaker 1: and the two men inside. In the next room, they
Speaker 1: made the grizzly discovery Fink had been shot three times
Speaker 1: at close range. One of the men mentioned suicide, and
Speaker 1: though that had been Officer Captain Baine's first thought, he
Speaker 1: noticed a glaring problem. He didn't see a gun. He
Speaker 1: also noticed that the iron sitting on the ironing board
Speaker 1: was on, but apparently hadn't been on long enough to
Speaker 1: scorch the shirt Fink had been ironing. Equally unusual was
Speaker 1: that one of the shots had been through Fink's wrist.
Speaker 1: More patrolmen and detectives were summoned, and although they conducted
Speaker 1: a thorough search, no one found a gun. The only
Speaker 1: fingerprints in the apartment belonged to Fink. Nothing had been
Speaker 1: taken either, money in a pocket watch satin plain sight.
Speaker 1: Whoever killed him hadn't done so as part of a robbery.
Speaker 1: They thought that perhaps a local gang had tried to
Speaker 1: extort a small business owner, a common practice at the time,
Speaker 1: but the neighbors couldn't provide any details to solidify their theory.
Speaker 1: In the end, they were left with a dead body,
Speaker 1: no motive, no suspects, no witnesses, and no obvious way
Speaker 1: in or out of the lock department. Armchair criminologists and
Speaker 1: sluts have been trying to solve this locked room mystery
Speaker 1: ever since. After all, appearances and perceptions are often deceiving.
Speaker 1: I'm Lauren Vogelbon. Welcome to American Shadows. The weather in
Speaker 1: New York City was mild in the spring. Of people
Speaker 1: packed the Coney Island boardwalk, and the well off who
Speaker 1: hadn't been hit during the Great Depression sunbathed on Long
Speaker 1: Island speeches. After a long winter summer seemed like it
Speaker 1: was just around the corner. Though things were still tight
Speaker 1: and many families were being in debt, the people took
Speaker 1: time first roll outside, a day in the park, or
Speaker 1: other free activities. By April, baseball was in full swing.
Speaker 1: A young player named Babe Ruth made an impressive first
Speaker 1: appearance with a home run and a single in the
Speaker 1: Boston braves Ford to win over the New York Giants.
Speaker 1: On the radio, your Hit Parade debuted. Think of it
Speaker 1: like a billboard top. Forty listeners everywhere sang along with
Speaker 1: Bing Crosby. Frederick Gross couldn't afford a trip to the
Speaker 1: beach or a baseball game, but he did enjoy sitting
Speaker 1: on the front step of the housing project where he lived,
Speaker 1: listening to music coming from the open windows, and he
Speaker 1: especially liked talking with his neighbors as their kids played nearby.
Speaker 1: Though he had lost part of his leg in an
Speaker 1: auto accident and wore a prosthesis, Frederick never complained, Always
Speaker 1: pleasant and cheerful. His neighbors had grown fond of him
Speaker 1: ever since he and his wife, Katherine had moved there.
Speaker 1: In he had found work as a bookkeeper at an
Speaker 1: importing firm. Katherine had been a telephone operator back in Philadelphia,
Speaker 1: but now took care of the children Freddie Junior, Catherine Junior, Frances, Leo,
Speaker 1: and Barbara. Frederick's mother in law, Olga, also lived with
Speaker 1: them in the cramped apartment. With so many mouths to feed,
Speaker 1: things were more than tight for the family. During the Depression,
Speaker 1: the importing firm Frederick worked for had reduced his salary
Speaker 1: from thirty five dollars a week to just twenty. The
Speaker 1: money wasn't enough to keep him and his wife well
Speaker 1: fed and sheltered, much less five children and another adult.
Speaker 1: Even before the Depression, Frederick's income was barely enough for
Speaker 1: the basics. Now, with his pain nearly halved, that sunk
Speaker 1: far below the poverty line. They had no hot water,
Speaker 1: no light, and no heat. Like many families during the depression,
Speaker 1: they were sinking in debt that would be hard, if
Speaker 1: not impossible, to pay off. And then Catherine announced she
Speaker 1: was pregnant with their sixth child. It meant another mouth
Speaker 1: to feed, much less all the doctor's bills that incur
Speaker 1: The situation would have pushed many people beyond the breaking point,
Speaker 1: but not Frederick. As poor as they were, he remained
Speaker 1: oddly happy. And always had a smile and a kind
Speaker 1: word give. The neighbors noticed that he wasn't like the
Speaker 1: rest of his family. They were less cheerful and often rowdy.
Speaker 1: Frederick seemed more kind hearted and gentle. The neighbors marveled
Speaker 1: at his eternal optimism. At the firm, his personality remained
Speaker 1: equally positive. His coworkers could rely on Frederick. He was
Speaker 1: hard working and pleasant. Everyone knew him and he was
Speaker 1: well liked. Every day Frederick went to work, and each
Speaker 1: week he brought home his easily paycheck without complaint. Twenty
Speaker 1: dollars didn't stretch far, and the family often went without
Speaker 1: much food. The kids were thin, too thin. They all
Speaker 1: were really On one particularly sunny day, Frederick arrived home
Speaker 1: toward that nine year old Freddie isn't well. Kids often
Speaker 1: picked up a bug here or there, and the couple
Speaker 1: figured it was nothing to be concerned over. Frederick lovingly
Speaker 1: scooped his son up into his arms and tucked him
Speaker 1: into bed to recover. Freddie didn't recover is expected, though,
Speaker 1: and the next day he was worse, much worse. He
Speaker 1: seemed thinner, frailer, His eyes appeared dull and listless, his
Speaker 1: hair began to fall out in clumps. Frederick took a
Speaker 1: fitful nap in a chair next to his son's bed.
Speaker 1: He awoke hours later to Freddie's desperate gasps for air.
Speaker 1: By the time the doctor arrived, little Freddie was dead.
Speaker 1: After a thorough examination, the doctor concluded he had died
Speaker 1: from bronchial pneumonia. Just days later, while families enjoyed picnics
Speaker 1: and parks, and Frederick and his family attended Freddie's funeral
Speaker 1: at Saint John Cemetery in Queen's the next day. The
Speaker 1: birds still sang and the sun still shined, but the
Speaker 1: family stayed inside. Morning. They barely had time to begin
Speaker 1: the grieving process, though, because that's when three year old
Speaker 1: Leo fell ill. Frederick kept a close eye on Leo.
Speaker 1: He showed the same symptoms as his older brother, and
Speaker 1: the couple determined had caught whatever Freddie had had. It
Speaker 1: would be hard not to inside their shoe box apartment.
Speaker 1: After a fit of convulsions, Leo died a couple of
Speaker 1: days later. Again, a doctor had been summoned, but arrived
Speaker 1: too late, and just like before, because of death was
Speaker 1: listed as bronch field pneumonia and reported to the Department
Speaker 1: of Health. Catherine Sr. Fell ill next, though she at
Speaker 1: first thought it was just morning sickness, she became so
Speaker 1: ill that the care of the household and children fell
Speaker 1: on Olga and Frederick. Considering the deaths of their two
Speaker 1: children and her pregnancy, she went straight to the hospital.
Speaker 1: It seemed that whatever had killed Freddie and Leo was
Speaker 1: now spreading through the rest of the household. There wasn't
Speaker 1: anywhere to send the remaining children, and quarantining in such
Speaker 1: a tiny space was impossible. All they could do was
Speaker 1: hope for the best. By now, I'm sure you're wondering
Speaker 1: whether something wasn't right. I'm sure illness can spread unpredictably,
Speaker 1: But why wasn't the whole family sick or any of
Speaker 1: the neighbors. Why had the few cases been so severe?
Speaker 1: Was foul play at hand? Here's a wrench. The doctors
Speaker 1: diagnosed Katherine with encephalitis, not bronchial pneumonia. Unlike Freddie and Leo,
Speaker 1: she hadn't lost her hair either. Doctors concluded that the
Speaker 1: two boys might have died from encephalitis instead of pneumonia.
Speaker 1: Encephalitis is an infection that pauses inflammation of the brain
Speaker 1: and can share similar symptoms with the flu. While such
Speaker 1: infections are serious, they aren't always fatal if caught in time.
Speaker 1: While doctors worked to stabilize Mrs Gross, seven year old
Speaker 1: Katherine Jr. Five year old Frank, and eighteen month old
Speaker 1: Barbara fell ill, only Olga and Frederick remained well. Olga's
Speaker 1: other daughter came over to cook for the family. Unable
Speaker 1: to afford to sit her, she brought over her own
Speaker 1: children while attending to her sisters. Oddly, though all the
Speaker 1: children interacted with one another, hers stayed healthy. Frederick's children
Speaker 1: grew steadily worse. They followed the same pattern their siblings
Speaker 1: had fever, convulsions, and hair loss. Months earlier, Katherine Sr.
Speaker 1: Had proudly shown off eighteen month old Barbara's full head
Speaker 1: of gorgeous brown curls. Now the toddler had become completely bald.
Speaker 1: By the month's end, Katherine Junior and little Barbara both died.
Speaker 1: Doctors believed that had encephalitis like their mother. The couple
Speaker 1: had lost four children in a matter of weeks. Then
Speaker 1: Catherine Senior died in the hospital. Once a family of eight,
Speaker 1: only three remained, Frederick, Olga and five year old Frank.
Speaker 1: A day later, Frank collapsed and had to be rushed
Speaker 1: to the hospital, and doctors thought he had chicken pox.
Speaker 1: Not a day later, Olga joined him with similar symptoms,
Speaker 1: and that left just Frederick in the apartment. Neighbors commented
Speaker 1: that things couldn't get much worse for him, but they
Speaker 1: were wrong. As you might imagine, the doctors had grown
Speaker 1: rather suspicious of Frederick had remained completely healthy while everyone
Speaker 1: else got sick or died. Tissue samples from two of
Speaker 1: the deceased children were examined. Doctor Edward Gall had recently
Speaker 1: acquired a spectroscope, an instrument that can identify the chemical
Speaker 1: makeup of a sample by precisely measuring the wavelengths or
Speaker 1: colors of light given off when the sample is heated.
Speaker 1: Different elements give off different colors. In the end, Gall
Speaker 1: determined that the family had been poisoned. I'm sure that's
Speaker 1: not exactly shocking news. Poison was easy to come by.
Speaker 1: It was practically everywhere. Aside from the barbiturous people took
Speaker 1: the handle stress and the poison like alcohol in circulation
Speaker 1: of poisons could be found in many household products. Though
Speaker 1: the consumer safety organization that would become The FDA had
Speaker 1: been around for nineteen years. At that point, it lacked
Speaker 1: meaningful authority in corporate liability was practically non existent, allowing
Speaker 1: dubious materials and anything from cleaners to cosmetics. Wallpaper contained arsenic.
Speaker 1: Cyanide was used in pest control, killing more than just
Speaker 1: mice and insects. It would have been easy for Frederick
Speaker 1: to obtain enough of either to kill his family. The
Speaker 1: police arrested Frederick on suspicion of murdering his wife and
Speaker 1: four children. He denied it, insistent he wouldn't have heard
Speaker 1: any of his family, much less poison them. Authorities remained
Speaker 1: unconvinced and escorted him to the waiting patrol car. Neighbors
Speaker 1: watched and stunned silence. Arsenic was the easiest poison to
Speaker 1: come by and the most commonly used in poison related murders.
Speaker 1: There was a problem, though, After more tests, Dr gall
Speaker 1: noted something unusual, the tell tale green flash of thallium.
Speaker 1: The true it was a poison, and one of the
Speaker 1: deadliest at that but it wasn't easy to come by
Speaker 1: and was more costly than arsenic or cyanide. That left
Speaker 1: one question, how could a poor bookkeeper afford such an
Speaker 1: exotic poison. The New York Times headline became the talk
Speaker 1: of the town. Five killed by rare poison. The district
Speaker 1: attorney ordered two of the deceased children exhumed. Tissue samples
Speaker 1: were sent to Dr. Gall He ran the tests and
Speaker 1: found the same tell tale green flash with the spectroscope.
Speaker 1: It left little doubt that they had died of thallium poisoning.
Speaker 1: Most people had never heard of thallium, much less knew
Speaker 1: how to use it or where to get it. The
Speaker 1: substance is so deadly that even touching it is dangerous.
Speaker 1: The victims experienced nerve damage, hair loss, and a host
Speaker 1: of symptoms suggestive of various diseases and conditions. In some places,
Speaker 1: it's been used as rat poison and ant bait. Before
Speaker 1: its toxicity to humans became widely known, it had been
Speaker 1: used for hair removal. Odorless, colorless, and tasteless, thallium was
Speaker 1: called the poisoner's poison for its slow acting and painful
Speaker 1: manner of death. French chemist Claude August Lammy had been
Speaker 1: the first to voice concerns about thallium in the late
Speaker 1: eighteen seventies. He studied the effects of the compound on
Speaker 1: chickens and ducks. The birds experienced severe weakness, tremors, difficulty breathing,
Speaker 1: and often paralysis. Every bird died within days. Sure afterward,
Speaker 1: Lamby's own health began to fail. Despite his warnings, companies
Speaker 1: continued to use vallium in products. In the nineteen twenties,
Speaker 1: California painted grain with the poison to deal with squirrels.
Speaker 1: While effective, it also killed any animal that ate the
Speaker 1: poisoned squirrels, including foxes, birds of prey, and household pets.
Speaker 1: And the squirrels weren't the only animals eating the grain either.
Speaker 1: Everything from songbirds to livestock died. A large group of
Speaker 1: field workers came upon an unmarked back of the grain
Speaker 1: and cooked it for their supper. Seven died and a
Speaker 1: dozen others were paralyzed. In California banned excuse and nothing.
Speaker 1: Authorities turned up answered how a poor bookkeeper in New
Speaker 1: York had managed to get the poison. For forty eight hours,
Speaker 1: detectives interrogated Frederick. No matter how many times they tried
Speaker 1: to get him to confess, he maintained his innocence. He
Speaker 1: had no idea how his family had come across the poison.
Speaker 1: After days of questioning, and with all but two of
Speaker 1: his family members dead within a month, authorities tossed Frederick
Speaker 1: in a jail cell, still wearing the only good suit
Speaker 1: he owned, a blue one. He still owed seventeen dollars
Speaker 1: on he fell asleep. Exhausted, detectives scoured the apartment. The
Speaker 1: kitchen turned up little in the way of food, except
Speaker 1: for cans of cocoa. Frederick told them that they had
Speaker 1: been living off the coco as a sort of emergency
Speaker 1: staple for months. He admitted that he hadn't drank any
Speaker 1: of it, preferring to give as much as he could
Speaker 1: to his children. His employer imported lots of goods, and
Speaker 1: coco had been one of them. Ultimately, they had decided
Speaker 1: not to add the coco to their distribution list and
Speaker 1: had sold it to their employees for twenty cents a can.
Speaker 1: Frederick had purchased four half pound tins. He said the
Speaker 1: cocoa was sweet and filling and helped supplement their meager
Speaker 1: grocery budget. The detectives were certain had laced the tins
Speaker 1: with thallium, knowing it would kill his family, but why.
Speaker 1: The only motive was how poor they were. The police
Speaker 1: reasoned that Frederick might have thought that if he poisoned
Speaker 1: his family, he'd be a free man, no more hungry
Speaker 1: mouths to feed. But Frederick boggedly insisted he would have
Speaker 1: never hurt his family, no matter how bad things got.
Speaker 1: His demeanor had a few detectives questioning his guilt. They
Speaker 1: still couldn't figure out how he had purchased the poison,
Speaker 1: and they hadn't had an insurance policy to collect on
Speaker 1: since his employer imported so many goods. The search continued there.
Speaker 1: Finally they discovered that the company kept thallium self aiate
Speaker 1: on hand to reduce the warehouse's rat population. They questioned
Speaker 1: the other employees, but no one had anything bad to
Speaker 1: say about Frederick, and no one had seen him mixing
Speaker 1: anything into his hands of cocoa. Police called in tooxychologist
Speaker 1: Alexander Getler, who ran tests on the family's tissue samples
Speaker 1: and the cocoa found in the apartment. He saw a
Speaker 1: flash of green, but further tests showed that it was
Speaker 1: from copper from the tin that had leached into the
Speaker 1: cocoa powder. The case took on a new twist when
Speaker 1: Getler concluded that there was indeed, ballym present in the
Speaker 1: tissue samples, but none in any of the tins of cocoa.
Speaker 1: The police searched the home once more, and this time
Speaker 1: they came up with a surprise. They finally had a
Speaker 1: new suspect. The evidence, it seems, had been written down
Speaker 1: for them. They found several notebooks along with medical books
Speaker 1: on poisons. The handwriting in the notebooks belonged to Katherine sr. Oddly,
Speaker 1: the books were initially dismissed as unimportant. The notebooks may
Speaker 1: have belonged to his wife, but certainly the books had
Speaker 1: to have belonged to Frederick. No mother would do such
Speaker 1: a thing. She had no motive, and she had been
Speaker 1: a victim herself. But after reports from the neighbors began
Speaker 1: to trickle in, the district attorney couldn't ignore the picture
Speaker 1: they painted. A woman who lived two doors down from
Speaker 1: the family signed a statement that she had once had
Speaker 1: an unsettling conversation with Mrs Gross. Catherine Senior had just
Speaker 1: found out she was pregnant and broke down in a
Speaker 1: moment of despair. She had said that she planned to
Speaker 1: kill her own children with rat poison. Shocked, the neighbor
Speaker 1: had asked if she was serious. The neighbor stated she
Speaker 1: had dismissed Catherine Senior's inconsolable reply that the poison she
Speaker 1: had wouldn't let them suffer, that it would be as
Speaker 1: sure and quick death. It sounded so illogical, so heat
Speaker 1: of the moment that the neighbor let it go. Detectives
Speaker 1: poured over Catherine's notebooks and unraveled the truth. She had
Speaker 1: wanted to free her husband from the burden of a
Speaker 1: large family. She hated the idea of her children growing
Speaker 1: up in extreme poverty. If she killed her children, Frederick
Speaker 1: could get back on his feet financially. However, they found
Speaker 1: no evidence indicating Katherine had planned to kill herself, and
Speaker 1: Frederick insisted that he had known his wife for twenty
Speaker 1: years and that she was incapable of harming anyone. The
Speaker 1: bodies of Katherine Junior and Barbara were exhumed along with
Speaker 1: their mother. Tissue samples were taken for further analysis. The
Speaker 1: toxicologist determined that all of the children had died of
Speaker 1: thalium poisoning, but surprisingly, Katherine Senior had not. It turns
Speaker 1: out she really did have encephalitis, but one question remained.
Speaker 1: Katherine Senior was in the hospital by the time eighteen
Speaker 1: month old Barbara and seven year old Katherine Junior got sick.
Speaker 1: How could she have killed them? The samples suggested that
Speaker 1: she had poisoned her children all at the same time.
Speaker 1: The toxicologist offered his thoughts that two girls had and
Speaker 1: given a lower dose and had taken longer to die.
Speaker 1: On My twenty, charges were dismissed against Frederick Gross. Instead
Speaker 1: of going home, he went straight to the hospital to
Speaker 1: see his remaining son and mother in law. He found
Speaker 1: little Frank on the sun porch and burst into tears
Speaker 1: at the side of his child's bald head. Frank simply
Speaker 1: asked his father why he hadn't come to see him.
Speaker 1: Frederick swept his son into his arms and promised he
Speaker 1: wouldn't leave his side again. Reporters flocked to the hospital
Speaker 1: to interview Frederick. He told them he planned to take
Speaker 1: care of his son and mother in law no matter
Speaker 1: what it took. He had no idea how, since he
Speaker 1: had been in jail for nearly a month, but he
Speaker 1: smiled and said he would find a way. It turns
Speaker 1: out he didn't have to. Neighbors weren't the only ones
Speaker 1: who believed in his innocence. The import company had held
Speaker 1: his job for him, which meant there was money in
Speaker 1: his pocket and for the rest of his days. Frederick
Speaker 1: kept his promise. There's more to this story. Stick around
Speaker 1: after this brief sponsor break to hear all about it.
Speaker 1: Right before Christmas, the president of the Knickerbocker Club received
Speaker 1: an unexpected package. Harry Cornish unwrapped the gift, finding a
Speaker 1: blue Tiffany box containing a bottle of Bromo seltzer and
Speaker 1: a silver bottle holder. The holidays were bound to be
Speaker 1: a time of over indulgence, and he tucked the gift away,
Speaker 1: expecting to need the acid producer at some point before
Speaker 1: the celebrations were done. After the New year, Cornish's aunt,
Speaker 1: Catherine Adams, complained of a terrible migraine. Remembering the gift,
Speaker 1: he took the box out of a drawer and promptly
Speaker 1: made her some of the elixir. Adams took a swig
Speaker 1: and collapsed to the floor, gasping for air. Stunned, Cornish
Speaker 1: called for family members. One ran off to fetch the doctor,
Speaker 1: and sadly, the doctor didn't arrive fast enough to save Adams.
Speaker 1: She had just suffered a migraine. The family said she
Speaker 1: had been well before then. The doctor examined the body
Speaker 1: and noted the distinct smell of almonds. He also smelled
Speaker 1: the same aroma from the bottle of elixir should drank
Speaker 1: from suspicious. He called for an autopsy, which confirmed his theory.
Speaker 1: Adams had died from cyanide poisoning. Death by cyanide is
Speaker 1: a nasty way to go. One swallowed, it leaves a
Speaker 1: corrosive trail through the digestive system. It attaches to hemoglobin,
Speaker 1: breaking down the respiration process and causing cell death due
Speaker 1: to oxygen deprivation. The victim convulses violently. The gift had
Speaker 1: been for Cornish, but the sender hadn't left a note.
Speaker 1: Poisonings by mail usually went unsolved. Fortunately, he had stored
Speaker 1: the wrappings along with the gift. Police asked several club
Speaker 1: members if they knew anything about the package. The club's
Speaker 1: secretary instantly recognized the handwriting on the rapper. It belonged
Speaker 1: to thirty one year old Roland Millanieu, who was known
Speaker 1: to have had a dispute with Cornish. It seems the
Speaker 1: two got into a yelling match over Cornish's reluctance to
Speaker 1: remove some of the less prominent members of the club.
Speaker 1: Molaneux had gone so far as to try to turn
Speaker 1: other members against Cornish, even writing to them demanding his expulsion.
Speaker 1: Everyone had ignored the request. The police thought Molanneux was
Speaker 1: an unlikely suspect. He was well educated and an esteemed
Speaker 1: member of society. His father was a famous Civil War hero,
Speaker 1: having supported Ulysses Grant in Richmond and William Sherman during
Speaker 1: his march through Georgia, and sure everyone knew. The younger
Speaker 1: Molaneux suffered tantrums, described as brash and egotistical with a
Speaker 1: superiority complex. His father's fame and good standing had often
Speaker 1: shielded him, and people made con sessions for his behavior
Speaker 1: based on his status unpleasant personality aside, no one thought
Speaker 1: someone like him would stoop to killing anyone over such
Speaker 1: a dispute. However, evidence forced police to reconsider. For one,
Speaker 1: Molaneu did have an account at the elite Tiffany and
Speaker 1: Company's Fifth Avenue store. Paperwork showed that Molineux had made
Speaker 1: a purchase right before Christmas. Tiffany's sold silver bottles just
Speaker 1: like the one Cornish had received. Also, Molaneux worked at
Speaker 1: his family's dye company and had studied chemistry. He would
Speaker 1: be very well educated on the poisons used to make
Speaker 1: richly colored dyes like the mercury, arsenic and cyanide rich
Speaker 1: Prussian blue. The company was located near the post office
Speaker 1: where the package had been mailed, and interviews with other
Speaker 1: club members turned up another disturbing death. Just a month earlier,
Speaker 1: club member Henry Barnett had died unexpectedly in November. Had
Speaker 1: been pursuing a beautiful young woman named Margaret Connell. It
Speaker 1: seems the lovely Margaret had also caught the attention of Molanieux,
Speaker 1: A l cornish Barnett had also received a mysterious package
Speaker 1: containing medicine. He died three days later. With her suitor gone,
Speaker 1: Molaneux stepped in and immediately proposed to Margaret, burying her.
Speaker 1: Three weeks later. Suspecting foul play, police exhumed Barnett's body.
Speaker 1: It's no surprise the autopsy turned up sinide throughout the
Speaker 1: stomach and other organs. Convinced Molaneux had killed two people,
Speaker 1: the justice system brought him to trial in late The
Speaker 1: evidence was damning and the jury returned a guilty verdict.
Speaker 1: Margaret divorced her husband, as you might imagine, and Molaneu
Speaker 1: was sent to Sing Singh to await execution. But his
Speaker 1: father wasn't about to let his son hang, and he
Speaker 1: hired the best lawyers to work on an appeal. On
Speaker 1: August fIF teenth of nineteen o one, the New York
Speaker 1: State Court of Appeals ruled in Molaneu's favor over a
Speaker 1: technicality in the prosecution's closing statement. Determined to not let
Speaker 1: a murderer escape justice, the prosecution tried him again, but
Speaker 1: his father's pockets were deep, and the attorneys got him
Speaker 1: acquitted free once more. Roland Molaneux became obsessed with the
Speaker 1: plight of unjustly convicted men. A few years later, he
Speaker 1: suffered a mental breakdown and was committed to the New
Speaker 1: York State Hospital for the Insane, where he remained for
Speaker 1: the rest of his life. The general feeling from the
Speaker 1: public was that the son was guilty, but the jury
Speaker 1: had exonerated the father. In the end, the only people
Speaker 1: the father and son had managed to deceive were themselves.
Speaker 1: American Shadows as hosted by Lauren Vogelbaum. This episode was
Speaker 1: written by Michelle Uto, researched by Ali Steed and produced
Speaker 1: by Miranda Hawkins and Trevor Young, with executive producers Aaron Mankey,
Speaker 1: Alex Williams, and Matt Frederick. To learn more about the show,
Speaker 1: visit grim and mild dot com. For more podcasts from
Speaker 1: iHeart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or
Speaker 1: wherever you get your podcasts.