The ‘Black Dahlia’: Was Elizabeth Short the only victim?
Could such a precise and methodical murder have come from someone with no experience of similar offences?
According to FBI archives it was the early morning of 15 January 1947 when Elizabeth Short’s body was found. Her body was found by a mother and her young child, due to the position of the body the mother initially mistook it for a mannequin.
Elizabeth Short was not identified until the L.A. Police Department requested the help of the FBI. After fifty-six minutes the FBI linked the fingerprints of the victim to their records. She had applied for a job as a clerk at the commissary of the Army’s Camp Cooke in California in January 1943 and was arrested seven months later by Santa Barbara police for underage drinking.
As a result, the FBI had her mug-shot on record and released it to the press, this probably lead to the case being more infamous in popular culture and her face being more recognizable than other victims from similarly prominent cases in popular memory.
Elizabeth Short was dubbed Black Dahlia by the press due to Elizabeth’s fondness for wearing shear black clothes, and the Blue Dahlia movie being released at the time.
The autopsy of Elizabeth Short’s body can be found detailed in full in The Encyclopedia of Unsolved Crimes by Micheal Newton, 2009.
There are two sets of injuries that are important to note; firstly there was a 3in lateral deep laceration from the right corner of the mouth and an opposite 2.5in lateral laceration from the left corner of the mouth. What was important to note about these injuries was the surrounding tissue displayed ecchymosis and bluish discolouring. The presence of bruising due to these injuries would suggest they were ante or peri-mortem, suggesting Elizabeth was still alive when they occurred.
Ecchymosis noun. a discoloration of the skin resulting from bleeding underneath, typically caused by bruising.
Unlike, the mutilation to her face, the blow to the right side of her head was determined to be the cause of her death, evidenced from signs of localised subarachnoid hemorrhage. There was also signs of hemorrhage in her corpus callosum, probably due to the concussive force rebounding in her skull from the impact.
It was quite clear that the blow to the head was used to kill Elizabeth Short but the lacerations to her face were not necessary. In other words; the blow to the head was part of the M.O. but the lacerations were the signature (unless they were intentional to misdirect). The fact she was alive when her face was mutilated would probably indicate a sadistic individual because the victim was alive. As a stretch it might indicate the killer needed her to be alive during this particular mutilation. However, if the blow to the head came before the lacerations to the face, they have in fact been performed as she died or was unconscious.
From this point onward the murderer mutilated the body as evidenced by the lack or little ecchymosis.
The right breast was removed, there was a somewhat strange ‘elliptical’ opening in the skin in the mid portion of the torso. Elizabeth Short’s body was also severed completely with a clean incision below the waist, severing the intestines and the duodenum. Very little ecchymosis was found in the surrounding tissue.
The area surrounding her genitals were also mutilated, an opening “longitudinally from the umbilicus to the supra-pubic regions” (Newton, 2009, p. 39) was found with multiple small lacerations on both sides.
This would certainly indicated a sexual motivation behind the crime, where all these post and perimortem mutilations probably filled sexually deviant fantasy the murderer held. Interestingly, no semen was found vaginally or anally, but her anus was dilated abnormally. This would mean the penetration by foreign object can’t be ruled out, or the murderer was forensically aware.
Alternatively, evidence could have been removed during the extensive clean up of the body. The cleaning of the body and primary crime scene was detailed by the FBI’s request to the FBI’s Laboratory to analyse several bristles.
This is what was noted in the letter:
- The body was thoroughly scrubbed, no blood on it
- The murder was felt to be committed indoors, with access to water and drainage facilities
- There may have been medical equipment present
- The brush was likely used in the clean-up
- They had some medical or dissection training, possibly even a medical student.
Therefore, the body can be determined to have been moved to a secondary location it was found in. As the torso and legs were found together it was not a forensic counter-measure or for transportation. Instead the severing of the body would have served a purpose with meaning to the murderer. As it was posed publicly perhaps it was to shock those who found it.
More than one victim: A serial killer hypothesis
All this could very well point to a lust murderer, most likely serial because of the level of organisation and careful post mortem mutilation of the body. It would also suggest that the killer is older than most medical students. Perhaps, we should find similar cases around the area and time period if this is the case?
This intriguing newspaper article (source unknown) was found via the FBI vault, attached to publicly available documents relating to the Black Dahlia case. It suggests that some law enforcement officers were hopeful about linking Ms. Short’s murder to several other sexually motivated murders.
However, there are some discrepancies between the ‘Modus Operandi’ (M.O.) of this serial killer compared to the killer of Ms. Short.
Law-enforcement believed these killings were related, despite numerous disparities in the victim type (age), M.O., even if they were purposely posed or not. For example, it could be suggested Louise Tueber was purposely staged. Furthermore, reporters often linked murders of a similar nature between 1930–38 to an unknown suspect dubbed the ‘Coast Fiend Killer’.
They also describe him as a sexual sadist who rapes repeatedly, and tortures his victims ante-mortem. This seems quite unlike the aberrant sexual behaviours of the culprit in the Black Dahlia case who mutilated and potentially sexually assaulted Ms. Short after her death. Not to mention some of the murders did not have a secondary location, they were killed where there body was found.
Instead, it is perhaps more pertinent to link solved and unsolved cases that display similar characteristics to that of the black dahlia case. For example, those that appear highly methodological, show mostly post-mortem mutilations with focuses in similar areas, and evidence of sexual activity, the victim being dumped at a secondary location is probably also likely.
If the FBI is correct about the killer having a place which has access to water, drainage and medical equipment it could mean the primary location of the crime is a singular location which offers long, guaranteed privacy, or a fairly large vehicle. This might suggest potentially related murders would be clustered in California.
Although it is possible to make these suggestions, there are a number of key unknowns that make it particularly difficult to ground much of this speculation. Most of which come from there is only one known victim, any patterns that can be extracted may be only representative of this particular event. Conversely, if there are multiple victims it is known that serial killers evolve and change their methods and fantasies as they kill, making it particularly hard to identify potentially related cases. This leads to the point that having too strict a criteria when searching for related cases may result in missing out potentially related cases. Lastly, the ambiguity surrounding the primary location makes it hard to be certain whether similar murders would occur in the same geographical location or follow similar methods of murder.
The Suspects and Theories
The Cleveland Torso Murderer
One such suspect was The Cleveland Torso Murderer, put forward by some of Cleveland’s law enforcement who worked on the case and crime reporters. The Cleveland Torso murders took place between 1934–38 and remain unsolved. However unlike the murder of Elizabeth Short, the Cleveland Torso Murderer’s victims cause of death was often dismemberment or decapitation and the bodily mutilations, particularly the castration of males seemed to be part of the dismemberment process. Furthermore, some of his victims were coated in chemical agents, probably a preservative. This meant the murderer kept the some of the body parts for a period of time unlike Elizabeth Short’s killer.
Despite surface similarities then, the similarity of the cases is quite lacking. Not to mention there is no hard evidence linking the cases.
The Grand Jury Investigation, 1949:
The Madera Tribune, number 55 issued on 7 September 1949 reported on the reconvening of the LA Grand Jury in order to sift through potentially related murders. Highlighting the difficulty the L.A. Police Department faced solving such murders.
They also sifted through the complicated web of suspects in the Black Dahlia case including Leslie Dillon and George Hodel.
Leslie Dillon and Jeff Connors
Leslie Dillon was a formerly employed bellhop at a Los Angeles hotel who was interestingly once an mortician’s assistant. Dillon was said to have somewhat of a morbid imagination and his eager fascination was focused on the Black Dahlia case. Dillon even wrote letters to L.A. Police Department’s Police Psychiatrist Dr. DeRiver, theorising about the case because of his supposed fascination with sadism.
Dillon even mentioned that he thought the killer would have killed Ms. Short in a motel room, as is discussed in length in Black Dahlia, Red Rose by Piu Eatwell, 2017. Some rather damning circumstantial evidence came to light that a somewhat seedy motel, Aster Motel was found to have one of it’s room drenched in blood, witnesses describe the walls, bathroom and bedsheets covered in blood.
It was quite clear that someone had died there, only a mile away from where Elizabeth Short’s body was dumped. Forensic evidence also suggested the presence of blood under the rooms floor tiles by a police chemist in 1949.
Despite the build up of circumstantial evidence relating Leslie Dillon to the murder, he was never charged for the murder. This was partly due to the hasty interrogations of the police psychiatrist who was quite certain he had the right man, this resulted in Dillon suing the police department in 1950. Secondly, Dillon had a number of people come forward to provide Alibis, however they were considered somewhat unreliable.
Lastly, Dillon accused a former acquaintance Jeff Connors of the murder, stating that he knew a man who would be capable of the murder. However, Connors denied his involvement in the murder. Stating Dillon’s attempt to implicate him was “ridiculous”, further suggesting he was “absolutely innocent”.
Interestingly, Dillon stated that Connors gave him inside information about the murder. However, Connors denied involvement and stated that he doesn’t know where Dillon got his information.
The implication being Dillon committed the crime, especially because he provided police with information they kept secret, or he was making it up. On the other hand Connors may be lying.
Despite, being in the same bar as the night Elizabeth Short was murdered, making Connors a prime suspect. He too provided an alibi where he stated he was with a girl friend Dorothy Cahoon the night of Ms. Short’s murder.
Stating that he knew the Black Dahlia “by sight” probably places Connors as the most likely suspect but for Dillon to know this and implicate him is also suspicious.
It is perhaps impossible to tell who could have done it now. Dillon and Connors had a reputation of being somewhat less than reputable. Either one could be lying or they are both involved somehow.
George Hodel
“Supposin’ I did kill the Black Dahlia. They couldn’t prove it now. They can’t talk to my secretary any more because she’s dead.”
Steve Hodel, George Hodel’s son a now retired LAPD Homicide Detective has spent perhaps the last 16 years investigating the Black Dahlia case, under the impression that his father was the killer.
According to Alexis Sobel Fitts writing for The Guardian in 2016, Steve Hodel has not been the only person to accuse their own father was the murderer of Elizabeth Short. Janice Knowlton also accused her own father of the same crime. However unlike Steve Hodel, Janice Knowlton does not have a background in criminal investigation which perhaps put more weight to his claims.
Steve Hodel’s background is not the only aspect that adds more credence to his theory as it dismisses the importance of his investigative work over the years trying to prove George Hodel killed Elizabeth Short.
First it started with discovering a photo of a black haired woman in his father’s belongings. Steve Hodel felt this woman strongly resembled Ms. Short, a sort of light bulb moment starting his investigation into his father’s involvement with the case as a suspect.
Suspiciously, George Hodel’s secretary died of a drug overdose, something a doctor would be able to cover up. It is convenient she died before she could implicate him in the murder as the transcript would suggest. The transcript comes from police surveillance during a period of time in 1950. A summarised copy of the detective notes from the transcript can be found on Steve Hodel’s website.
Furthermore, according to the autopsy report Elizabeth Short’s abdomen was severed through the the intervertebral disk, passing through the second and third lumbar vertebrae. This is the only way to sever a body in half without breaking any bones. It is also something Dr. Hodel was likely to have been taught.
Another piece of evidence was George Hodel’s handwriting which had a strong likelihood to match the letters sent to L.A. Police Department by Elizabeth Short’s supposed killer. Albeit the match was not conclusive. An often linked circumstantial evidence was the presence of a cement bag at the crime scene which was linked to Dr. Hodel contracting cement work to J. A. Konrad. Although, the purchase was made 6 days before Elizabeth Short’s murder there is no evidence to directly link this purchase to the cement bag found at the scene.
Relating to serial killer theories, Steve Hodel goes as far to suggest George Hodel was also the Zodiac killer, and links Dr. Hodel to multiple crimes across California. However, much of this is even more speculation.
The ‘nine’ Black Dahlia type murders
The Madera Tribune’s LA grand jury article piece refers to nine black dahlia type murders which have gone unsolved during the same time period of the Black Dahlia period, at least all of them happening before 1949.
I have done some preliminary research into this and it links to the murder of Jean French with “Fuck you B.D. TEX” scrawled on her body in red lipstick. However, this crime lacked similar features of mutilation other than the extreme beating she suffered. It is also linked potentially to other murders but it has been suggested that B.D. was actually P.D. for police department. In any case there was clearly a lot of difficulty solving crimes that involved the murder of women by strangers. This was either due to the instability after World War 2, police corruption or lack of police experience for investigating stranger murders.
Perhaps an even more somber note to end this on
Due to the time that has passed it is extremely difficult to revive the confusing web of dead ends in this case, suspect after suspect was brought to police attention and they all lead nowhere. Due to the lack of original evidence it is now probably near impossible to break free of that web and examine the murder with fresh eyes.
One of Elizabeth Short’s childhood friend recalled how the press treated the death of Elizabeth, sexualising her and claiming she was a prostitute: “ It was just horrible, the way she was portrayed”. Morbidly it is quite well known the Los Angeles Examiner sold the most papers they ever had, other than when they reported the end of the second world war. Perhaps because of this Elizabeth Short’s murder would become a infamous murder of the ‘Black Dahlia’ in popular culture.
John William
This was my first piece of writing I have done involving true crime. I hope it makes an interesting read.
