Los Angeles in the 1920s was by no means a city of angels. High crime, corruption and a growing distrust of law enforcement only worsened his reputation. The rage of bitterness was shed by the crime that shocked the public opinion, and made parents sleepless nights filled with fear for the fate of their children ...
On December 15, 1927, a well-dressed young man showed up at Mount Vernon Junior High in Los Angeles. He introduced himself by the name of Cooper. He claimed to be an assistant to wealthy banker, Perry Parker, who had a car accident, and asks for his daughter to be brought to him. Miss Holt, the teacher who listened to this story, initially distrusted the stranger. The latter, however, dispelled her doubts by informing that she could call the bank and everything would be confirmed.
Before Miss Holt departed to fetch the little girl, she asked the question:"Which daughter?" The man in a surprised voice replied:"Marion." Soon the twelve-year-old girl left the school walls, to which she never returned. And where she left an unaware twin sister, Marjorie Parker.
Macabre exchange
The fact that Marion had been kidnapped did not become apparent until her sister returned home. Concerned by the absence of her second daughter, her parents called the school, where they found out about the alleged assistant who had taken her with him. They notified the police immediately. After a few hours, the girl's father began to receive mysterious telegrams signed with the name of George Fox. One of them said: In return for Marion's return home, the kidnapper demanded $ 1,500. If his condition was not met, the girl would die.
Desperate Perry Parker, of course, agreed to the ultimatum. The exchange was to take place on December 16. Unfortunately, it did not happen, because the kidnapper saw the policemen waiting for him and did not show up at the agreed place. Another telegram was sent to the Parker house the next day. This time the kidnapper warned the parents against cooperating with the authorities, giving them one last chance to get their daughter back - the same evening.
At 8 p.m. Father Marion obediently showed up with the cash at the junction of West 5th Street and South Manhattan Place in Los Angeles. A moment later a car drove up to him, driven by a masked man with a gun. There was a girl wrapped in a blanket in the passenger seat. She was unconscious, but the criminal assured Perry that she was only sleeping.
Panorama of Los Angeles in the 1920s
As Parker handed the kidnapper the money, the kidnapper started with a screech of tires. He stopped after several dozen meters, opened the passenger door and threw Marion onto the street. Her father immediately started walking towards her. When he took her in his arms, joy turned to despair. His daughter was not sleeping at all. She was also not intoxicated with anything. Perry held a dead body in his arms, devoid of arms and legs…
An autopsy revealed that Marion had been dead for twelve hours - possibly dying after the first unsuccessful exchange attempt. What happened to her afterwards gives her chills. The girl - apart from being deprived of limbs - was gutted, stuffed with towels, and her eyes were sewn up. There were no signs of sexual assault on his body, but his condition made it difficult to clearly identify the cause of death. The doctor decided that Marion might have died from suffocation or loss of blood.
It was not the end of terrifying discoveries. On December 18, the girl's limbs and organs wrapped in newspapers were found in Elysian Park. The horror of the crime shocked the people of Los Angeles and began a nationwide search for the murderer of little Parker.
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Chase the beast
More than 20,000 policemen participated in the search, and the reward for catching the murderer (alive or dead) eventually reached $ 100,000. The evidence collected led the police to William Edward Hickman, a former employee of the First National Bank who also employed Perry Parker.
Hickman was convicted in June 1927 of stealing and forgery of checks (Parker's testimony contributed to this). He served a prison sentence, but after his release, he had great problems with finding a job. Struggling with poverty and the stigma of a condemned man, he decided to take a desperate step - he kidnapped the daughter of a man whom he blamed for his misfortune. The authorities issued an arrest warrant after Hickman. Eventually he was arrested in Oregon; the local police handed him over to California law enforcement.
William Hickman was convicted of the murder of Marion.
William explained that he had kidnapped because ... he wanted to go to college and needed money for tuition fees. He also claimed that it was not him but his accomplice that killed Marion. However, the alleged murderer chosen by Hickman had an indisputable alibi - he was in prison at the time of the crime.
Ultimately, the suspect admitted that the girl recognized him from visits to the bank, thereby signing a death warrant for herself. He was supposed to strangle her first, then cut her to pieces and hide her. Afterwards, however, he realized that he would need Marion alive to collect the ransom, so he decided to stuff her torso and sew her eyes.
Hickman's trial began on January 25, 1928. The man planned to defend himself with madness and thus prove his innocence, but the prosecutor arranged for a team of psychiatrists to confirm that William was sane at the time of the murder. On February 14, 1928, he was sentenced to death by hanging. The sentence was carried out on October 29.
William, after climbing the gallows, fainted when the executioner put a black hood over his head. This, however, did not save him from execution. It was unfortunate that the rope turned out to be too loose. After the release of the trapezoid, the murderer died in agony for 14 minutes before the doctor confirmed his death by asphyxiation.