Carter Roy (5:08)
On the morning of January 15, 1947, Will Fowler, a reporter for the Los Angeles examiner, was driving back to his office with a staff photographer. They'd just finished covering an assignment nearby. Always ready for the next story, Fowler's shortwave radio rested on the dashboard, set to the police channel. Suddenly, the two men heard chatter. The officer on the radio said there was a code 2 between 39th and Coliseum streets. The men knew code 2 meant officers should head to the scene as quickly as possible, without lights or sirens. They usually did this to prevent drawing attention to public intoxication or indecent exposure. Fowler and his co worker rushed to the scene. They were surprised to find they were there before law enforcement. They scanned the vacant lots next to the intersection, expecting to spot someone stumbling around drunk. As Fowler paced outside his vehicle, he noticed something in the grass near the sidewalk. He looked closer and realized it was a woman. She was naked and appeared to be dead. Fowler took a step closer, then stopped in his tracks. The woman wasn't just dead, she'd been cut in half. The woman was so badly mutilated, she was unrecognizable. It looked like someone had beaten her to a pulp, cut her in half at the waist and slashed the corners of her mouth. Then they positioned her body. Her bottom half was carefully aligned with her torso, and her arms were raised above her head, both slightly bent but symmetrical to each other. Fowler and his colleagues got as close to the body as possible, quickly taking notes and photographs. Soon, officers and other reporters swarmed the scene. Amid the chaos, Fowler slipped to a nearby payphone and called his editor, Jim Richardson. He told Richardson everything he knew. Then he and the photographer rushed back to the examiner offices, where the newsroom was already abuzz. They got to work on their breaking story. Meanwhile, Captain Jack Donohoe, the chief of homicide, sent Detective Harry Hanson to the crime scene. Hanson joined the LAPD in 1926 and now in 1947, supervised most homicide investigations in his district. Hanson considered murder scenes to be sacred ground and thought they should be treated as such. This included refraining from touching the body or the area around it. When he arrived at the heavily disturbed crime scene, he was livid, especially when he saw the state of the victim's body. Immediately, Hansen could tell this was an extremely violent murder. Yet whoever left this woman here had posed her intentionally. Based on the level of dismemberment, Hansen knew this was a rage killing. But most rage killers dumped their victims bodies carelessly. Not this one. Hansen's next step was getting a forensic assessment before the crowd of reporters and other officers compromised things further. He called the head of the crime lab, Ray Pinker. Pinker showed up around noon and quickly determined that the victim had been dead for at least 10 hours. He noted the surgical precision of her dismemberment, most notably the clean and even spinal bisection. Based on this detail, Pinker believed that only a trained surgeon could have murdered her. In addition, there were rope marks around her neck and signs of blunt force trauma to her head. It appeared she had been tortured for hours before she died, and not just physically, but psychologically. This next detail is pretty disturbing if you want to skip ahead 15 seconds. As well as the beatings, Pinker found evidence that the killer had forced the woman to eat feces before she died. The only identifying feature he could discern was a small amount of wax the woman had used to conceal her dental cavities. This told investigators that she didn't have a lot of money. With hardly anything to go on, investigators now faced the challenge of identifying the woman who had been labeled Jane Doe. Hansen believed her extensive facial injuries were the killer's way of preventing anyone from recognizing her. It didn't help that her fingerprints were too wrinkled to get an accurate record, Pinker determined that her entire body was immersed in water for an extended period of time at some point before her murder. But there was no other way to ID Her. So Pinker applied some ink to Jane Doe's fingertips and transferred her prints onto a card. But at the time, the LAPD didn't have a way to cross analyze the prints. So Pinker mailed the card to the FBI. Meanwhile, just one hour after Jane Doe's body was taken to the morgue, a special edition of the Los Angeles examiner came hot off the press. It included a front page photo of the crime scene retouched to conceal the gruesome injuries. By the next morning, every paper in the city had the story plastered across their front pages. For the examiner, this was just the beginning. Examiner editor Jim Richardson somehow caught wind that the LAPD had mailed Jane Doe's prints to Washington. On January 16, he contacted Captain Donohoe and said the paper could help. Richardson knew there were snowstorms on the east coast and it would be a while before the FBI received the prints. So he offered to let Donohoe wire a copy of Jane Doe's prints to the FBI using the paper's sound photo machine. This was the newest, fastest way to wire images. Think of it like a fax machine. Donohoe took Richardson up on his offer. Once the FBI received a clear image of the prince, it only took them one hour to identify the victim. Back in 1943, a young woman had been caught drinking underage on an army base just outside Santa Barbara, and her fingerprints were shared with the FBI. When the FBI received Jane Doe's prints from the lapd, they found a match. The victim's name was Elizabeth Short. Detectives tried to keep this under wraps, especially now that they were trying to find Elizabeth's family. The news of her death would be excruciating, and they wanted to handle the matter with care. Unfortunately, examiner reporters were also on the case, and they worked faster than detectives. On January 17th or 18th, just a few days after Elizabeth's body was found, a reporter named Wayne Sutton used Elizabeth's arrest record to learn she was from Medford, Massachusetts. Then he used the Medford information line to get her mother's phone number. Jim Richardson brought Wayne into an office and instructed him to call Elizabeth's mother, Phoebe. But he wanted him to lie to her and say he was calling because Elizabeth had won a beauty pageant. That way, they could get as much information out of her as possible before telling her the truth. It was a disgusting strategy. That completely ignored how traumatic Elizabeth's murder was for her family. It also showed a total lack of respect for Elizabeth, even in death. Elizabeth Short's murder was making waves across the country, but newspapers were referring to her as the Black Dahlia. She got the nickname because of her ink black hair, the all black clothes she wore, and the fact that the film the Blue Dahlia was popular at the time. Even if Phoebe had seen reports of the Black Dahlia murder because of the nickname, she may not have realized the woman in question was her daughter. So when she found out the truth from Wayne, she was in shock. She might have been trying to piece things together out loud because she told him that on January 8, a man her daughter referred to as Red picked her up in San Diego and drove her back to Los Angeles. Richardson wasted no time. He enlisted two reporters to drive south to San Diego. It didn't take long for them to make a game changing Discovery Way to eat a Tea. 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Featuring expert psychological analysis from licensed clinical and forensic psychologist Dr. Tristan Engels, mind of a Serial Killer will take you into their stories like never before. So get ready to uncover what drives someone to commit the unimaginable Mind of a Serial Killer is a crime House Original. New episodes drop every Monday. Just search Mind of a Serial Killer and follow wherever you listen to podcasts. This episode is brought to you by Peacock and the New Original Docuseries. Making Manson in 1969, Charles Manson and his followers committed seven brutal murders in Los Angeles that would make him infamous. Now, with access to over 100 hours of phone recordings between an incarcerated Manson and his closest confidant, a new story will unfold with shocking revelations from the man himself. Making Manson is streaming now only on Peacock. On January 18, 1947, two reporters from the Los Angeles examiner drove from LA to San Diego in pursuit of a man named Red. They'd just gotten a tip that this person knew Elizabeth Short, and they wondered if he was involved in her murder. The reporters stopped at motels along the route, checking the guest registers in case Elizabeth and Red had stopped off at 1. In those days, the police gave some reporters badges from the sheriff's office to help smooth over any scuffles with the law or gain access to restricted crime scenes. And since the examiner reporters had those badges, motel clerks easily handed over their registers. When reporters gave the clerk at the Mecca Motel a description of Elizabeth, he remembered her, but not from January 8th. He recalled Elizabeth coming in with a man back in mid December. Elizabeth Short had checked in with a man named Robert Morris Manley on December 16, 1946, a little over a month before she was killed. To top it off, Manley had provided his home address. The reporters hopped back into their car and raced to Manley's house in San Diego. While they were on the road, their colleagues interviewed some of Elizabeth's acquaintances. That's how they learned she had checked luggage at a bus station. At some point, the examiner contacted Captain Jack Donohoe, the chief of homicide, and told him what they learned. For the most part, they said they would tell him where the luggage was, but only if officers opened the bags in the newsroom so reporters could document everything. Donohoe was indignant, but the luggage could be a huge break. So he caved. Inside, there were some of her clothes, photos of her, and letters from several boyfriends. But the letters were mostly romantic musings. Nothing in them shed new light on Elizabeth's life. Investigators spoke to the men Elizabeth wrote to, but it doesn't seem they learned anything groundbreaking. But maybe the reporters in San Diego would. Later that day, on January 18, the examiner staff arrived at Robert Manley's house. Manley wasn't home, but his wife was. She informed them that her husband was on a business trip and would return the next day. The reporters knew Donohoe would want to know what they'd learned, so they called him up and gave him the rundown, including his address. Then they phoned their colleagues at the examiner. They told them they could name Manley as a suspect in Elizabeth Short's murder. The following day, January 19th, LAPD detectives pulled up to Manley's house in San Diego. He still wasn't back from his business trip, so they waited outside until he returned. Then they ambushed him. Manley maintained his innocence, but agreed to go to the station for questioning. But once Manley was in the interrogation room, he suddenly clammed up. Detective Harry Hanson and Captain Donohoe seemed to think only one person had a shot at getting Manley to tell his side of the story. That person was Aggie Underwood, a reporter for the Los Angeles Herald Express. Not only was Aggee an excellent reporter, but she was a woman. Donohoe figured she could use her feminine charm to coax Manley to talk. Apparently, the idea wasn't as silly as it might sound. Author Donald Wolf wrote that Aggee used a motherly angle to make Manley feel comfortable with her. And it worked. Manley told her everything. He said he met Elizabeth about a month prior when he was in San Diego on business. He was driving around one day when he saw her standing alone on a street corner. He pulled up and asked if he could drive her home. Elizabeth declined, but Manly was persistent and eventually she accepted. They chatted casually in the car, and when they arrived at the house where Elizabeth was staying, he asked her out. When talking to police, Manley was forthright about the fact that he was unfaithful to his wife. Elizabeth said yes, and they hung out a few times after that. But Manley never mentioned if things progressed beyond friendship. However, the fact that they checked into a motel together suggests it was possible. And we do know that on January 8th, Elizabeth asked Manley to take her back to LA. He agreed, and they arrived there on the 9th. He dropped her off at the Biltmore, a luxurious hotel that hosted the Academy awards up until 1943. Elizabeth told Manley she was meeting her sister there. At 6:30pm Manley left and drove back home to San Diego, about two hours away. Elizabeth's body was found on January 15th. According to Manley, between January 9th and 14th, he carried on as usual, working during the day and going home at night. Things went on this way until the cops came knocking, and that was that. Manly was adamant that he didn't kill Elizabeth. Detectives looked into his story, and everything checked out. The hotel staff placed him there on the 9th, and his wife and colleagues corroborated. The next few days. Robert Manley was cleared. Elizabeth's next known sighting was in LA on January 14, just one day before her body was found. LAPD officer Miriel McBride was patrolling the downtown area on foot when Elizabeth came running out of a nearby bar. She was sobbing and looked scared. McBride tried to calm her down. Through tears, the young woman said that one of her former suitors had just threatened to kill her. McBride took Elizabeth back into the bar to find the man, but he was gone. After that, Elizabeth and McBride parted ways. McBride never knew Elizabeth's name until it was on the front page of every newspaper. And no one ever learned who the man was that had scared her so badly. From there, Elizabeth's movements were a mystery. Detectives waited for more information, and sure enough, on January 25, they received key evidence. Someone mailed a suspicious envelope to the examiner. Inside, they found Elizabeth's birth certificate, Social Security card, and an address book with contact information for 75 men. As usual, reporters documented everything before handing the items over to the lapd. The examiner had inserted itself into Elizabeth's investigation from the very beginning. Captain Donohoe had tried to get them to back down, but the reporters were insistent. Plus, they had given his department an important lead with Manley. But the FBI was also involved, and they were growing tired of the examiner tampering with evidence. The reporter's fingerprints were all over the envelope. On top of that, federal investigators suspected officers from the LAPD were leaking information to the press. The contaminated envelope was the last straw for the FBI. After that, the FBI ordered LA authorities to stop giving reporters access to the investigation. It was crazy to think how much damage the examiner and other papers had already done when it came to Elizabeth's case. It's possible the FBI could have put a stop to it if they'd gotten involved earlier. But when it came to the envelope, it didn't matter. In the end, whoever sent the envelope had soaked everything in gasoline, meaning they couldn't ID the fingerprints. However, the COVID of the address book had a name spelled out in gold letters. Mark Hansen. Not to be confused with Detective Harry Hansen, Mark Hansen was a well known LA nightclub owner. He was also good friends with another homicide detective. One day after Elizabeth's body was found, Mark Hansen came into the station to give a statement. He told police that he and Elizabeth were friends. She'd even stayed at his house before. But detectives had no reasonable cause to keep Mark at the station, so they let him go. It's not clear whether the police questioned Mark again after they saw the address book. It's possible his friends on the force protected him. Over the next year, investigators questioned hundreds of potential suspects, including the men listed in the address book, but none were charged. Detective Hanson also tracked down Elizabeth's father, Cleo Short, but didn't get anything useful out of him. In October 1948, over a year since Elizabeth's murder, the LAPD decided to change tactics. Dr. Paul D. River, a psychiatrist consultant to the LAPD, wrote a cover story for the pulp crime magazine True Detective. The article was based on Elizabeth Short's murder, but it wasn't completely factual. De river intentionally baited the killer by describing them as studious and scientific. Not long after, D River received a letter from a reader who knew gruesome details about the murder that hadn't been revealed to the public. D. River and this person wrote back and forth for a while. Over time, he managed to gather enough personal information for the LAPD to determine the reader was a 27 year old man named Leslie Dillon. Detectives started searching for Dylan. They questioned Elizabeth's friends and associates about him. At least one person remembered seeing them together at the Astor Motel in la. The motel had a seedy reputation. The owner, Henry Hoffman, had a history of evading the law. But when they showed up to ask him about Elizabeth and Dylan, he had no problem talking. Little did they know it would topple the entire investigation.
