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- [00:01]
Vanessa Richardson
Hi Crime House community. It's Vanessa Richardson, and if you love digging into the most gripping true crime stories, then you need to listen to another Crime House original Crimes of with Sabrina Deanna Roga and Corinne Vien. Crimes of is a weekly series that explores a new theme each season from Crimes of Paranormal, unsolved murders, mysterious disappearances, and more. Sabrina and Corinne have been covering the true stories behind Hollywood's most iconic horror villains, and this month the they'll be diving into the paranormal. Listen to Crimes of every Tuesday on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music or wherever you listen to podcasts.
- [00:50]
Crime House Announcer
This is Crime House.
- [00:55]
Vanessa Richardson
This week in Crime history. We're looking at two infamous American crimes which starting on November 26, 1899, when Bruno Richard Hauptman was born in Germany. Hauptman would later emigrate to the United States, where he would become known as the man responsible for the Lindbergh baby kidnapping. Then we'll jump forward 64 years to November 24, 1963, when Dallas nightclub owner Jack Ruby fatally shot Lee Harvey Oswald while he was in police custody. Two days earlier, Oswald had been arrested for assassinating President John F. Kennedy. Because of Ruby's actions, the world would never know the truth about Oswald's motivations. Welcome to True Crime this week part of Crime House Daily. I'm Vanessa Richardson. Every Sunday, we'll be revisiting notorious crimes from the coming week in history, from serial killers to mysterious disappearances or murders. Every episode will explore stories that share a common theme. Each week we'll cover two stories, one further in the past and one more rooted in the present. Here at Crime House. We know none of this would be possible without you, our community. Please support us by rating, reviewing and following Crime House Daily wherever you get your podcasts and for ad free and early access to Crime House Daily plus exciting bonus content. Subscribe to Crime House plus on Apple Podcasts. This week's theme is Crimes of the Century. First, we'll start in 1899 with the birth of Bruno Richard Hauptman. After moving to the United States, Hauptman lived in relative obscurity until years later, when he committed one of the most notorious crimes of the 20th century. Then we'll jump ahead to 1963 to one of the most painful chapters in US history, the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in Dallas, Texas. Just hours after the attack, Lee Harvey Oswald was arrested for murder, but he would never face trial for his crime because two days later, local nightclub owner Jack Ruby fatally shot Oswald as he was being escorted by police. The stories behind these sensational cases. Coming up.
- [03:30]
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Julian from Snacks Lab
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- [04:24]
Vanessa Richardson
TikTok for business is helping owners like you reach new customers every day. Head over to get started. Started.TikTok.com TikTok ads. Bruno Richard Hauptman was born on November 26, 1899 in a village near Dresden, Germany. He was the youngest of five siblings and their lives were marked by the chaos that engulfed Europe in the early 20th century. Two of Bruno's brothers were killed in combat during World War I. Bruno was also drafted into the German army and sent to serve on the Western Front, but managed to survive shellings and gas attacks. The war was horrific, but life in post war Germany was no picnic either. The country's economy was in shambles and unemployment was rampant. With no other way to support himself, 20 year old Bruno turned to a life of crime in 1919. He spent the next three years burglarizing homes and robbing people at gunpoint. But in 1922, the law caught up to the 23 year old and he was arrested. Instead of taking responsibility for his crimes, Bruno somehow escaped from jail. When the guard discovered his empty cell, they found a note he'd left. It read Best wishes to the police. By then, Bruno was long gone. He'd fled the country and hopped a boat to America. In November 1923, the 24 year old arrived at Ellis island with forged paperwork and a stolen identity. It wasn't the most honest start to his new life, but after settling down in Queens, New York, it seemed like Bruno wanted to turn over a new leaf. He married a fellow German immigrant and found work as a carpenter. He was well on his way to the American dream. But he hadn't left his old ways behind. In just a few years, he'd get tired of the daily grind and risk it all for one big score. As Bruno Richard Hauptmann was getting established in the United States, another young man was making a name for himself in an emerging industry. Commercial aviation. Charles Lindbergh was the son of a Minnesota congressman and had been obsessed with flying since he was a child. He bided his time and in 1984, 1922, when he was 20 years old, Charles dropped out of engineering school to chase his dreams of becoming a pilot. Then in 1924, he honed his skills as a member of the US Army Air Service and later became an air mail pilot flying deliveries between St. Louis and Chicago. Charles was ambitious, intelligent and very hands on. He was a skilled mechanic who could fix planes just as well as he could fly them. But it wasn't until 1927 that he became a a household name. In 1919, hotel magnate Raymond Orteague announced a $25,000 prize to the first allied pilot who could make a non stop transatlantic flight between New York and Paris. That's a half million dollars in today's money. No one had managed to get it done, though several accomplished pilots had died trying. It was a dangerous journey that pushed the limits of what airplanes at the time were capable of. Weather conditions over the Atlantic could change unexpectedly and because much of the 3,600plus mile journey took place over open ocean, there was nowhere to land if something went wrong. None of that scared off Charles. Based on his experience flying through blizzards between St. Louis and Chicago, Charles believed that a single transatlantic flight would be less hazardous than another winter as an airmail pilot. So with some financial help from A pair of St. Louis businessmen, Charles designed and built his own plane to make the transatlantic journey. Charles figured the key was fuel efficiency. So he did everything he could to make the plane as light and aerodynamic as possible. Every inch of the exterior was sealed with aluminum and fabric to prevent wind drag. And every spare inch of the interior was dedicated to fuel tanks. When the work was done, he named his completed airplane the Spirit of St. Louis in honor of the St. Louis businessman financing his flight. On May 20, 1927, 25 year old Charles took off from an airfield on Long island bound for Paris, France. It was a grueling flight, but it was all worth it. When he landed. He'd proven that international air travel was possible and and he was welcomed as a hero. Over 100,000 Parisians rushed the airfield and a mob of adoring fans pulled him out of the cockpit and carried him around on their shoulders in celebration. From that moment on, Charles Lindbergh became one of the most famous people in the world. He met with leaders from all over Europe and when he returned to the US he was honored with a parade in New York City. In addition to the cash prize, he received several awards, including the first ever Distinguished Flying Cross from President Calvin Coolidge. Charles also published a book which became a bestseller and went on to receive the Pulitzer Prize. But even with all his success, Charles still craved adventure and he used his newfound fortune to fly around the world and promote the aviation industry. In December 1927, his travels took him to Mexico where he visited the home of the US ambassador. The ambassador's daughter, 21 year old Anne Morrow, happened to be home from college at the time. She and Charles hit it off and started dating two years later, in May 1929. They got married when Charles was 27 and Anne was 23. For a time they were known as the first couple of flight. Their days were spent meeting with prominent global leaders and making public appearances. But the newlyweds didn't want to be celebrities forever. They wanted a normal, quiet life. Most of all, they wanted to start a family. That's why they settled down in a country mansion outside of Hopewell, New Jersey in early 1930. Just a few months later, they welcomed their first child, Charles Jr. Charles Lindbergh had fame, fortune and a beautiful family. But in just a few years, his domestic bliss would be shattered by tragedy. On March 1, 1932, at around 10pm Charles Jr. S nurse entered the baby's room on the second floor of the Lindbergh home. She was shocked to discover that the 20 month old was missing from his crib. There were traces of mud on the floor, the window was open and a rickety handmade ladder was leaning up against the exterior of the house. The nurse rushed over to the window window and found a ransom note. The note, which was full of spelling mistakes, demanded $50,000 for Charles Jr's safe return which would be over 1 million in today's money. The author promised to send instructions on how to pay in the next few days. The nurse immediately notified Charles and Anne who called the police and began frantically searching their 390 acre property. Before long, the authorities arrived and joined the search. But the Only clues they found were a few difficult to identify footprints underneath the nursery window. Detectives dusted the ladder for fingerprints and found none. Clearly the kidnapper had thought ahead and worn gloves. They also questioned and investigated all the members of the Lindbergh's house staff but none raised any suspicions. As news of the kidnapping spread, hundreds of reporters and curious onlookers swarmed the grounds of the Lindbergh estate. By the time police were able to regain control of the crime scene, the intruders had trampled over any additional evidence. This was the first of many complications that the Lindbergh's celebrity status would bring to the case in the days to come. The kidnapping would become a new nationwide obsession. President Herbert Hoover was briefed on the crime and law enforcement officials offered a $25,000 reward for information leading to Charles Jr's safe return. Although the Lindberghs were more than willing to pay the $50,000 ransom, they offered the same amount to anyone who came forward to return their son. In the week after the kidnapping, the kidnapper sent three more letters to the Lindberghs. First, they increased the ransom to $70,000 as punishment for getting the police involved. That's over one and a half million in today's money. And second, they wanted the Lindberghs to find an intermediary to communicate through. According to the kidnapper, the negotiator had to be someone random and therefore impartial. Thanks to all the publicity the case had generated, plenty of strangers were vying for the role. One of those people was 72 year old Dr. John Condon. He took it upon himself to publish an ad in his local paper, the Bronx Home News. The retired principal addressed the ad to the kidnapper and offered to pay an additional $1,000 if they agreed to negotiate through him. On March 9, Condon got a response. The kidnapper was willing to work with him. With Charles Blessing, Condon began a theatrical back and forth involving coded messages printed in local paper and notes delivered via taxi drivers and hidden under rocks in random locations until finally, on March 12, Condon and the kidnapper met in person at New York's Woodlawn Cemetery. Condon paid close attention to the man who called himself John. He later described John as tall, with a high forehead, large ears and a pointed chin. During this meeting, John agreed to provide proof that he really had Charles Jr. A few days later, Condon received a delivery at his apartment. The pajamas Charles Jr. Was wearing when he was kidnapped. Once they knew the kidnapper or kidnappers really had Charles Jr. The Lindberghs gave Condon $70,000 worth of gold certificates to pay the ransom. At that time, gold certificates were a popular form of paper currency which could be used at stores like regular cash or redeemed at a bank for their face value in gold. Before handing these certificates over to Condon, the police carefully noted the serial numbers on every one of them so they could spot them if they turned up in circulation. Later, on the evening of April 2, 1932, Dr. Condon met up with a mysterious new John in a city park to hand over the ransom. Once John had the bag of gold certificates, he handed Condon a final note, then turned and walked away into the thicket of trees at the edge of the park. According to the note, Charles Jr. Was aboard a boat called the Nelly somewhere near Martha's Vineyard in Massachusetts. Police rushed to Martha's Vineyard and began searching the waters all around the island for any sign of the Nelly. The but the boat wasn't there. And despite Condon and the Lindbergh's many attempts to restart negotiations, they never heard from the kidnapper again. They'd been fooled. But the biggest tragedy was still to come. More than a month later, on May 12, 1932, a truck driver stopped to go to the bathroom in the woods a few miles from the Lindbergh's property and made a horrible discovery. 45ft from the road, he spotted the decomposing body of an infant partially buried among the trees. When police arrived, they identified the body as Charles Jr. His skull had been crushed, and the county coroner later determined that the baby had been dead for roughly two months. A day later, the President authorized FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover to take command of the investigation. They hadn't been able to save Charles Jr. But they were determined to make his killer pay for what they'd done.
- [17:25]
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- [17:30]
Vanessa Richardson
Literally.
- [17:31]
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- [17:37]
Vanessa Richardson
Excuse to stay in.
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Vanessa Richardson
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- [17:56]
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- [18:28]
Vanessa Richardson
In March 1932, Charles Lindbergh's infant son was kidnapped. Two months later, the boy was found dead a few miles away from Charles Mansion. In the wake of this shocking discovery, the authorities shifted their investigation. They were no longer looking for Charles Lindbergh Jr. They were on the hunt for his killer. Police repeatedly met with Dr. John Condon, the man who'd been negotiating on the Lindbergh's behalf and the only person who'd met the kidnapper face to face. Detectives showed Condon hundreds of mugshots, hoping he could identify one of them as the kidnapper. Unfortunately, none of them were a match for the man calling himself John. And in the end, the authorities had Condon work with a sketch artist to render an image of the kidnapper's face, depicting his high forehead, large ears and pointed chin. FBI analysts and handwriting experts also examined the 13 ransom notes that had been sent. They were riddled with spelling and grammatical errors. Based on the kidnapper's strange syntax and spelling choices, investigators agreed that the author was most likely a native German speaker. For example, in multiple letters, the kidnapper spelled good as gut, which is the German spelling. Investigators also took a close look at the wooden ladder that was used to enter Charles Jr's nursery in. It was rickety with oddly spaced rungs. To detectives, this indicated it had been handmade by someone with experience as a woodworker or carpenter. Slowly but surely, detectives were getting an idea of their suspect, someone in the German immigrant community who knew how to work with their hands. It was a promising start, but in a place like New York City with tens of thousands of German immigrants, and this didn't exactly narrow things down. It would take another two years and a whole lot of detective work until there was a break in the case. And it didn't come from Condon's description or the wooden ladder. It would come from following a money trail. When Condon had met with John for the second and final time, he delivered the ransom payment, a bag of gold certificates with serial numbers on them. The FBI printed thousands of pamphlets listing these numbers, which they distributed to cashiers everywhere. Currency changed hands. Places like banks, post offices, department stores, telegraph companies, gas stations, and more. For two years, nothing turned up, possibly because the kidnapper was waiting for the heat to die down before they started spending their money. But in the summer of 1934, they started to get sloppy. Beginning on August 20, shopkeepers in New York City began Alerting police that the flagged gold certificates had shown up in their cash registers. Detectives tracked the locations of each of these certificates on a big map of the city. They found they were all being spent in businesses close to the Lexington Avenue subway line, which ran through the heavily German American neighborhood of Yorkville. On September 18, 1934, a bank teller on Park Avenue contacted the FBI to let them know that a $10 gold certificate from the ransom had turned up in a deposit from a local gas station. Detectives rushed over to the gas station and spoke to the staff. One attendant remembered receiving the $10 certificate a few days earlier. He thought it was strange that someone would pay for gas with a gold certificate, so he made note of the customer's license plate number and appearance. When he gave his description of the man who'd handed him the bill, it perfectly matched Dr. Condon's description of John. Detectives immediately ran the license plate number the attendant had written down. The car John had been driving was registered to 35 year old Bruno Richard Hauptman, who lived at 1279 East 222nd street in the Bronx. It had taken more than two years, but the authorities finally had a suspect in their sights. Police and FBI agents staked out Bruno Hauptman's tidy white two story house all night, waiting for him to show his face. Finally, on the morning of September 19, Bruno emerged. Police rushed out of their hiding places and arrested him. And as soon as they searched him, their suspicions were confirmed. Bruno was carrying a 20 gold certificate from the ransom payment in his wallet. Bruno was taken to jail and investigators began looking through his house and questioning his wife. She maintained he was innocent, but couldn't explain why. Dr. John Condon's phone number and address were scribbled on a door frame near the telephone. And when police searched the house's detached garage, they found even more damning evidence. $13,000 dollars in gold certificates from the ransom, much of it hidden in an empty gas can. Investigators were never able to find the rest of the ransom money, but suspected that Bruno had either spent it or shared it with one or more unidentified accomplices. Within hours of his arrest, the case against Bruno Hauptman was already strong. And it only got stronger a few months later when he went to trial. Bruno's murder trial began on January 3, 1935 in New Jersey. Prosecutors hinged their argument on the gold certificates found in his house. However, there was other circumstantial evidence tying him to the crime, too. Multiple handwriting experts testified that samples of Bruno's penmanship matched the ransom notes. The lumber used to make the homemade ladder perfectly matched wooden floorboards taken from Bruno's attic. And Bruno's employment history raised questions as well. Bruno had worked as a carpenter for nine years, ever since his arrival in the US in 1923. But shortly after the Lindbergh's Ransom was delivered in April 1932, Bruno quit his job and began investing heavily in the stock market. The defense didn't address these claims directly. Instead, they tried to place the blame elsewhere. Bruno's Lawyer insisted the $13,000 in gold certificates belonged to Bruno's friend and former business partner, Isidore Fish. Apparently, Isidore had left the money with the Hauptmanns in 1933, then returned home to Germany, where he died in 1934. Unsurprisingly, this story fell apart under cross examination. Prosecutors brought in Isidore's family from Germany to testify that he was too sick with tuberculosis to commit a kidnapping in 1932 and had died nearly penniless. On February 13, 1935, Bruno was found guilty of the first degree murder of Charles Augustus Lindbergh Jr. And sentenced to death by electric chair. Bruno maintained his innocence until his execution on April 3, 1936, even turning down an offer to have his death sentence commuted to life in prison in exchange for a confession. For Charles and Anne Lindbergh, it was a bittersweet ending to an incredibly painful chapter. Although Bruno Hauptman never admitted to killing Charles Jr. The Lindberghs remained convinced that he was responsible. And they didn't let his actions destroy them. They went on to have five more children and continued to honor Charles Jr. For the rest of their lives. Coming up, another historic crime that left the public begging for answers.
- [26:47]
Ryan Reynolds
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- [27:07]
Vanessa Richardson
Yeah.
- [27:07]
Ryan Reynolds
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- [27:11]
Vanessa Richardson
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- [27:16]
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- [28:23]
Crime House Announcer
If you're a fan of true crime, horror or creepy encounters, you've got to listen to Disturbed True Horror Stories. Each episode shares the terrifying experiences of real people retold by professional actors.
- [28:37]
Vanessa Richardson
I bit down on his hand and he pulled back, but he pushed the knife a little harder against my sweatshirt. I began to hear the breathing and growling of what could only come from a monster.
- [28:46]
Crime House Announcer
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- [28:56]
Vanessa Richardson
Sixty four years after the man who killed Charles Lindbergh Jr. Was born, another notorious murderer was unveiled. But this criminal wasn't entering the world. He was taking his last breath and leaving an enduring mystery in his wake. On November 24, 1963, America was paralyzed by shock and grief. Just two days earlier, President John F. Kennedy had been killed by a sniper as his motorcade traveled through downtown Dallas, Texas. In the hours after the shooting, police arrested a suspect, 24 year old Marine veteran Lee Harvey Oswald. Ever since his arrest, Oswald had been locked up at Dallas police headquarters. Due to the immense public interest in the case, police decided to move Oswald to a more secure facility at the county jail. At 11:20am several officers escorted the handcuffed suspect through the basement of the police station to a waiting armored car. The basement was packed with reporters all jostling to get a look at the mysterious assassin. One journalist called out and asked Oswald if he shot the President. Oswald responded, I'm just a patsy. Moments later, a man in a black jacket burst out of the crowd clutching a.38 revolver. He was a local nightclub owner named Jack Ruby, and he was about to make history. Ruby lunged at Oswald and fired a single shot, hitting his target in the stomach. Then chaos ensued. Oswald slumped to the ground, bleeding. Reporters dove for cover and police tackled the shooter, Lee Harvey Oswald was pronounced dead an hour and a half later. All the world could do now was look back on his life and try to understand how he'd become one of the most notorious criminals of the 20th century. Lee Harvey Oswald was born on October 18, 1939 in New Orleans. His father died before he was born and his mother Marguerite struggled to care for him and his two brothers. When they were still young, she sent the three boys to an orphanage for several years. Years. Eventually though, she remarried and moved to Dallas. That's when she brought the boys home. It's also when Oswald first developed a reputation as a loner. Oswald was an average student and got along well enough with his classmates. But when he had the choice, he preferred to be alone. And he had plenty of opportunities for solitude. His mother and stepfather worked long hours and there weren't many other kids kids in his neighborhood. So Oswald spent most of his free time reading. At the age of 15, he first encountered Marxist literature at his local library. For Oswald, this was the beginning of a lifelong fascination with the struggle for equality. In the years to come. Oswald had an affinity for two different political organizations based on Marxist principles. The Socialist Party of America and the American Communist Party. But activism didn't pay the bills. So when he turned 17 in 1956, Oswald quit school and joined the Marines. Oswald trained as an aircraft mechanic but was known as a gifted sharpshooter. And much like in high school, he kept to himself. Oswald rarely hung out with his fellow Marines and spent weekends reading by himself or visiting family. But even though he kept people at arms length, everybody knew he was interested in communism. He listened to Russian music and sprinkled Russian words and phrases into his conversations. This love of communism at the height of the Cold War may have made Oswald unpopular. He was court martialed twice for getting into fights with superior officers. By 1959, he'd soured on the Marines and applied for a discharge. Claiming that he needed to take care of his ailing mother in Fort Worth, Texas. He left the military in September of that year. But Oswald didn't go to Fort Worth. One month later, on October 16, 19 year old Oswald turned up in Moscow, the capital of the Soviet Union. Almost as soon as he arrived, he told his government appointed tour guide the real reason for his trip. He wanted to become a Soviet citizen and live under Communism. An American defecting to the Soviet Union was huge news on both sides of the Atlantic and a shock to Oswald's family back home. The Soviet government saw this as a major propaganda victory and rewarded Oswald with a Rent from free apartment and a job at a radio factory. At first, Oswald loved life in the ussr. He became more outgoing than he'd ever been in the United States and made friends. He also started dating a 19 year old Russian woman named Marina, who He married in 1961 when he was 21. But life under communism wasn't everything Oswald had hoped for. Every everything was a struggle. Despite working long hours he barely made enough money to get by. And despite lots of practice, he never became fluent in Russian. He felt lonely, isolated and homesick. So In May of 1962, after months of haggling with Soviet and U.S. officials, Oswald was finally granted permission to return to America with his his wife and their newborn baby girl. Although he hadn't enjoyed his time in the Soviet Union, the experience didn't put Oswald off communism. Instead he set his sights on another communist nation. One that was a little closer to home. After his return from the Soviet Union, Oswald, Marina and their daughter settled in his hometown of Dallas. But Oswald had a hard time transitioning back to life in America. He bounced between a few different jobs, repeatedly getting fired for rude and aggressive behavior. He tried to write a book about life in the Soviet Union but eventually abandoned the project. And he grew obsessed with Cuba which he saw as a communist country that might offer a better quality of life than he'd had in the Soviet Union. Oswald's continued continued support for communism made him a fish out of water in Dallas, a conservative city with a strong anti communist culture. One of Dallas's most outspoken opponents of Communism was Edwin Walker, a former U.S. army general. Walker had been forced out of the military for publicly accusing Eleanor Roosevelt and former President Harry Truman of having communist sympathies as well as destroy distributing right wing pamphlets to his troops. And though his beliefs were too radical for the military, they made him very popular with conspiracy oriented fringe groups like the John Birch Society. He was known for giving fiery speeches where he denounced the civil rights movement as a communist plot and called for the assassination of Cuban leader Fidel Castro. As it happened, Walker lived just a few minutes away from Oswald in the Dallas suburbs. And in early 1963, as Oswald's career stagnated and his resentments grew, he decided that the best thing he could do for the communist cause was to silence General Walker permanently. In March of 1963, Oswald bought a 6.5 millimeter Carcano brand rifle and scope from a mail order catalog as well as a 38 caliber pistol. Although he didn't tell Marina what he was planning to use, the weapons for he did pose for a picture carrying the rifle, which would later become infamous. Over the next few weeks, Oswald repeatedly traveled to Walker's neighborhood to formulate his plan. He explored the alley behind Walker's house and found a hiding spot beside a picket fence that gave him an unobstructed view into Walker's study. On the night of April 10, 1963, Oswald left a note for Marina instructing her to contact the Soviet embassy in case he was arrested. Then he packed up his rifle and took a bus to walker's house. Around 9pm Oswald crept into Walker's alley and took up a position at the vantage point he'd found. He could see Walker sitting at the desk in his house, filling out some paperwork. Oswald lined up a shot through the scope of his rifle and squeezed the trigger. The bullet crashed through the window and buried itself in the wall of the study, missing Walker's head by about an inch. Walker dove for cover, then grabbed a pistol and went charging into the alley to confront his attacker. But by the time he got there, Oswald was long gone. He stashed his rifle in a nearby rail yard, then doubled back and hopped on a bus back to his house. Walker reported the assassination attempt to the police, but investigators were unable to figure out who the shooter was. When he got home, Oswald told Marina what he'd done. Marina was relieved he'd managed to escape, but she was not pleased. She made him promise not to try to something like that again. Oswald made that promise, but he wouldn't keep it. And the next time he took a shot at someone, he wouldn't miss.
- [38:58]
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- [39:25]
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- [39:56]
Vanessa Richardson
Ever since he was a teenager, Lee Harvey Oswald had been obsessed with communism. After a short stint in the Marines, he defected to the Soviet Union but returned to the US less than three years later. In 1962. With his Russian wife Marina living in Dallas, Oswald struggled to find work and still retained his communist sympathies. Then in the spring of 1963, he tried to assassinate local anti communist firebrand Edwin Walker. Immediately after his botched assassination attempted, Oswald fled Dallas and spent a few months alone in his birthplace of New Orleans. He spent most of his time there looking for work, filing unemployment claims and engaging in pro Cuba activism. At one point he even told his wife he was considering hijacking a plane to get to Havana. But she managed to talk him out of it instead. In late September, oswald took a 20 hour bus trip to Mexico City where he went to the Cuban Embassy and tried to get an entry visa. But the trip was a bust. Staff at the Cuban Embassy refused to give him a visa and the meeting devolved into a heated argument. Oswald returned to Dallas the following day rejected and angry he didn't get a warm reception when he got home. Marina, who was pregnant with their second child, was still angry at Oswald for trying to kill Edwin Walker, not to mention his months long absence. She refused to let him into the house. So Oswald stayed in cheap rooms at the YMCA and local boarding houses. However, Oswald did manage to finally get a job. On October 16, the 23 year old started work at the Texas School Book Depository, packing boxes full of textbooks for $1.25 an hour. The next month of Oswald's life is a mystery. But it's fair to say that he wasn't in a good headspace and it was just a matter of time until he did something reckless. President John F. Kennedy arrived in Dallas on the evening of November 21st with plans to give a speech at a luncheon for local business leaders the following day. On November 22, Kennedy, his wife Jackie, Texas Governor John Connally and Connally's wife Nellie got into an open topped black limousine for the drive to the speech. As the motorcade made its way through Dallas's Dealey Plaza, gunshots rang out. The first shot passed through President Kennedy's neck causing him to jerk forward. The bullet continued onward and struck Governor Connally who sat in front of Kennedy. The second shot shattered the President's skull. Realizing that something was very wrong, the Secret Service agent driving the limousine stepped on the gas and sped out of the plaza as Jackie Kennedy screamed. Clutching her husband's body in the bloody backseat, the motorcade rushed to nearby Parkland Memorial Hospital where the nation's 35th president was pronounced dead. Governor Connally was treated for a wound to his true shoulder, but ultimately survived. Meanwhile, back at Dealey Plaza, police and Secret Service agents had already begun the hunt for the assassin when the shots were fired. Bystanders in Dealey Plaza looked towards the sound of the gunfire and spotted a slender young white man with a rifle in one of the six story windows of the Texas School Book Depository, which was right nearby. Multiple people passed this description along to the police. Armed with this information, the authorities rushed into the building and began climbing the stairs to the sixth floor. On the second floor, roughly 90 seconds after the shooting, they encountered Lee Harvey Oswald standing by some vending machines. They briefly questioned him at gunpoint, but Oswald seemed calm and unbothered. When the officer learned that Oswald was an employee at the Depository, they let him go and continued up the stairs to the sixth floor. Immediately after his encounter with the police, Oswald was spotted walking out of the building drinking a Coke. He left the schoolbook depository at 12:33pm Three minutes after Kennedy was assassinated and four minutes before police locked down the the building. Nearly an hour later, police discovered Oswald's Carcano rifle on the sixth floor, hidden behind several boxes of books. But by then, Oswald was long gone. Oswald took a bus and a taxi back to his boarding house in Dallas's Oak Cliff neighborhood. He arrived around 1pm and rushed upstairs to his bedroom. Three or four minutes later he ran back out, then started walking briskly up the street. Minutes after Kennedy's shooting, the police had broadcast the sniper's description to officers all over town. A tall, slender white man, approximately 30 years old. One of the officers who heard that description was 39 year old J.D. tippett, an 11 year veteran of the Dallas Police Department. As he drove down a residential street in Oak Cliff, he spotted Oswald on the sidewalk and noticed that he matched the description of the assassin. Tippet pulled up beside Oswald and called him over to his squad car. Oswald approached the passenger side of the vehicle and the two men exchanged a few words through the open window. Then Tippet got out of the car and began walking towards Oswald. As Tippit rounded the front of his car, Oswald pulled his.38 caliber revolver from his jacket and shot the officer four times in the chest, killing him on the spot. Oswald ran for eight blocks as police sirens blared from all over the neighborhood. Panicked, he spotted a nearby movie theater and rushed inside without buying a ticket. The woman taking tickets saw this and was immediately suspicious. She'd heard about Tippet's shooting on the radio. And knew the police were looking for his killer, so she picked up the phone and called them. Minutes later, a swarm of officers entered the theater and had the projectionist turn up the house lights. There were only a handful of people in the theater and officers spotted Oswald sitting alone in the back row, looking antsy. When they approached him, Oswald said, well, it's all over now, and punched the closest officer in the face. He tried to draw his gun, but several other officers tackled him to the ground, wrestled the pistol away and put him in handcuffs. Half an hour later, Oswald was in custody when a police captain returned from the Schoolbook Depository with a new lead in the hunt for President Kennedy's killer. He told the other officers that one of the employees had been absent when they questioned everybody. His name was Lee Harvey Oswald. One of the officers who'd arrested Oswald pointed in the direction of the jail cells and said, we'll save you a trip. There he sits. Over the next two days, Oswald was questioned by Dallas police, the FBI and the Secret Service. He denied killing President Kennedy. He denied shooting Officer Tippit. He denied owning the rifle that had been used to kill President Kennedy. He was evasive, uncooperative and told many easily disproven lies. After around 12 hours of interrogation, the authorities had more complex questions than answers. They didn't know why Oswald had killed the President, if he'd had any accomplices, or whether an organization or foreign government had put him up to it. All they knew was the police station was a bad place to keep such a high profile prisoner. The building was surrounded by as many as 800 reporters at all times and police had received multiple calls from angel angry Texans threatening to kill the man who'd shot the President. So on the morning of November 24, detectives escorted Oswald through the basement of the police station to take him to the county jail. That's when Jack Ruby burst out of a crowd of reporters and shot Oswald. When he went on trial, Ruby claimed he was so grief stricken over Kennedy's killing that he experienced a psychotic break that led him to shoot Oswald as an unconscious reflex. The jury didn't believe this and he was found guilty of murder in 1964. Ruby appealed his case, but died of cancer in prison three years later in 1967. In the decades since Kennedy's assassination, the world has has tried to make sense of Oswald's actions. And there are a lot of conspiracy theories out there. Many believe that Oswald wasn't the real shooter, that he was just a fall guy taking the heat for a killing orchestrated by the Mafia, the Russians, or the CIA. Others think Jack Ruby killed him so he wouldn't reveal the truth. There's a lot we'll probably never know. But the closest, closest thing we have to the truth is the US government's 888 page report on the killing called the Warren Commission. According to that, Oswald was an unhappy loner whose life hadn't turned out the way he wanted it to. So he did what many infamous Americans do he reached for a gun. Looking back at this week in crime history, we can see why some crimes live on in the public consciousness. After the murder of Charles Lindbergh Jr. The search for his killer kept the country glued to their radios. Unanswered questions about Lee Harvey Oswald's role in the Kennedy assassination have ensured that it remains a hot topic more than a half century later. It just goes to show that the the most crucial ingredient in making something the crime of the century is a few missing puzzle pieces to keep the public guessing. Thanks so much for listening. I'm Vanessa Richardson and this is True Crime this week part of Crime House Daily. Crime House Daily is a Crime House original Powered by Pave Studios. At Crime House, we want to express our gratitude to you, our community, for making this possible. Please support us by rating, reviewing and following Crime House Daily. Wherever you get your podcasts, your feedback truly matters. And for ad free and early access to Crime House Daily plus exciting bonus content, subscribe to Crime House plus on Apple Podcasts. We'll be back next Sunday. True Crime this week is hosted by me, Vanessa Richardson, and is a Crime House original powered by Pave Studios. This episode was brought to life by the True Crime this Week Team Max Cutler, Ron Shapiro, Alex Benedon, Natalie Pertzovsky, Rachel Engelman, Lori Martin Marinelli, Sarah Camp, Truman Capps, Leah Roche, Spencer Howard and Michael Langsner. Thank you for listening.
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Vanessa Richardson
Looking for your next Crime House listen? Don't miss Crimes of with Sabrina Diana Roga and Corinne Vien. Crimes of is a weekly series that explores a new theme each season from Crimes of the Paranormal, unsolved murders, mysterious disappearances, and more. Their first season is Crimes of Infamy, the true stories behind Hollywood's most iconic horror villains. And coming up next is Crimes of Paranormal Real life cases where the line between the living and dead gets seriously blurry. Listen to Crimes of every Tuesday on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you listen to podcasts.