EPISODE 12: Alone Women
These lonely, lone women, intoxicated and alone: Trelstad, Mondragon and Norton; disappear from the streets of the city.
Abducted on the sidewalk after closing and struck with a tire iron, Viola Norton was not expected to recover.
On May 12 1947 the Velvet Tigress rides again as Winnie Ruth Judd escapes from the Arizona State Hospital for the Insane for the third time in eight years. She surrenders quietly when caught hiding at the edge of an irrigation canal in an orange grove outside of Phoenix Arizona.
The second headline story of the day is a crime of rape and murder. The Los Angeles Daily News refers to the crime as the sixth victim of the season’s sex wave murder.
Note the paper used the word “season” in the same manner as I would say “baseball season” as if body dumping is a Los Angeles sporting event. Crazy use of language. Returning to the facts as reported; the woman is found after dawn in the Signal Hill area of north Long Beach. Her lifeless, still warm body lying face up and spread-eagled in the dust of an oil field access road. She was discovered by a company patrolman coming to work at daybreak. The petite brown haired woman was garroted with a torn cloth strip. This uncommon weapon had a blue and white floral pattern and is early reporting suggested it was torn from a man’s cotton pajamas. Only the Los Angeles Daily News has a photo of the torn colored cotton piece. There is a knot in the middle of the strip, a rope-like draw string still tied in a bow like one would see on a pair of old school board shorts. In the picture in the Daily News the rope is as thick as the detectives finger, half an inch in diameter, a thicker cotton rope one might associate with boating rather than sleepwear. The victim’s expensive peacock blue dress was ripped open and pulled up, her bra and panties were torn, no purse was found and one white open toe shoe was missing. A three-quarter length coat was crumbled underneath her body. Foot prints and tire tracks recorded in the soft dirt of the body dump location indicate the woman was killed elsewhere. Police surmise the clothing was tossed from a vehicle, then the body dragged from the cabin into the ground.
Newspapers highlight Black Dahlia similarities and like many others this woman has been bludgeoned and strangled. This victim was raped but not mutilated. Elizabeth Short was mutilated but not raped, factors that make each murder unique are ignored when papers selling the Werewolf angle to the other Lone women murders. Newspapers need a story that sells papers; and editors know the Black Dahlia headline sold the most papers in recent history. The Los Angeles Daily News claims the Trelstad body like the Black Dahlia, was found in a vacant field. No. Norton Ave was a empty residential lot in suburb area. Not a dirt road next to oil derricks like Trelstad or a gravel pit like Gertrude Landon or adjacent to railroad tracks like Evelyn Winters.
The Hollywood Citizen News says the these other victims were hacked by a sadistic killer like the Black Dahlia. Certainly these are cruel and gruesome murders, only Elizabeth was tortured and bisected and only the killer of the Black Dahlia talks to the press on the phone and mails physical evidence to the police. There is no Lipstick Murder Avenger, no Butcher of Kingsbury Row Avenger.
The Long Beach police hold a press conference at headquarters with evidence present and something interesting happens; the local reporters in the room notice a laundry service tag on the ¾ length coat that lay under victim and the press follows up on that lead to discover the local cleaner and the identity of the victim. She is Laura Trelstad, 5’4” 105 pounds 37 years old. She is mother of three small children; Audrey age 8, Janet age 7 and Tommy age 3. Her husband identifies the body, saying, “Yes that’s Laura.” Tells Police learn from her husband Laura wanted to celebrate and go dancing on Mother's Day. She tells her husband "If you won't take me out on Mother’s Day I’m going to dance by myself.” The body dump location is a mere 12 blocks from their home.
It should be noted that there is a vulnerability for smaller women in these types of crimes. Predators perceive a weaker victim is going to be easier to handle: for example, tiny Louise Springer is only 99 pounds. A smaller victim is affected by alcohol faster. Laura was next seen in the company of three young sailors who entered a tavern on First Street in Long Beach and became friendly with Mrs. Trelstad at the bar. After a few beers, the four leave together. The bartender at the 322 club said while he did not know the names of the sailors, he could easily identify them they had been regular customers over the past 10-days and because the men looked underage, he had examined their Navy identification cards, and he remembers the sailor that paid attention to Mrs. Trelstad had a birth date of April 17, 1926. Police locate Sailor 1st class Harry Packard and arrest him on the 13th and only to release him on next day. Packard stated he took Laura Trelstad to a Huntington Park bus stop. Driver Cleve Dowdy remembers Laura getting on and off his bus. Dowdy is on vacation now in Kansas City when Long Beach police reach him on the phone, Dowdy remembers Trelstad disembarked at 36th street, 14 blocks north of her stop. Trelstad has words with Dowdy about his allowing her to miss her stop. Dowdy recalls a tall well dressed man wearing a snap brim hat followed Laura Trelstad from the bus.
Because a car was used to dump the body, and the tall well dressed man was on foot, police believe the killer lives within walking distance from the bus stop and set up three road blocks, stopping hundreds of cars seeking a tire tread match. It is futile search. Long Beach police locate an ex-con, who had been sent to San Quentin for sexual assault. His return sparked a special interest when the murder occurred. Police note this ex-con quit his job one day before the murder. The Wilmington Press Journal declares this man is the slayer. the Trelstad home is at 2211 Locust Ave. and the oil field dirt road further north at the 3100 block where Mrs. Trelstad's body was found. The ex-con was living in the 14 block area between The home and the dump site. Police are unable locate the ex-con at his address. Nonetheless, Chief Martin announces an arrest is forthcoming. If the ex-con was arrested, it is not announced in the newspapers. With no further statements on the ex-con, I assume the lead was a dead end.
Laura Trelstad has a twin sister, Mrs. Lydia Ramstad of Salem, South Dakota. Mrs. Ramstad is coming to town for her sister's funeral. Police Captain Martin understands she looks just like her sister and plans to take photos of Lydia to show possible witnesses. Mrs. Ramstad agrees to do more, she will accompany Captain Martin on a round of night spots in the vicinity of the crime. When Lydia arrives in Long Beach, the police realize she is not an identical twin and therefore they do not take her out for a dive bar tour of north Long Beach. Police have no more leads.
The next newspaper Black Dahlia reference occurs on May 23rd. Robert Smith is driving along a lonely Norwalk road at night and saw a woman in his headlights. There seems to trouble. The woman is fighting a with a man in a ditch on the side of the road and Smith pulls over. The newspapers will proclaim he has saved her from being the next victim in “the Black Dahlia" sex murder pattern. Mrs. Violet Asher, 43, is bleeding and bitten as the man’s fingernails have shredded her stomach and his teeth have broken thru the skin on her thighs. Mrs. Asher, mother of a 6-year-old boy, tells the reporters interviewing her at General Hospital that she thanks Robert Smith, "If it hadn't been for (him) getting here just then, (that man) would have killed me.” The man’s car drives off when Smith stopped to investigate. Smith remembers the plate number. The police locate Henry Alfred Hampton, 39, a construction worker who lives in north Long Beach. Hampton is arrested at his home on suspicion of rape. Because of similarity of circumstances, Hampton was questioned by Long Beach officers in connection with the mutilation death of Mrs. Laura Trelstad, but Long Beach Police compare the treads on Hampton’s tires to the set of clear tire prints at the Trelstad dump site and find It is not a match. Equally the LAPD dismiss Hampton as a Black Dahlia suspect. Officers say Hampton admitted taking Mrs. Asher from a tavern and going to her North Long Beach home for a drink then later going for a ride. Hampton claimed he was so drunk he unable to recall everything that happened. Mrs. Asher, admits leaving the bar with a man that night but she did not remember the name of her companion.
Now a couple of oddities that are worthy of discussion but are not part of the headline of Robert Smith the hero. When Mrs Asher is taken to the police station, she was booked for intoxication before the details of the violent crime became clear. Mrs. Asher has been in a similar situation previously. In 1944 she declined to prosecute a man on a rape charge; that man was released. After the arrest of Hampton there is no more news of the crime or trial.
July 8th 1947 is another day of two headlines. The headline in the San Bernardino Sun: Flying Disc Found: In Army Possession. The Roswell UFO story breaks. The other headline on the front page is that of the murder of young woman tossed into the street from a moving car, northeast of downtown Los Angeles. The headline in the Daily News. Girl, 20, slain in L.A. Mutilation Crime A young woman is found just before dawn a dozen blocks from City Hall on North Main Street. Newton Josha, a postal clerk found the nude body laying in the gutter on North Main near an elementary School. She has been strangled by her silk stocking. The woman’s breast was macerated into pulp. She has been struck in the face. The deep lacerations on her back were likely caused when the body was thrown out of a moving automobile as it headed south on Main St. The young woman is identified as Mrs. Rosenda Mondragon, age 20. She had been arrested for drunkenness the year prior. When police removed the silk stocking, they notice Rosenda wore a Catholic medallion meant to protect the wearer from harm.
William Moore, described in the paper as a vegetable store clerk, told investigators he saw Mrs. Mondragon call a taxi from his store at Mission and North Main. It is 2:15 a.m. A man in his late 20s drives up in a 1936 dark green coupe, asked William Moore for directions. Rosenda suggests the man might wish to drop her off at Ninth and San Pedro. He agrees. Moore said the girl canceled the taxi call and got into the stranger’s car at approximately 2:30 a.m. The body is found in the street at 3:50 a.m. Police put out a description in a bulletin seeking that driver; a husky male with light hair, 28 to 33 years old.
Rosenda’s sister in law, Mrs. Trinidad Vigil, told investigators that Rosenda had been separated from her husband. Rosenda and Tony were quarreling as he was served with divorce papers earlier in the day. Around 2 a.m. An intoxicated Rosenda showed up at Tony’s home and argued with him for 20 minutes. When she left claiming to have a date, Tony attempted to follow her. Tony Mondragon is booked on suspicion of murder. He is questioned at length and given a lie detector test. His car is checked by the crime lab for evidence of blood. The police find the other silk stocking, one block from where the body was dumped. Several blocks further, police locate children playing “dress up” with Rosenda’s blood-stained coat dress. Police still seek her black suede shoes and undergarments. The coroner concludes Rosenda had not been raped. Concussion and strangulation are the causes of death. Tony Mondragon tells police when he tried to follow Rosenda after she left his home, he never caught up to her but saw Rosenda get into a strange automobile at Eastlake Ave and North Main. Police conclude Tony Mondragon not a suspect and he is released. That is the end of news cycle for this silk stocking murder.
The most compelling Black Dahlia related victim is one you have likely not heard of: 36 year old Viola Norton. was attacked late night Friday the 13th. Abducted and bludgeoned; her body dumped in Leimert Park. Yet her experience merited only a few paragraphs on one day in the newspapers of Valentine's Day 1948. Paul Norton expected to have dinner with his estranged wife. He waited in the restaurant, Viola did not show. Paul then went to her rooming house and waited for an hour. Viola did not show. It seems Viola is spending the evening drinking a bar close to her rooming house. Viola leaves the bar at 2:am and two men in their forties offer to give her a ride. Viola declines. The men respond by throwing her in the back seat of their light blue sedan and hitting her in the head with a tire iron. Her abductors drive with the bleeding body in the back seat to the westside of Los Angeles. This is a long journey, It’s 2 am. after bar closing, police are on the lookout for drunk drivers and odd behavior and these two men take a 40 minute drive to Leimert Park from Alhambra. Why? The best answer is this attempted murder is a copy cat crime. I think it is clear these two men planned a Black Dahlia type body dump murder. I doubt that the two men who abducted Viola introduced themselves or asked Viola for her last name. These men are driving toward Norton Ave with Viola Norton in the back seat. Early Valentine’s Day morning a homeowner in Leimert Park finds Viola in her backyard, unconscious with a coat thrown over her head. The house at 3997 Westside Ave is five blocks east of Norton Ave. Viola’s stockings are ripped. One of her shoes is found near a pool of blood in the driveway of the adjacent house. Her empty purse found three doors further up the street. Likely Viola was thrown from the car where there is blood in the driveway at 3991 Westside Ave. then Viola escaped to the Schmitt backyard next door. Mrs. Norton has been struck in the skull with a such force that her head is split open and her brain was visible. Viola initially is not expected to live. Paul Norton identifies Viola in the hospital. Her memory of the evening is faint. She remembers two bits; a blue car and two men… I wonder why the two men do not leave the body on Norton Ave? Interesting question…are the two men from Alhambra a bit lost in a strange neighborhood? Or are they afraid of being framed for the first crime? They might fear that someone is watching the Black Dahlia site. There is no further reporting on Viola Norton. She has not been raped. She survives her attack, like Asher. This abduction and bludgeoning is not recorded by the papers as a Black Dahlia related lone murder because she lived. Yet it is very much related as dumping of the body in Leimert Park suggests, this is the Black Dahlia inspired murder. These two men are the most evil and brutal Black Dahlia volunteers. All of these women discussed in this episode; Trelstad, Mondragon, Asher and Norton were significantly intoxicated late at night and were approached because they appeared to be easy prey. Elevated alcohol levels are critical factors in the Jeanne French and Evelyn Winters murders.
Being sober didn’t save Elizabeth Short or Louise Springer or Gladys Kern. Alcohol plays no role in those deaths and to me that is indicative of a very different predator. The commonality for these unsolved crimes is they were killed by strangers. And that made it very difficult for the 1947 police who start with the husband, then expand the investigation by looking for a someone with a connection to the victim. Tangentially, when we examine the circumstances under which the two lone women victims who disappeared, Jean Spangler and Mimi Boomhower, I assume the bodies were hidden because the killers were known by the victims, and connections could be made. If there is no body, there is no murder, just a missing person. Of all of these 1947 and 1948 victims, only the Black Dahlia case has a killer invest a significant amount of time and effort before, during and after death. Of the four victims discussed in this podcast; Trelstad, Mondragon, Asher and Norton, only Mondragon gets a newspaper moniker. The Herald calls it the Silk Stocking murder. No other paper picks up on using a moniker; not the Daily News or the Valley Times, not the Metropolitan Star News or Hollywood Citizen News, not the San Bernardino Sun or the Los Angeles Times.
The Silk Stocking Murder has been used before many many times as a moniker. There was a Silk Stocking Murder headline reported by newspapers in 1916 Philadelphia, 1931 Georgia, 1932 Dallas, 1936 San Francisco, 1937 Manhattan, 1941 Toronto, 1949 Troy, New York, 1949 London, England, and a Silk Stocking Murder in 1951 Sausalito, Ca.
I point this out because these Examiner monikers purposely mimic the titles of pulp detective stories: the Torso Murder, the Lipstick Killer, The Butterfly Murder; this is why I ignore the narrative about flowers in the headlines. These monikers sound like paperback noir titles because they are written for the same audience. There was, in fact, a detective novel of the month called the Silk Stocking Murder published in 1928. Paperback pulp fiction offers a known and expected narrative, the victim is beautiful young naked and unaware of the pending danger. Facts bend when the newspaper story is delivered in the form of fiction. The power of a mysterious moniker to create a sense of adventure and curiosity is clear; who is the Lone Ranger, who is the Shadow, who is Jack the Ripper?
Because the Black Dahlia is the victim and not the killer, suddenly the mystery evolves into questions about the victim. Who is the Black Dahlia? How did she get her name? How could she be missing for seven days? Who did she know who could have tortured and severed her? Because the Black Dahlia has the moniker, Elizabeth’s journey in death becomes more legend driven than person driven. And the way our minds work, a person must be important in order to have become a legend. This noir narrative creates an expectation that there must be an important reason the murder was not solved. This belief in myths of forces conspiring in 1947; The idea that “Important People” must have not wanted the case solved because of lawless mobsters, police corruption and payoffs. Elizabeth Short was not important. Elizabeth Short was a nobody but the Black Dahlia is a legend. This notoriety is incorrectly referred to as ironic; that a wannabe actress becomes famous in death. Elizabeth couldn’t become the Black Dahlia unless she was young and a nobody. The Black Dahlia legend would not exist if Elizabeth Short were a 37 year old mother of three.
When speaking about the Dahlia myth I have been equating myths with lies. Defining a myth is a widely held but false beliefs such as, Elizabeth Short was an actress and Robert Manley was the last person to see her alive. Those are lies. There is another meaning of a myth, one every screenwriter knows; Joseph Campbell’s A Hero’s Journey. The myth as fable; folklore that serves to explain a greater truth. The myths that we create, the lies we tell ourselves reveals how our culture comes to terms with the disturbing and dark corners of human behavior. Our culture is drawn to unsolved mysteries. There are myths to explore in our armchair detective movies and TV shows.
This story that Beth is hopeful actress is a myth she tells herself, one she writes about in her letters to friends and family and one speaks about when introduced to strangers. She tells others she dreams of Hollywood.
When we define Beth by her actions, it is evokes a myth of fear. As Elizabeth Short turns south on Olive Street the night of Jan 9th 1947, Where is she going? No friend to greet her, no job, no home to go to. What is her purpose, what is her journey? How does a homeless drifter come home? Beth disappears into the unknown. Disappearing is a disturbing fate.
Elizabeth Short walks into the dead of night; that is the powerful myth, a journey to nowhere imposes the discomforting idea that life has no meaning. Death means nothing. No closure, only silence. Our myths succeed even when our dreams fail as they must because we are not who we think we are. This fear that we will not reach our potential is exponentially true in the land of movie stars. The Hollywood false myth of the moth and the flame succeeds because it offers a digestible piece of the puzzle, it gives direction and brings purpose to Beth’s actions and elevates her death to a tragic level. She could have, should have been somebody and so tell us more. It is human nature to dream to be more than we are. For Elizabeth Short, we hear her dream but we see her inaction. Unless the dreamer is a doer, there is insufficient drama; a drifter passing is not tragedy. Hollywood did not make or break Beth. One of Beth’s young boyfriends in Medford when interviewed said, “ I told her I wanted to wash the makeup off her face, wanted her to be her natural self. She was a loner. And seemed to be floating, wandering with no direction.”
Remembering the out of town article with the headline, Even Los Angeles Was Shocked, written by Jim Murray and published in the St. Louis newspaper, Beth was described as “trapped and haunted” “desperate and unwanted”. The underlying theme is Hollywood is a den of sinners , as if Elizabeth Short is doomed as soon as she gets off the bus. This “out of town myth” is key in my final Black Dahlia volunteer example. Lita Gustin, 21, argues with her husband on the evening of Sunday June 15th. She is so enraged, Lita leaves the house, goes downtown and gets on an out of town bus. Her impromptu flight leaves her at the Fresno bus station at 2 a.m. With few options, Lita sleeps on a bench until daybreak and walks to town. A man in his 30’s picks her up in picnic area of a public park and drives her to a tavern then to the outskirts of town and sexually assaults her in an empty swimming pool, threatening to cut her “like that other Los Angeles girl, that Black Dahlia.” An amazing statement that the local man suggests Mrs Gustin a mother of two, deserves the Black Dahlia fate because she too is from Los Angeles.
There are so many volunteers in the Black Dahlia case; the hundreds of men and women that confessed; the hundreds of false leads called into the police, the people who wrote notes to the police pretending to be the killer and the men that picked up women and instructed them to not get out of line or they would end up like the Black Dahlia and the thugs that tried to copy cat kill Viola Norton. People still volunteer today when they dress up like the Black Dahlia for Halloween and folks at the party will recognize the heavy pancake make-up, the flower in the hair and the bloody wound that is the Joker smile. I imagine folks at a party will not consider the lack of wisdom in dressing up as a violently attacked victim. It’s Hollywood after all. Make-up is a career. A wannabe has no days off, auditions are 365 days and nights a year.
I wonder if those in costume think they are dressing in character because there was a Black Dahlia movie; so it’s allowed, no different from dressing up as the evil clown, Pennywise or being a Sexy Zombie, the Black Dahlia is a movie character that plays Elizabeth Short in death.
No one goes to a costume party dressed like Nicole Simpson or Sharon Tate. Why is the Black Dahlia ok? Part of the answer is that the trope of Elizabeth Short is distinctly different from the trope of the Black Dahlia. Elizabeth Short is the naive girl from the country that comes to the city to seek her fortune. The Trope of the Black Dahlia is the Chanteuse. The doomed night club singer; such a common character in film noir movies. A sultry melodramatic performer; worldly, troubled and fragile, emotionally distant and sexually available as she beckons in the slit dress under the smoke filled spotlight. The singer is beautiful and unattainable. She is the bird in the cage. The detective/hero falls for her knowing the affair is doomed from the beginning. Think of Isabella Rossellini in Blue Velvet. David Lynch knows what he was doing with that “Dahlia” inspired look he gives to the character Dorthy Vallens. It is worth looking at the photos on my web page that compare Isabella and Elizabeth.
One more film noir movie to discuss there is a scene in the Sunset Boulevard where William Holden’s character arrives late to the New Year’s Eve party and Jack Webb says to him ”I almost reported you to the Bureau of Missing Persons. Fans, you all know Joe Gillis, the well-known screen writer, opium smuggler and Black Dahlia suspect.” Billy Wilder started writing this script in mid 1948 and finished a year later. Think of this then, Elizabeth Short is killed in January 1947 and after a year and a half, enough of the horror has worn off by this parade of confessors and volunteers so that “Black Dahlia suspect” is a throw away remark in the quintessential Hollywood movie. I enjoy how this impactful film noir celebrates the cynical black humor that is part of the unique language of Los Angeles culture. The movie used the Black Dahlia suspect as a clever name for a raconteur, a man about town. Remember multiple times the newspaper will describe a large number of police officers are going to bars in Hollywood asking questions. When the LAPD was looking for LYNN Martin it was stated that 1,000 officers followed the Black Dahlia nightlife trail. I imagine it would be a badge of honor for a certain type of fellow if the police quizzed them about being a Black Dahlia suspect. This noir angle to the myth of the Black Dahlia continues in a true crime pulp magazine, as Dr. DeRiver publishes his thoughts on the Black Dahlia in the October 1948 issue of True Detective magazine. A man in Florida corresponds with DeRiver. Thus begins a situation that will end badly for everyone and is the focus of the 13th and final podcast.
Three last things. Two short things and one long last thing before I go.
First Thank you for listening. I am delighted to have so many listeners all over the world: Australia is the winner with one-third of my total listeners. Mexico, Canada, Spain, United Kingdom, South Africa India and Japan. Wow. Great to see. I want to make a special shout out to Scotland. As my name is Scott, I am pleased to see so many Scots are listening. Scots like to keep score so here are the current listener numbers: Glasgow 49, Edinburgh zero. Another win for Glasgow, city of art and of culture.
I appreciate the emails I’ve received. If you have been enjoying the podcast, consider leaving a review on the apple podcast listing.
Second thing: nicknames. Jack Levin, Professor of Sociology and Criminology at Northeastern University in Boston comments, “…once they are identified with a superstar moniker, the… frequency of murder increases”. When serial killer has been assigned a nickname they embarrass that identity and need to maintain and build upon their legend. Levin is referring to the category of organized serial killers because they are media focused.
Third thing: the mob myth. Gangster Jack Dragna lives in Leimert Park in 1947. 3927 Hubert Street is 6 blocks away from Norton Avenue dump site. Drag a is a competitor to Mickey Cohen. The hypothesis that Cohen killed Elizabeth Short as a message to his rival. It is not. 6 blocks. How is that a warning? Viola Norton was dumped in Leimert Park, did that have any message for Jack Dragna? No. If gangsters want to send a clear message they would drop the body in his front yard. Or put only bottom half of the body in his driveway. That would be most disquieting. What evidence exists that Dragna might have known Beth Short? None. How would a successful mobster used her as part of his organization? Beth is a asthmatic unemployed flighty 22 year old girl. Beth, who’s lived in Hollywood for 108 days doesn’t smoke and rarely drinks; Beth lets servicemen buy her dinner at the Italian Kitchen and the Pig N Whistle and goes to live radio broadcasts at CBS. How could Elizabeth Short become someone that Jack Dragna would know? How could she get close to Jack Dragon in 108 days for him to care if she was alive or dead? There is no proof or indication that Beth played any role in the Los Angeles underworld of vice or gambling. There are some threads of evidence related to marijuana use in her circle of activity. She is not a marked for a hit because she knew too much. Who knows Beth? Bartenders, head-waiters, head-ushers and roommates. There is no sign of agenda in her murder other than the desires of one lust killer. Her murder is unsolved just like 38% of murder cases are unsolved today.
Until the next podcast.
1 Wilmington Daily Press Journal 16 May 1947, Fri • Page 1
2 Most articles do not mention the time of day Smith recuses Asher. SF Examiner says she was “abducted” at night Sun, May 25, 1947 · Page 21
3 San Bernardino County Sun 25 May 1947, Sun • Page 1
4 Sacramento Bee, July 9, 1947 • Page 4
5 Los Angeles Times, July 10, 1947 • Page 12
6 one block west of Welland Ave witness (Walter Johnston)
7 Pasadena Independent 15 Feb 1948, Sun • Page 10
8 Childhood Shadows – The Hidden Story of the Black Dahlia Murder. Mary Pacios – quoted young man is unnamed mutual friend of Bette and Mary.
9 Valley Times (North Hollywood) 17 Jun 1947, Tue • Page 2
10 United States Dept of Justice; The FBI Uniform Crime Report estimates that investigators were able to close only 62% of murders and only 35% of sexual assaults in 2017.
The Black Dahlia plays the role the of a chanteuse in the Los Angeles Noir myth.