0:03

I'm Kate Winkler Dawson. I'm a journalist

0:06

who's spent the last twenty five years writing

0:08

about true crime.

0:10

And I'm Paul Holles, a retired cold case

0:12

investigator who's works some of America's most

0:14

complicated cases and solve them.

0:16

Each week, I present Paul with

0:18

one of history's most.

0:20

Compelling true crimes, and I weigh

0:22

in using modern forensic techniques to bring

0:24

new insights to old mysteries.

0:26

Together, using our individual

0:28

expertise, we're examining

0:30

historical true crime cases through a twenty

0:33

first century lens.

0:34

Some are solved and some are cold, very

0:37

cold.

0:38

This is buried Bones.

1:01

Hey, Paul, Hey Kate, how are you doing.

1:04

I'm doing well. Second episode.

1:06

I know I didn't scare you off. I'm

1:10

still here. You are still accepting

1:12

of me. In my babble, I

1:14

was crossing my fingers and here you are. Thank goodness.

1:17

Yes, nope, this is a good,

1:19

good thing we're doing. I'm loving it.

1:21

So.

1:22

You know.

1:22

One of the things that I think you and I bond

1:25

over is our love

1:27

of books and love of writing

1:29

books, even though I think it is

1:31

painful for both of us in really

1:34

different ways. And one thing I want to celebrate

1:36

right now is your status as

1:38

a New York Times bestselling

1:41

author, which if you were even

1:43

remotely a jerk, I would say

1:46

I'm so jealous of But I'm so proud

1:48

of you for that success.

1:49

It's really remarkable.

1:51

Well, thank you very much.

1:52

You know, when I was first notified of that, I

1:55

truly didn't know what to make of it, you

1:57

know, because I don't pay much attention.

1:59

It's just like, well, I know that's a good thing.

2:01

But my agents are like screaming

2:04

up and down, hey you got

2:06

this. So no, I'm

2:09

very thankful that the book has

2:11

been well accepted by the readers

2:14

and that the message within the book

2:16

is.

2:16

Getting out there.

2:17

I do love how unaware

2:19

you are of these types of things, because when I saw your

2:21

name on the list, I think it was the second week, and I texted

2:24

you and I said, Paul, you're on the list. And you said

2:26

yes, and you said, I have no idea what that means.

2:29

You said that's a good thing, and I said, yes, that's a good thing.

2:32

It is a good thing. Well, and you've got

2:34

a book as well.

2:36

I have a book coming out in just a few weeks

2:38

that I'm really excited about. It's called All

2:40

That Is Wicked, and it's based on

2:43

the first season of tenfold More

2:45

Wicked, which is my baby. It was the first show

2:47

that I did and it's been a

2:49

labor of love for me. I don't know how you feel

2:52

about books, but for

2:54

me, when a book of mine comes out, this is

2:56

my third book, it's like the amount of

2:58

time you spend on them having a

3:00

child and then inviting the world

3:03

to judge your child on a scale of

3:05

one to five, right if it's based

3:07

on attractiveness or intelligence.

3:09

But it's really really difficult.

3:11

Did you have any insecurities when

3:13

your book came out?

3:15

Oh?

3:15

I was so nervous, you know, because

3:17

with my book, like you said, it is a long, hard

3:20

process from beginning to finally

3:22

getting the book published. First it's

3:24

are people going to like the

3:26

material that's contained within the book?

3:29

But that I really exposed myself as a

3:31

person in the book, and you know, I'm private.

3:33

That was what I was really uncomfortable

3:35

with.

3:36

But then I accepted, you know, in

3:39

order to really get that

3:42

message of working

3:44

these cases and how it impacts

3:46

me as a person and other professionals

3:48

as individuals. It was worth

3:50

it and everybody that I've talked to have

3:52

been very gracious in saying,

3:55

hey, really appreciate you opening up.

3:57

So that has been surprised.

4:00

You know, I thought, oh god, you know, everybody would

4:02

have had a perception of me before reading the book,

4:04

and then after reading the book is like, oh god, I don't

4:06

really like this Paul Holes guy.

4:08

You know, so impossible.

4:11

No, please, Well, I think you and

4:13

I tackle these projects from

4:15

opposite ends of the spectrum, because you know, your

4:17

book Unmasked, it's you on a page,

4:19

It is everything about you.

4:21

It feels really unedited.

4:23

It feels like you've just been willing

4:25

to spill everything out. And I

4:27

struggle in my books because I

4:29

can't insert my personality very

4:32

much in a book about history. Which is why

4:34

I love podcasts, and that's why I love chatting

4:36

with you.

4:37

Is I really like people.

4:38

To know who I am, and my life

4:40

is frankly, just not that interesting enough

4:43

to run a memore.

4:44

So I am a little jealous. I didn't think I was jealous.

4:46

I am a little jealous of you.

4:47

Then, well, but I think you know with what you're

4:50

doing, It's like I've tried to write

4:52

creative fiction before, and then I'm

4:54

nervous to give that to somebody

4:57

else out of fear they're going to judge

4:59

me. So I imagine, and that's what you experience

5:01

with your books creative fiction.

5:03

I love that. I will say.

5:05

The case that we're going to talk about in just a bit

5:07

is a case from my second

5:10

book. It never made it into the book, but it's from the forensic

5:12

scientist Oscar Heinrich.

5:13

You and I've talked about him, and I'm not saying.

5:15

This is you, Paul Hols, but Oscar

5:17

Heinrich knew everything about

5:19

all forensics, everything, and he tried his

5:22

hand at writing fiction

5:24

and it was possibly the worst

5:27

fiction I've read.

5:29

Mine probably would be on that level

5:31

as well.

5:32

Yeah, now I now have very

5:34

very low standards for what I considered to

5:36

be decent fiction from a forensic

5:39

guy, because it was a very low.

5:41

Bar for it was not good.

5:43

Well, like I would say, in reflecting

5:45

upon my writing experience, most of my

5:48

career has been writing analytical reports

5:51

and case supplements, and then to get

5:53

into something that is more

5:55

in the creative world. You know,

5:57

it's not so factually driven,

5:59

but there is a use of words

6:02

and painting a picture and doing things

6:04

that I've never done in the past. I think there's

6:06

an aptitude and innate aptitude that many

6:08

writers have, but it is also a learned skill

6:10

set. So I'm at the very beginning of learning

6:13

that skill set.

6:14

Well, you're brave. It's a brave new world.

6:15

So my book is out October fourth, and it's terrifying

6:18

to think about that coming up. But I'm

6:20

so proud of tenfold more wicket

6:23

and of course wicked words in this show too. But that

6:25

first season, people ask me what my favorite

6:27

season is because we're now going into like season

6:30

seven, and.

6:31

That first season.

6:32

You never forget your first and that was my

6:35

first season.

6:36

I love that season.

6:37

And this book is Edward Ruloff chained

6:39

to the floor of a jail and all

6:41

of these men coming in and being able to

6:44

hopefully figure out why this man was

6:46

brilliant and a killer at the same time. And what it

6:48

tells us now, you know, we thought the real mind

6:50

hunters were from the nineteen seventies with the

6:52

FBI's Behavioral Science Unit, and it really

6:54

was these men one hundred years earlier.

6:56

So it's exciting. I love talking about

6:58

the criminal.

6:59

Mind the eighteen hundreds, and I certainly

7:01

love talking about it with you.

7:03

That's part of the fun of what we're doing

7:05

together is showing that

7:07

where we are at today with criminal

7:10

investigations and forensic science, Well,

7:12

it's based on the foundations that were

7:14

laid by those that

7:17

came before me, before us,

7:19

two hundred years ago.

7:20

Well, this story is an Oscar Heinrich

7:22

mystery. So let's go ahead and set the scene.

7:27

So this case really

7:29

haunted Oscar Heinrich. It

7:31

was sort of at the height of his career in nineteen

7:34

thirty and it's the hallmarks

7:36

of everything that he really enjoyed as a forensic

7:38

scientist. It's sort of a glamorous person

7:41

at the center of it. Many many suspects,

7:43

a lot of wacky, weird forensics,

7:46

and he loved a good mystery. So

7:49

as we unfold this, maybe you'll enjoy trying

7:51

to help me out with this mystery too.

7:53

I'm here with bated breath. Let

7:55

me hear it.

7:57

Okay, So, Oscar Heinrich loved

7:59

keeping all sorts of evidence

8:01

that was probably pretty inappropriate for him to keep.

8:04

It probably should have been in a police locker

8:06

room somewhere. Did you ever do that

8:08

you hear about these old detectives

8:11

and who really killed Jack the Rippers

8:13

in somebody's basement. Did you ever

8:16

squirrel away evidence on a particular

8:18

case that maybe you weren't allowed to do that?

8:20

No, you know, my generation, the

8:23

chain of custody was much more rigid.

8:25

It would be very tough to squirrel

8:28

away evidence without somebody

8:30

noticing that there's.

8:31

Been a break in the chain.

8:32

I actually repatriated some evidence

8:35

back to our property room from

8:37

a nineteen seventy homicide that

8:40

I found tucked away. A previous kriminist

8:42

had squirreled away a box of evidence and

8:44

he ended up becoming sick and passing away

8:46

before he ever got around to returning

8:49

it. And then when I start digging

8:51

back into that nineteen seventy homicide

8:53

years later, that evidence that I had sent

8:55

to property had been destroyed. So

8:57

in some ways, if I had just sat on it,

9:00

it would have been available.

9:01

Would have been safer. Yeah.

9:02

So Oscar Heinrich had the most random

9:04

stuff in his archive, and they found

9:07

all sorts of things from the Fatty Arbuckle

9:09

case, the supposed victim of Virginia Repee.

9:12

There was a chunk of her hair.

9:13

There were all sorts of things, including three

9:15

fully loaded guns, and the UC

9:18

Berkeley police had to come and remove

9:20

the firing pin. So I

9:23

want to show you a piece of evidence that I

9:25

find to be interesting because I like seeing

9:28

things from the victims. For me, that's

9:30

a good way to set the scene. So

9:32

this is something that I found in his archive

9:34

about this case. So this is the

9:36

murder of Dorothy Moremeister,

9:39

and this was a lockett that he

9:41

found around her neck, and

9:43

it was a very violent scene

9:46

when he went to the scene, and this was a lockett

9:48

with somebody's hair. We don't know who, but Dorothy

9:51

Moremeister has a very complicated

9:53

life, and I think that

9:55

she had some complicated relationships.

9:58

So I wanted to just start with that lockett

10:00

to show that she clearly cared about somebody

10:03

other than herself, because much

10:05

of this story is that she

10:07

had some issues with relationships, and so I

10:10

think it's important to frame the story that

10:12

this is someone who was caring

10:14

of other people.

10:15

For me, it's always neat to see

10:18

in these old cases evidence

10:20

or items that reflect

10:23

the time period. So now looking

10:25

at the container obviously has a

10:27

rustic look to it, but what

10:29

struck me was the hair

10:32

inside of it. The individual strands

10:34

of hair look like they have some thickness to them.

10:36

Just does not look like hair that has come from

10:39

an infant, like sometimes what happens

10:41

the first haircut.

10:43

There's length to it. It's hard to

10:45

say how logs.

10:46

I can't tell the size of this container,

10:48

but this hair, this is at least

10:50

a I would say, a child who's got a

10:52

more mature set of hair, and it could be from

10:55

an adult.

10:55

Yeah.

10:56

From an investigator standpoint, I'm looking

10:58

at that going, okay, was.

10:59

This a boyfriend?

11:01

Yeah?

11:01

Is somebody we don't know about that

11:03

could have had motive or somebody close

11:06

to him, maybe a wife or girlfriend that could

11:08

have had motive, you know, So this is

11:10

evidence in the case. Also, what

11:12

strikes me is this is a color photograph. This

11:14

is not black and white.

11:16

This was a photograph indicating that

11:18

this item of evidence had been kept

11:20

and then photoed decades later.

11:22

Well, actually, Paul, this was available

11:25

to me.

11:25

I took this photo. So this was

11:28

something that he kept. I picked

11:30

this thing up. It's about the size of your thumb. So

11:32

this was sizable for her to wear around

11:34

her neck. So this was somebody who meant something.

11:36

She didn't have any biological children.

11:38

She had a stepdaughter who was probably too

11:40

old for her to be too sentimental about.

11:43

But I agree with you, this could easily be

11:45

a child's hair. But my big point is

11:47

for sure that this was someone who

11:49

wasn't always thinking about herself, although as

11:52

we get into the story, it sort of feels like she

11:54

was thinking about herself a lot.

11:55

Okay, So let me tell you a little bit

11:57

about Dorothy.

11:58

So, Dorothy Mooremi was thirty

12:00

two years old, so she's young, and

12:03

her husband, Frank, was a very prominent

12:05

and wealthy physician in Salt

12:07

Lake City, Utah, and on

12:09

the surface, seemed like a happy couple, like a lot

12:11

of people present. Right, But let's talk

12:14

about the time period. So this is Salt

12:16

Lake City during Prohibition in nineteen

12:18

thirty and also the Great Depression.

12:20

It was a big double whammy.

12:21

I write an awful lot about this time period,

12:23

the intersection between Prohibition and

12:25

the Great Depression. It was a rise

12:27

in crime, it was a rise in organized

12:29

crime. Certainly, Utah economically

12:32

was one of the hardest hit states. The

12:35

unemployment in Utah was at almost

12:37

forty percent. Oh wow, forty

12:39

percent unemployment. Can you imagine?

12:42

That's crazy?

12:43

Man? You're saying Salt Lake City

12:45

and prohibition. Back then, I imagine

12:48

it still was a very Mormon dominated

12:50

city. So how big

12:53

was the loss of alcohol to this community.

12:56

I think probably not big.

12:57

And what ended up happening was, even though it was for

13:00

thirty percent unapployment,

13:02

they were still doing better than much of the

13:04

country. And so there were people coming

13:06

to Utah looking for jobs and

13:08

they were generating crime in the process

13:11

because they weren't finding those shops, to a point

13:13

where the state actually began kicking

13:15

them out later that year, ejecting

13:17

non residents because crime

13:19

was really becoming out of control.

13:22

And that sort of plays a part in this case when

13:24

we're trying to figure out who did what.

13:26

Yeah, so this is literally like in the

13:28

first Rambo movie where the deputy

13:30

gets Rambo and drives them to the edge

13:33

of the town and says, don't come back.

13:35

It took you two episodes to pull up a

13:38

Rambo reference.

13:39

I was waiting for that, Okay.

13:42

So here's the story.

13:44

So, just after midnight on February twenty

13:46

second, nineteen thirty, Dorothy Mooremeister

13:49

her body was found on the western

13:51

edge of the city, in a rural area. So

13:54

she was on a lonely road, no car,

13:57

no nothing around her. The car was

13:59

found several miles away. But

14:01

once Heinrich and other people came

14:04

to do an accident reconstruction, I

14:06

think a lot of this becomes clear. Police

14:08

just responding because a witness happened

14:11

to see her on the road. When they found her

14:13

and they sort of lit up the area, it

14:15

was a terrible scene. She was face down

14:18

and even without a car there, you

14:20

could tell that she had been run over.

14:22

Yeah, with a car.

14:24

So my first thought, which

14:26

I think is where a lot of people might go, is this

14:28

takes gender out of it, because anybody

14:31

can get behind the wheel of a car.

14:33

It's an interesting choice of

14:35

weapon. I don't feel like we see

14:37

that that often do.

14:38

We Typically when we have

14:40

pedestrians that have been run over, it's

14:43

often in the hit and run environment

14:45

where the driver is the

14:48

UI or is not paying attention,

14:50

hits the pedestrian and then runs off. So there is

14:52

no mal intent from the driver

14:55

to purposely kill the victim. Of course,

14:58

I've got questions about Dorothy her

15:00

body at this location is could

15:02

they tell that she had been run over at

15:04

this spot where her body's found or

15:07

had she been run over somewhere else and then

15:09

dumped here, or has she been drug by a

15:11

vehicle from a location,

15:13

because oftentimes when a vehicle

15:16

hits a pedestrian, a pedestrian can be

15:18

caught up in the undercarriage and then

15:20

carried a distance away.

15:22

Well, the forensics here are pretty complicated, So

15:25

this will be torture for you because I'm going

15:27

to unravel them slowly. So

15:30

as a police officer detective on the

15:32

scene, the first thing you see is this woman

15:34

face down. They said every bone in

15:36

her body had been broken, and what they

15:39

determined just based on

15:41

the tire marks and the

15:44

amount of dragging she had been

15:46

dragged. But it looked like she had

15:48

been dragged one time and that she had not

15:50

been moving when the car ran over

15:52

her five times. Okay,

15:55

that's a lot, isn't it.

15:56

It is if you have the driver who

15:59

hits a pedestrian, runs over the body

16:01

and then circles back around, comes

16:03

back or backs up. Now

16:06

this is showing intent that

16:08

there's not the oh I just

16:10

hit something and I didn't know what I hit

16:12

type of defense. This now puts

16:15

it into that realm of

16:17

this is purposeful. So this is where

16:19

proving that it's a single vehicle

16:21

versus multiple vehicles would be part of

16:24

the type of question that I would

16:26

be looking at. Maybe some of the

16:28

components of the vehicle breakoff due

16:30

to the impact with the victim, or

16:32

you see the same tire type

16:35

marks, whether they're impressions

16:37

and or prints that

16:40

are present on her clothing or

16:42

on the surface that her body's

16:44

on, or on the sides of the roads. So there's

16:46

ways to show that it was a single vehicle

16:49

versus multiple vehicles.

16:50

So one set of tire tracks is what

16:52

they're reporting. Is that accurate?

16:55

How far can we go with tire tracks

16:57

impressions in the dirt and let's just say

17:00

clean dirt, it's very clear

17:02

impressions. Is this an accurate tool

17:04

of forensics?

17:05

Well, obviously, different makes and models

17:08

of tires have different tread patterns,

17:10

they have different sizes, different width.

17:12

Then you also have the vehicular characteristics.

17:15

The axle width that these tires are

17:17

on vary from vehicle to vehicle. Now

17:19

we're talking in nineteen thirties, so it's

17:21

probably a very limited number of vehicles

17:24

that are present. And what I don't

17:26

know is how standardized let's

17:28

say the undercarriages of all

17:30

these vehicles are is it the same width, are

17:32

they using the same tires, or is

17:34

there enough variability to be able

17:37

to start narrowing down what

17:39

makes vehicles and or tires could

17:41

have been involved in the case based on

17:43

the tire impressions. There's ways

17:46

to look at these impressions

17:48

and start getting a sense of Okay,

17:51

I can now reconstruct what the

17:53

driver is doing.

17:54

They're in a singular vehicle.

17:55

They're driving forward, stopping, turning,

17:58

driving back, you know, doing this three point

18:00

turn. Provided that the surface

18:02

the car is on is a recording

18:04

medium. Asphalt typically doesn't afford

18:07

you that luxury.

18:08

Now, if we set this scene a woman,

18:11

well dressed, married to a wealthy

18:13

doctor. She's laying face down in the road,

18:15

there's no car around her, there's a set of tire

18:18

tracks. Would we think that there's

18:20

a good chance that she rode

18:22

up there with the killer, something

18:25

happened and he runs her down.

18:27

So that's option A.

18:28

Option B is she's out

18:30

there by herself at midnight,

18:33

walking around in a rural area,

18:35

maybe with somebody else who knows, and then

18:37

a driver comes and hits her accidentally

18:40

or on purpose or super

18:42

secret. Option number three, which I have no idea,

18:44

but you might come up with.

18:45

This is where victimology really

18:48

plays in. First, I would be

18:50

looking at the geography of this crime

18:52

scene. Is it a very isolated

18:54

location? And then is this

18:56

a location that she would

18:59

frequent or not? If she would

19:01

frequent there, why would she be going out

19:04

there? Or is there a prime arterial

19:06

road nearby, like maybe somebody dropped

19:08

her off and now she's just out there on the

19:10

side of the road.

19:11

You know.

19:12

I think all of those possibilities, with the set

19:14

of circumstances that you've laid out, are

19:16

in play. At this point, it's really

19:19

getting to know Dorothy better.

19:21

And once the investigation

19:23

proceeds, it's now talking to people who

19:25

said, oh, yeah, Dorothy would go out there all the time,

19:28

or Dorothy was planning on taking a ride

19:30

he said, this is the west end of the city.

19:32

Was she heading someplace out west

19:34

with somebody?

19:35

You know?

19:36

And obviously she ends up outside

19:38

the vehicle, and then who was that person

19:40

that she was heading out west with?

19:41

So digging into who she is,

19:44

what her patterns of life are.

19:46

And then the investigation into

19:48

at least the people that investigators

19:51

are able to determine new her and

19:53

saw her last becomes

19:56

critical information to start assessing.

19:58

Okay, what happened at the this location

20:00

in the west part of the city.

20:02

So investigators move up the road.

20:04

This was a one lane road, so they

20:06

can tell, as you had said, where the car

20:08

came in from, and they could see that it was

20:10

a real jig jaggedy motion as

20:12

if someone had been struggling inside

20:15

the car potentially, so

20:17

they theorized that she rode

20:19

up or was taken up

20:22

by.

20:22

The killer or at least one of the killers.

20:24

Does that change anything for you that we know that it

20:27

looks like there's a motion where she was maybe struggling

20:29

with the steering wheel to try to get control.

20:31

Well, that becomes interesting. Was

20:33

this a scenario where

20:36

she is inside a vehicle and at a certain

20:38

point she realizes the driver's

20:40

not taking her to where she wants

20:42

to go. You know, maybe she's saying I

20:44

want to go home, or she gets picked

20:47

up by somebody and she's expecting to be

20:49

taken to a different part of the city, and once

20:51

the vehicle turns onto this one

20:54

way road, she's recognizing this

20:56

is not good. And that's when the struggle

20:59

inside the vehicle occurs. That's

21:01

one possibility for sure. I

21:04

have to say, right now, there's an assumption that

21:06

Dorothy is not the driver. When the car

21:08

is zigzagging, Dorothy could be at the

21:11

driver and then the person that's

21:13

let's say in the front passenger seat, not necessarily

21:15

just front passenger seat.

21:16

But I don't know what kind of vehicle we're dealing with.

21:19

You're about to find out. I'm

21:21

going to show you a picture of it.

21:22

I'm just thinking it's possible where

21:24

now you have somebody inside a vehicle that

21:27

Dorothy's driving and is now

21:29

trying to take over control of

21:31

the vehicle, and that's why it's doing this jag

21:34

in motion.

21:34

Yeah, and I have thought maybe she was drugged and then woke up

21:37

and went, what this is not happening.

21:39

Another possibility.

21:40

Now, let me tell you what Heinrich found.

21:42

So he goes out and he examines the body,

21:44

and here are the details from what he finds.

21:46

At the body.

21:47

He looks at her close fitting hat, which

21:49

in the thirties women's sort of work. I'm not going to

21:51

say a bought it, but a really kind of tight hat

21:53

almost covering her whole head. And he looks

21:55

at the back of her head, and there is a

21:58

slit like a hole almost at the back

22:00

of her neck and a clot of blood beneath

22:03

it. Okay, that mine or might not have been fatal.

22:05

He doesn't know yet, he's just looking at the information.

22:08

There are injuries to her skull which

22:10

could have been caused by blunt force trauma.

22:13

It could have been caused by the car

22:15

or both. We don't know cause

22:18

of death yet, and we don't know if it was the

22:20

car that killed her yet. So hole

22:23

in the back of the base of her skull right

22:25

the base of where her neck is, and then

22:27

definitely some injuries to her skull.

22:30

And I will say that when

22:32

pedestrians have been hit by vehicles,

22:35

that really complicates any

22:38

interpretation of what may

22:40

have happened prior to the

22:42

injuries and damage the vehicle has inflicted.

22:45

If you have somebody that had blunt force

22:47

trauma from let's say a beating, and

22:49

now they've been run over five times,

22:52

it can be difficult, but not impossible,

22:54

to determine whether or not there

22:56

had been violence inflicted on that person

22:59

before the injuries and damage

23:01

from the vehicle. So that's where it

23:03

gets into Okay, what else is

23:05

found, and then that's when the autopsy becomes

23:08

absolutely critical.

23:09

And I think what's interesting about this too is, you know,

23:11

they said she had not been moving, she was

23:13

not fighting back or trying to get out

23:15

of the way when this car was running over

23:17

here, because they found drag marks, but kind of like

23:19

an initial drag mark, and then

23:22

it just kept hitting her over and over again. So

23:24

Heinrich's first thought was that she was

23:26

either totally incapacitated or already

23:29

dead when the car ran her over

23:31

five times. And his thought was

23:33

she would at least be moving around a little bit

23:35

and causing different sort of marks in the ground.

23:38

Does that make sense to you?

23:39

Not really, are.

23:40

You contradicting Oscar Heinrich, my.

23:43

Investigator, Okay, I

23:45

am more thinking to

23:48

try to determine whether or not

23:50

she was alive at

23:53

the time of the first impact. I would be

23:55

more paying attention to are

23:58

there any impact injuries her

24:00

that would indicate she was upright. So a

24:02

pedestrian who's standing up when a car

24:05

hits them and again not knowing

24:07

what damage is on the car and the make and model

24:09

of the car, but there is often severe

24:12

injuries that say to the lower legs or

24:14

the thighs that would indicate that

24:16

you have an impact from the bumper or

24:18

other feature of the car on the front of

24:20

the car.

24:21

So that's again we need to.

24:22

Assess the injuries to her

24:25

body, the damage to the vehicle, as

24:27

well as even taking a look at

24:30

her clothing and the types of marks

24:32

that are on her clothing and

24:35

where different types of evidence are

24:37

found on the vehicle to start reconstructing.

24:40

Okay, we have an impact with an upright

24:42

pedestrian, and then the vehicle starts

24:44

running over a pedestrian that

24:47

is severely injured and

24:49

likely unconscious or dead. But

24:52

Heinrich coming and saying, well, he's not

24:54

seeing evidence of her moving prior

24:56

to being struck by the vehicle. I

24:58

would need to see more before I had

25:01

any confidence in that kind of opinion.

25:03

Luckily, they find the car. They

25:05

find her car several miles away. Her

25:07

car, uh huh, her car which

25:10

was used to run her over. Okay,

25:12

so this is what the damage was done

25:14

to the car. There was blood and

25:17

a dent in the car's rear bumper,

25:19

and there was hair

25:22

stuck also in the rear bumper, and

25:24

they found little to no blood

25:27

at the scene. Underneath her. So

25:30

that's why the theory. I

25:33

think that she was killed or

25:35

I guess incapacitated before

25:37

she was on the ground or

25:40

run over by this car. That's where that came

25:42

from. But it is certain that

25:44

she was hit by her own car. So somebody

25:47

or Dorothy drove her car up

25:49

to this area and then something happened

25:51

after that.

25:52

They're not finding much blood at

25:54

the.

25:54

Scene now, not tons of blood.

25:56

No, Heinrich believed this happened someplace

25:59

different.

25:59

He did not.

26:00

I think the death itself did not happen

26:02

at this rural area. What do you

26:04

think about just the idea that she was hit

26:06

by her own car.

26:07

This is where now I start asking,

26:09

well, who has access to the vehicle?

26:11

Who would she give access to the vehicle?

26:14

Who would she ride in the vehicle with?

26:16

This is interesting that somebody would

26:18

use her vehicle to run her over

26:21

multiple times.

26:22

So Heinrich when he examines

26:24

on the inside of this car, and here's the photo of the car.

26:27

I promised you it's a big car.

26:29

I can now see the car. A

26:31

huge car it is.

26:33

This isn't some little model tea.

26:36

It's large, it's going to be heavy.

26:38

Doesn't show a photo of the rear bumper. But

26:40

I can see where there's a feature of the wheel

26:43

well that goes behind the driver's

26:45

rear wheel that actually is relatively

26:47

low. If that bumper on

26:50

the back is that low, then

26:52

that becomes interesting from reconstructing.

26:54

If we have blood that's low down

26:56

in the vehicle like that with hair, that indicates

26:59

that maybe she was in a

27:01

position at the time that that contact

27:03

occurred where her head is being hit

27:06

by the rear bumper. This is not a

27:08

small vehicle, so to be run over

27:10

five times, yep. I

27:12

do wonder how they determined the number

27:14

five, But this vehicle would do

27:17

a lot of damage to the human body.

27:19

What would make a car go back and forth?

27:21

Is it possible on a dirt road

27:23

with all of the variations of rocks and sticks

27:26

and everything. Can a car go back

27:28

and forth systematically in its own tracks?

27:31

Or?

27:31

I wonder if a car this age, nineteen

27:33

thirty, this heavy, if they almost

27:35

could count like the rings on a tree,

27:38

the different impressions, just slight

27:40

impressions that each tire moving

27:42

forward and backward made Yes.

27:44

That would be the one way that they would be able

27:46

to do it.

27:47

Okay, no matter how carefully you

27:50

move the car back and forth, there's

27:52

always a deviation. So if

27:54

they were trying to rely on her injuries

27:57

to say five times, and I would have concerns

27:59

on that determination.

28:01

So this is a huge car.

28:02

People often when you read about it called a limo.

28:05

I didn't really understand that because it's also called

28:07

a sedan. But if you look at this thing, it's

28:10

long, it does look like a limo now,

28:12

and I think she had a.

28:13

Driver who drove this regularly.

28:15

Do you see below the doors, don't you think those

28:17

are step ups where you lower the

28:19

step and the person can step up

28:21

and get into the car. If that is, And that's

28:24

an element of fanciness that I didn't expect.

28:26

You know, this is a car where just

28:29

somebody who sees it goes, oh,

28:31

there's a level of wealth.

28:33

Associated with this person.

28:35

Yep. So there is a scenario

28:38

that you could see her coming

28:40

to an intersection and somebody

28:42

who's interested in committing a crime

28:45

for financial gain all of a sudden

28:47

has a victim of opportunity. Yep.

28:49

Well, and if we're taking an inventory of

28:52

the crime scene, she was wearing

28:54

some very expensive jewelry, including a pendant

28:56

and thousands of dollars worth of jewelry and

28:59

it was gone. I don't know if robbery

29:01

had been a motive, but certainly

29:03

it was there and it was taken

29:06

by whoever killed her.

29:07

Okay, so now that puts more weight

29:10

on a financial gain crime. Possibly

29:13

still could be somebody who knew her, could

29:15

be a stranger. But also was

29:17

this jewelry so unique that

29:20

that could be used to help identify

29:22

her? Now are they trying to hide

29:24

her identification? Just like we have cases

29:27

where hands are cut off, heads

29:29

are cut off to prevent identification,

29:31

Maybe this jewelry would be rapidly

29:34

traced back as this crumpled mass

29:36

on the middle of the road is Dorothy. So this is

29:38

part of what I would be assessing as to why

29:41

is this jewelry taken?

29:43

But now I'm starting to go I

29:46

think there might be a financial motive here, and.

29:48

I will say that I think you'll be

29:50

surprised that it could be both. Oh,

30:04

so you know the basics of the

30:06

forensics. There's no huge revelations

30:09

after that. Now we need to talk about the inner circle

30:11

because this is where things become pretty interesting.

30:13

So I mentioned she was married, and you had

30:16

an excellent query, which was who has

30:18

access to her car? Because obviously,

30:20

if she's killed by her own car, she has access,

30:22

and then the people in her inner circle potentially

30:25

have access to the car. So she was

30:27

married to Frank Mooremeister,

30:30

who was quite a bit older, and he

30:32

was a widower who had a young daughter,

30:34

and he and Dorothy married two

30:36

years earlier before her death. So

30:39

they both had affairs, and they apparently

30:41

had a pretty unhappy marriage, but they

30:44

were still married, so it could have been a marriage

30:46

of convenience.

30:47

She was very attractive, he was very wealthy.

30:49

Who knows why they were staying together,

30:52

but they were together when all

30:54

of this happened.

30:55

How old is Frank's daughter?

30:57

Young?

30:58

Just you know, a young girl's under

31:00

fifteen.

31:01

And I don't get the impression that

31:03

she was particularly attached to

31:05

Dorothy and vice versa.

31:07

But I don't know.

31:07

This could have been the hair in the locket,

31:09

but I don't know. Okay, So we'll

31:11

start with Dorothy. Dorothy had

31:14

several affairs, and as I said, the doctor

31:16

had several affairs. They appeared

31:18

to be living these parallel lives.

31:21

When she was found dead,

31:23

the doctor was taken up there and he identified

31:26

the body, and he looked at the crime scene and he of

31:28

course immediately identified her.

31:30

Later on, there would be a lot of speculation about

31:32

doctor moremeister. How could he identify

31:36

her when she really was tattered,

31:38

The car had runner over, As I said, every

31:40

bone was broken, she was completely

31:42

disfigured. And I don't think it's gonna be that

31:44

surprising that he could look at her clothing and probably

31:46

look at a couple of key things. I think that

31:49

press was really just trying to dig up some

31:51

dirt on him.

31:51

What do you think about that?

31:53

I mean, are you shocked that the press was trying to

31:55

dig up dirt on anybody?

31:58

For me, it's always shocking to

32:00

think back to the days of

32:02

having to get loved ones

32:04

in to take a look at

32:07

a victim and to identify

32:10

them, because, like in this case,

32:12

my expectation is, you know what I've seen

32:14

as many of these victims of violent crime,

32:17

they're horribly mutilated.

32:18

This is not the last image you want to see

32:20

of your victim.

32:21

But back in nineteen thirty, you know, they

32:23

relied so heavily on a

32:25

loved one making that in person identification.

32:29

But was there enough features present

32:32

for the husband to be able to truly

32:34

say, yes, this is my wife Dorothy,

32:36

yeah, or it wasn't relied upon the

32:39

clothes. You know, he might be familiar

32:41

with the clothes she had on right now, don't

32:43

know, but yeah, that I

32:45

think is one of those things where

32:47

I just think back, going, oh God, I would

32:49

not want to be pulled in to identify

32:52

one of my family members if they had

32:54

suffered a traffic accident or you

32:56

know, we're victims of homicide.

32:58

And this is just terrible because me

33:00

it seems like overkilled really

33:02

trying to determine that this woman was killed.

33:05

Now, if we're looking at suspects and

33:07

doing a positive and negative list

33:09

of the suspects, and doctor Moremeister's positive

33:12

is he was the one who hired Oscar Heinrich.

33:14

So in the thirties, Heinrich was

33:16

usually hired either by defense attorneys or

33:19

prosecutors, and then sometimes he would be hired

33:21

by family members and more Meister

33:23

tracked him down and said, can you work on my wife's

33:26

case. I don't trust the police around here

33:28

to investigate this correctly. So that's

33:30

how Oscar got on with this

33:32

case. And Oscar started doing what you

33:34

would do, which is he starts digging into

33:37

the inner circle the personal life,

33:39

putting together victimology, and he starts

33:41

looking at who are the men who

33:44

Dorothy is involved with in these extramarital

33:46

affairs.

33:47

One of them is a man named Charles Peter.

33:49

He was pretty much immediately a prime

33:51

suspect in the death. He had urged

33:53

Dorothy to divorce her husband

33:56

and to take all of his money and they

33:58

would run away together. It's

34:00

unclear how intense this relationship

34:03

was. I think I get the sense that

34:05

this man was sort of a way for her to buy a little bit

34:07

of time, and he gave her attention. I

34:10

will say that she constantly

34:12

rejected him, so if

34:14

they had.

34:15

A true affair, it was very short lived.

34:17

And she actually called him to

34:19

a friend of hers a lop eared

34:21

fool, which is I'm pretty sure an

34:23

insult in the nineteen thirty like

34:26

a lop eared rabbit. I guess that seems

34:28

like a bad thing to say to someone.

34:30

But in addition to this affair,

34:33

the fact that he is pushing her to

34:35

divorce a husband and take all

34:37

his money, now this is starting

34:39

to overlap with what we're

34:41

seeing the offender having done with

34:44

stealing the valuables at the scene. It's

34:46

sort of an extension of that request

34:48

to Dorothy, where now it's like, well,

34:50

you're not going to get rid of your husband. I'm going

34:52

to take you out, but I'm going to take some of

34:55

his money with me. It's consistent

34:57

with Charles' mentality in that relationship.

35:00

Just a theory at this point, but I'm keying

35:02

in on that.

35:03

That's a strong theory because Charles

35:05

Peter knew her husband, they

35:08

didn't have really business relations. But Charles

35:10

approached doctor Moremeister and asked

35:12

for a loan, to which doctor Moremeister

35:14

not knowing that this man was courting his wife,

35:17

or maybe he did, we don't know. But doctor Mormeister

35:19

said, sure, I'll loan you the money,

35:21

but as collateral, I would like

35:24

a dimond pendant that I know you have.

35:26

This is the diamond pendant that Dorothy

35:28

was wearing the night that she was

35:30

found in that rural area, and

35:32

that diamond pendant was gone when

35:34

the police got there, and doctor Moremeister

35:37

said, where is it? What happened? So

35:39

does that bolster your theory? I think it does a little

35:41

bit about Charles Peter.

35:42

It most really could that diamond pendant would

35:44

be something that somebody who had

35:47

no relationship to it prior would

35:49

be attracted to and want to steal, So it's hard

35:51

to discern that. It really

35:54

would rely on other aspects of the investigation.

35:56

If that diamond pendant is found in

35:59

Charles's possession and after the homicide,

36:01

then that shows yeah, he wanted

36:04

that particular item back plus the other

36:06

items.

36:06

But right now I can't say.

36:07

Well, and I'd lied.

36:09

There are a couple of little forensic things I need

36:11

to bring up to you that the police discovered.

36:14

I know, I'm sneaky like that.

36:16

So we have another much

36:18

more serious suitor who was a

36:21

Persian prince. I mean, if I

36:23

could write a book on a Persian prince true

36:25

crime story.

36:26

That I would love that kind of book.

36:28

She was having an affair with

36:30

a Persian prince who seemed like

36:32

a really nice guy, and they seemed to

36:35

really love each other, and she wanted

36:37

to leave doctor Mooremeister and

36:40

live with this man in Paris, and it

36:42

sounds like they were making plans

36:44

for this to happen, and she was

36:46

squirreling away money that Oscar Heinrich

36:49

found out about. She had six thousand dollars, which

36:51

was an awful lot of money in nineteen thirty. Doctor

36:53

Mooremeister was very confused

36:56

because he only gave her an allowance

36:58

of two hundred dollars a month, so he wants

37:00

to know what the hell where did she get all this money

37:03

from? And there were letters that

37:05

Heinrich found. Investigators also

37:07

found between the Persian Prince

37:10

and Dorothy, professing love

37:12

and true affection and making plans

37:15

to leave. Now, the Persian Prince

37:17

was in Salt Lake City when

37:19

she was killed, So does he become

37:22

a strong suspect or

37:24

does he become a strong

37:26

motive And now we're coming back to Frank

37:28

Mooremeister.

37:29

Well, the Persian Prince, I'm assuming, just because

37:32

of his royalty, has money

37:34

himself.

37:35

He isn't he a diamond pendant?

37:36

So yeah, the.

37:37

Need to kill

37:39

Dorothy from his perspective, who would

37:41

be probably a few trinkets, right,

37:44

That doesn't wash with me, at

37:47

least at the time of the homicide.

37:49

It sounds like he and

37:51

Dorothy had a positive relationship.

37:54

And so this is where potentially,

37:56

if husband finds out

37:58

about the Persian pet, does husband

38:01

kill Dorothy out of rage

38:05

and then stage a

38:07

robbery by taking the jewelry,

38:10

So that is a theory that for me

38:12

is back on the table in terms

38:14

of yes considering this dynamic.

38:17

But I'm also curious in

38:19

addition to these suitors, I'm

38:21

assuming that Dorothy was

38:23

the beneficiary of the

38:25

husband's estate if

38:27

he were to die.

38:29

Yes, and she had changed her

38:31

will shortly before, But I

38:33

don't think she really had anything significantly.

38:36

Are there any individuals on

38:38

the husband's side of the family that

38:40

if Dorothy was out of the picture,

38:42

they would be the natural beneficiaries

38:45

of his wealth stepdaughter?

38:47

But again, I think she was really young.

38:48

It doesn't sound like it doesn't sound like the ex wife

38:51

was in the picture. Okay, so none

38:53

of that really seems

38:55

significant, at least not to Hi Rich. But as

38:57

we know, detectives from every

39:00

era make mistakes, so you know,

39:02

it might have been something that they missed. But what

39:04

they were really focusing on is the quite

39:06

a few kind of sketchy characters. I'm

39:08

not saying that Persian prince is sketchy, but she

39:11

was friends with racketeers. She

39:13

was friends with people who were in

39:15

the underbelly of Salt Lake City.

39:17

But it doesn't sound like mobsters.

39:20

It doesn't sound like she was living

39:23

necessarily a lifestyle

39:25

on the edge. It just sounded like she really

39:27

liked to go out and have a good time.

39:29

Okay, now you're telling me about her

39:32

suitors, Charles and the Persian prince.

39:34

And of course the assumption is is that

39:36

who she's having dallianceis

39:38

with, they're the ones likely going to

39:40

be committing a homicide. Right, But

39:42

I'm going to step back from that. You said husband

39:45

was having affairs. Yep, he's got women

39:47

in his life. When I'm evaluating

39:50

with say a victim of a homicide and it's been

39:52

an a fender physically attacking

39:54

the victim, I'm also trying to discern

39:57

is their significant physical

39:59

difference in terms of size

40:01

and strength that would indicate I'm dealing

40:04

with, let's say, a very robust male

40:06

versus a very petite woman. And there's

40:08

sometimes is evidence that that can be done.

40:11

Here, we don't have that type of

40:13

evidence because a vehicle is used.

40:15

So now it's like, well, who was a

40:17

husband having affairs with and

40:20

could they have motive to get

40:23

rid of Dorothy because they want the husband

40:25

for themselves. They want to have become

40:27

the beneficiary of his estate and live

40:29

the high life. And this is now

40:32

a woman in a planned

40:34

attack taken out Dorothy and

40:37

then grabbing the jewelry again, possibly

40:39

to stage a robbery. That would be a

40:41

side of this investigation that needs to

40:44

be dug into, not just the men in Dorothy's

40:46

life.

40:46

I agree.

40:47

Based on season four

40:50

of tenfold More Wicked, which was about Claire

40:52

Phillips in la a woman who thought

40:55

her husband was having affair with

40:57

a woman named Alberta Meadows, and she

40:59

lured Alberta and another person up

41:01

to the top of a remote area

41:04

and beat Alberta to death,

41:06

and people didn't believe that a woman

41:09

was capable of doing that. However, when

41:11

I was thinking about this case, you and

41:13

I have come back to who would have

41:15

access to her car and who would

41:17

she get in a car with, So if

41:20

he were having an affair, perhaps with one

41:22

of her close friends, that I

41:24

could see unless she's drugged, which

41:26

was another theory that we had, and you know, she's drugged

41:29

and she doesn't really have much of a choice.

41:31

But I was just thinking through that, like who would

41:33

she go up willingly with? And I'm

41:35

not sure it would be with a woman that he's

41:37

sleeping with. But we don't know who he was sleeping with

41:39

because the press really never pursued

41:41

them.

41:42

And this starts going back to where

41:45

was she killed? Yeah, or incapacitated?

41:48

At if Heinrich is saying, well, it doesn't

41:50

look like she's killed here.

41:51

There's a lack of blood.

41:52

And if her injuries are such, and

41:55

I imagine they were, there's typically

41:57

a lot of blood in the hicular

41:59

accident or arhicular homicide scenes,

42:01

and he's saying, hold on, where's the blood,

42:04

right, then he may be correct that

42:06

she had been transported there. Now, if

42:08

she had been killed elsewhere as it possible

42:11

that it was a act of homicide

42:13

that.

42:14

Did not result in bloodshed.

42:15

Let's say it's strangulation, and then she's put

42:17

into her vehicle and then the offender drives

42:19

out there. Now the jagat driving

42:22

indicating maybe a struggle, might

42:24

suggest that she hadn't actually died but

42:27

reanimated, and then now the.

42:28

Fight is on inside the vehicle. Yeah,

42:30

but then there'd be a lot.

42:32

Of blood at this scene after her being run over

42:34

five times. I'm a little bit concerned about the lack

42:36

of blood at the scene. A dead body is

42:38

still a reservoir of blood.

42:40

You know, you don't have the active pumping

42:43

of the heart if they're truly dead. But

42:45

when a body is crushed open, you

42:48

can still have leakage that

42:50

would be significant. You know,

42:52

you have reservoirs of blood within your

42:54

large blood vessels, organs

42:56

and stuff. So depending on what

42:59

injury her body had, I would want

43:01

to see that to assess, well, is

43:03

the blood that is present at the scene

43:05

consistent. You know, vehicles can just decimate

43:08

a body, tear bodies apart. If

43:10

these are just closed crushing injuries.

43:13

So maybe some evulsion, you know, you see

43:15

avulsion where tissue is torn off

43:17

of bone and stuff. Maybe the amount of

43:19

blood at the scene is consistent

43:21

with her being killed there, you know. So this is again,

43:24

this is where it's the autopsy is so

43:26

critical and in this day and age, when I go

43:28

into a case, first thing I always

43:30

look at is the autopsy. I need

43:32

to know what happened to the victim, what the offender

43:35

did to the victim, and then the victim's injuries

43:37

and how that would influence evidence

43:39

at the scene. Was she killed right there

43:41

by the vehicle, or was she possibly

43:43

incapacitated and or killed elsewhere,

43:46

blood elsewhere, and then transport.

43:48

It to this location where now she's run over multiple

43:51

times.

43:51

I think it is the latter

43:54

because there's no struggle. Hinrich

43:56

finds no struggle inside the car like nine

43:59

sure and not all that. He finds

44:01

no fingerprints, and the press finds out

44:03

and they say it's a hit man.

44:05

Who else would be able to do that.

44:06

It's not some dumb, jilted lover like

44:08

the Lopbard Charles Peter. It's

44:10

not a Persian prince. This is somebody who knew what he

44:13

was doing.

44:14

Let's talk about the no fingerprints.

44:16

This vehicle is obviously a vehicle that

44:18

multiple people have been in and

44:21

out of. Fingerprints they

44:23

are deposited, of course when people

44:25

touch various surfaces, but the

44:27

surfaces have to be amenable to

44:30

holding onto those fingerprints in a way

44:32

that they ultimately can be recovered and identified.

44:35

Back in nineteen thirty, Heinrich

44:38

is probably using or the CSI was

44:40

probably just using a very crude

44:42

black powder technique

44:44

on surfaces that may not be

44:46

amenable. There could be texture to these

44:49

surfaces. There could be a lot of fabric surfaces

44:51

inside this vehicle. The windows

44:54

and stuff possibly are never touched by people

44:56

who get in and out of this vehicle.

44:58

People use driving gloves in the

45:00

thirties.

45:00

Well, this is.

45:01

Where in modern day, you know, I've

45:03

had to review cases where, let's say you

45:05

have a robbery at a fast food

45:08

restaurant, very greasy. They're at the front

45:10

counter, the guns pointed at them, cash

45:12

register, the.

45:13

Money's taken out.

45:14

Deputy responds, and some agencies

45:16

they don't have trained csis

45:18

for this type of crime.

45:19

It's just a deputy. And then

45:21

I read the deputies report.

45:22

He says, I dusted with black powder, found

45:25

no fingerprints, And I say bs,

45:27

because you will find fingerprints

45:30

in a fast food restaurant. That tells me this

45:32

deputy didn't do a thorough job.

45:34

This is what we call pr dust. He's making a

45:37

show, he's being lazy and goes, oh, no fingerprints.

45:40

I've got a vehicle where multiple people

45:42

have been inside and out of how come

45:44

no fingerprints are found. There's likely going

45:46

to be some smudges and

45:48

potentially ridge patterns from

45:51

prior occasions on surfaces.

45:55

This is where I call into question

45:57

the veracity of the fingerprint

45:59

process that was done, possibly

46:02

just due to the lack of modern

46:04

technologies. With different types

46:06

of newer powders or magnetic powder

46:08

or even super glue cars.

46:11

If this was a homicide, that would be something we

46:13

would step up to out in the field. So

46:16

to conclude that the person

46:18

was a professional hit man because they

46:21

leave any latent prints behind, that

46:23

doesn't wash with me at all.

46:25

Well, Heinbrich was really good at pulling prince.

46:27

He had done that in the Fatty arboical case in nineteen

46:29

twenty one, and he used a couple

46:31

of different methods to pull prints. That

46:34

is possible though, but also this

46:36

is not an error. There's no CSI

46:39

New York or CSI Miami. People don't

46:41

know enough in the nineteen thirties about forensics

46:43

to know that they can get caught really using

46:45

fingerprints.

46:46

So it's an interesting theory.

46:48

And because of the lack of blood that

46:50

she had not been killed at the scene,

46:53

that she had been killed somewhere else, And

46:55

so they really started looking at alibis

46:58

and suspects, and Charles Peter actually

47:00

had a really solid alibi with several people who

47:02

knew where he was that night, and then

47:04

the Prince had an alibi, and nobody really

47:06

suspected the Prince Frank Moremeister

47:09

is a different story. He had

47:11

one really bad alibi and one shaky alibi.

47:14

He was alone the whole night, which you

47:16

know many of us are, I mean half the time in

47:18

my life. If I were accused of committing a

47:20

crime, I.

47:21

Had of allows the alibi too. So

47:23

he was out driving.

47:24

Alone for half the night, and the other

47:26

part of the night he was alone at the movies.

47:29

He's saying he's out driving around

47:31

alone.

47:32

By himself, and he couldn't really say

47:34

where but by himself. And

47:36

he also had a nurse who saw

47:38

him at home, so he was

47:40

sort of out and about. People said they

47:42

saw him at the movie, but they weren't one hundred percent sure

47:45

he was saying I was driving on the road.

47:47

It was all very sketchy.

47:49

This is where it does come into

47:51

establishing the veracity of the alibi.

47:54

And that's what's so important. If

47:56

an individual's alibi is

47:59

being established by a close

48:02

person to the suspect,

48:04

always have to consider that

48:07

that witness is lying

48:10

just because of their relationship

48:12

with the suspect. So this really becomes a

48:15

low bar type alibi

48:17

where I don't put any weight on it. You

48:19

mentioned Charles was alibied

48:21

out by multiple witnesses. Well, who are

48:23

those witnesses? Are they friends of his? Or

48:26

did he show up at a public location? And

48:28

these people independently who don't

48:30

know him say, yeah, that guy was here. Well

48:33

that establishes a little bit better of an

48:35

alibi for me. Good alibis

48:37

like today, of course, is you've got

48:39

video surveillance at a location and there's

48:41

no question that the suspect is

48:44

at this location at the time the homicide

48:46

occurred. And this is a high bar type

48:48

alibi. So Frank

48:51

is out driving alone when

48:54

Dorothy is out in her

48:56

vehicle being killed by her vehicle. To

48:59

me, this is where I'm I'm hearing that I'm going okay?

49:01

Is he weaving some truth into

49:03

a lie?

49:04

He might be, And so then you have to think what

49:07

is the motive? And I know what you're gonna say while

49:09

his wife is having an affair and.

49:10

She's running away.

49:12

But according to Dorothy's

49:15

sister, Dorothy did not believe

49:17

that Frank knew anything about the prince, and

49:20

he seemed genuinely pretty shocked

49:22

when the police presented him with the letters

49:24

and the fact that she had saved six thousand

49:26

dollars and he didn't know it. However,

49:29

Dorothy's sister said that I'm

49:31

going to read this quote because I think it's interesting. Dorothy

49:33

told her I have something

49:35

on the doctor he knows nothing

49:37

about, so something incriminating.

49:40

He would give me eighty thousand dollars

49:43

just to avoid the publicity. And

49:45

just so you know, that's about one point three million dollars

49:47

right now. So she's telling her sister

49:50

that she has information

49:52

on her husband that she can use

49:54

to blackmail him for almost a million

49:56

and a half dollars. That seems like a bigger motive

49:59

than a person prints or any number of

50:01

affairs that he probably knew she was having.

50:03

Yeah, now this really

50:05

does become a big

50:07

deal. Okay, now you start stacking

50:10

up the clues this extortion

50:13

that Dorothy was going to do for

50:15

her own personal gain at the expense

50:18

of I'm not sure you know what she

50:20

was going to extoor tom On, but his public reputation.

50:23

Potentially he could suffer business losses.

50:26

Who knows what exactly was,

50:28

but obviously it was going to be a very negative

50:30

thing for her husband.

50:33

And Dorothy almost

50:35

sounds like, I mean, how could she if she's extorting

50:37

him for his money, you know, the equivalent of one

50:39

point three million dollars today. That

50:42

tells me, well, she wasn't planning on staying

50:44

with him. She's planning on taking that money

50:46

and going to one of her suitors, and it sounds

50:48

like it's going to be the Prince. So obviously,

50:51

if the husband was truly in love with

50:53

her at some point, he's now going, well, I

50:55

can't have this happen. I can't

50:57

possibly let her walk away as

50:59

my money or divulge that information.

51:02

So now it's like she needs to

51:04

be eliminated so I can hold on

51:06

to my wealth and I could hold on to my

51:08

reputation. Whatever was going to be hurt

51:11

by the details that she was willing to go public

51:13

with.

51:13

Well, you're right about all that, because what

51:16

it sounds like she was going to go public with

51:18

is that the well respected doctor

51:21

was performing illegal.

51:23

Abortions in Salt Lake

51:25

City.

51:26

Yeah, in the nineteen thirties during

51:28

prohibition.

51:29

Yes.

51:29

Yes, And obviously the

51:31

religious philosophy in that area

51:34

is not going to be too accepting

51:37

of what he's doing.

51:39

Yeah, he would have lost his license.

51:41

It would have been very, very damaging.

51:44

So this becomes awkward for our

51:46

forensic scientists, because do we remember

51:48

who hired him?

51:49

That is an interesting little

51:51

twist there, and that's

51:54

where did the husband

51:57

have so much confidence that he covered his

51:59

tracks that there's no way

52:01

Heinrich would ever discover the sordid

52:03

details that would basically point fingers

52:06

back at the husband and getting

52:08

back to this professional hit. Did

52:10

the husband have a connection to somebody

52:13

where now he's at least one step removed

52:15

from the actual act of violence,

52:17

so he has further confidence that it would to

52:20

come back to him. But anytime you bring

52:22

somebody else into a homicide,

52:24

you always have to worry about that other

52:27

person coming forward. So

52:29

now that other person gets eliminated,

52:32

to be able to prevent that

52:34

person from coming forward, and that would

52:36

be part of the inquirer I would now be making

52:39

in terms of who's this other person

52:41

if that exists, if I can alibi

52:44

out the husband. But I think he is truly

52:46

the reason why Dorothy is

52:49

killed, But he's not the killer. Who

52:51

is he reaching out to in order

52:53

to be able to get her killed in order

52:55

to preserve his reputation and his wealth.

52:58

Well, this is what Heinrich can go and

53:00

then I'll just see what you think. What

53:02

he believed happened was that

53:04

the man who hired him, Frank mooremeister, he

53:07

himself killed Dorothy. He went back

53:09

and he looked at the back of her head and the

53:11

puncture and the whole through her hat.

53:14

And Dorothy had had a bit

53:16

of absinthe in her system.

53:18

How would you describe absinthe. I've never had it

53:20

before, Frankly.

53:21

Well, I've only had absinthe.

53:23

I should have known you had it.

53:25

I yeah, you know, I sipped the bottle

53:27

of absinthe over the course of a week

53:30

or so.

53:30

Wow.

53:31

And you know it's predominantly alcohol, and then

53:33

it also has wormwood.

53:35

You know, it's got this chemical compound, this

53:37

fu jone, which I'm not sure that's the way

53:39

to pronounce it.

53:40

It's a spirit just like anything

53:42

else.

53:42

Alcohol is the predominant drug

53:45

that is present in absinthe.

53:46

Sounds like she was.

53:47

Kind of doped a little bit, I mean, just a little buzzed.

53:50

Mabe.

53:50

Yeah.

53:50

Well, now, is this circular wound

53:52

on the back of her neck? Is this something that has

53:54

any size to it that Heinrich describes.

53:57

He thinks it was a small and I remember

53:59

this as a doctor. He thinks it was a puncture

54:02

wound, as in he came up

54:04

behind her. She was a little loopy from

54:06

the absence. She went to a hotel with some

54:08

friends and they dropped her off oka and he shoved

54:11

what I imagine would be sort of like a hat pin,

54:14

but I don't know the best way right

54:16

at the point in her neck where it would have just

54:18

killed her and there would have been a minimal amount of blood.

54:21

Does that make sense?

54:22

Well, almost as if you have an

54:25

ice pick going into her brain stem,

54:27

right yep, which yeah, obviously

54:29

would be very serious to the victim,

54:31

if not cause death. If he knows what he's

54:34

doing, and he's a medical doctor, so

54:36

he probably knows how to inflict

54:38

that type of injury. I would imagine

54:40

if she's looped up on alcohol to

54:42

where she's a little less aware

54:45

of the doctor coming up, and then if he just does

54:47

the ice pick to the brain stem, yeah,

54:50

very little blood, and now she could be transported

54:53

in her own vehicle without any

54:55

blood being found in the vehicle, and then put

54:57

on the road and then run over multiple

54:59

ti times to make it look like a vehicular

55:02

accident. She was a pedestrian and yep,

55:04

you know it's interesting the doctor taking

55:06

the jewelry back.

55:07

Well, and what Heinrich believes is

55:10

he does not believe that more

55:12

Meister actually deposited her. He

55:14

thinks he hired somebody, okay,

55:16

and he believes that more Meister

55:18

was in and about, you know, he was at the movies, and a couple

55:20

of people said, yeah, we saw him at the movies,

55:23

and that his alibi wasn't so

55:25

tight that he could get away with

55:28

killing her because he was at home and she came home,

55:30

but that it was around

55:33

that the alibi was structured

55:35

enough so that he would have wanted somebody to take

55:37

her out. There were lots of people available.

55:40

The kind of kicker with this case is that nobody

55:42

was convicted. They couldn't get a conviction

55:45

out of anybody. Somebody confessed in sixty

55:47

four to be the person who took her out

55:49

and ran her over, but it turns

55:51

out he read all of the details from a true detective

55:54

magazine. Yeah, and it turns out he wanted

55:56

to be transferred from Texas to Utah because

55:58

he thought he was going to get sort of better treatment

56:00

at a Utah jail. So this remains

56:02

officially a cold case, an

56:04

unsolved case, but Heinrich believed that

56:07

the man who hired him was absolutely

56:09

responsible.

56:10

He pulled it off.

56:11

He did the murder based on that puncture

56:13

wound that would have counted

56:15

for the lack of blood, but also just the

56:17

lack of fight. She had no defensive wounds,

56:20

nothing, So that seemed reasonable

56:22

to me.

56:23

But who knows?

56:24

This is interesting from the

56:26

husband to killing his wife. I

56:28

mean she may have been dead from this

56:30

wound, she may not have been, and then if somebody's

56:33

hired to dispose of her body and run

56:35

over the body, she may have technically

56:38

still been alive. And then that person has

56:40

culpability in her death.

56:42

Yep, under Heinrich scenario, and

56:45

I wouldn't disagree with it with the information

56:47

that.

56:47

You've told me.

56:49

In this day and age, I think yes, two people

56:51

potentially could be charged

56:54

with her homicide. It comes back

56:56

to when did she die and

56:59

probably point in time.

57:00

There's no way to be able to determine that.

57:06

I love a good mystery.

57:07

Paul Holes, thank you for taking this trip

57:10

to the nineteen thirties Utah with me.

57:12

Oh, this was another good

57:15

little twist. The Persian

57:17

prince was really catching my attention there

57:19

for a second at

57:21

least he caught Dorothy's attention.

57:23

Right, well,

57:26

I wish you the best of luck as

57:28

you continue on with your book journey, and

57:30

I'm continuing on with my book journey, and

57:32

our paths are going to cross with yet

57:34

another episode next week, and I'm really excited

57:37

about that.

57:38

All right, I'm looking forward to it.

57:39

Go pump some.

57:40

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57:46

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