Black Dahlia Avenger: The True Story

by Steve Hodel

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  "plastic coating--"

  "mirror film--"

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  "to her--"

  "Remember--"

  The use of these double-spaced dashes is such a rarity that their appearances in the Bauerdorf note and in my father's letter to me set off a loud alarm.

  Exhibit 56 shows how the original note appeared in the September 21, 1945, Examiner article along with Georgette's photograph. A separate Los Angeles Times article on the same date informed readers that detectives believe red iodine stains visible on the typed paper were placed there by the suspect to represent blood.

  Exhibit 56

  Los Angeles Examiner, September 21, 1945

  Gladys Eugenia Kern (February 14, 1948)

  On February 17, 1948, Los Angeles Times headlines again blared news of the city's latest murder:

  WOMAN SLAIN IN HOLLYWOOD

  MYSTERY; POLICE SEEK ANONYMOUS

  NOTE WRITER

  The victim was fifty-year-old real estate agent Gladys Eugenia Kern, who was stabbed to death while showing a house to a potential buyer. Her body was found two days later at 4217 Cromwell Avenue in the exclusive Los Feliz section of the Hollywood Hills, by another real estate agent who was showing the house to a client.

  The murder weapon, left at the crime scene by the killer and found in the kitchen sink wrapped in a man's bloody handkerchief, was described as an eight-inch jungle knife of a type used by soldiers during the war. Police found unidentified fingerprints at the crime scene, which, if not lost or disposed of, presumably remain as potential evidence in the unsolved homicide.

  A check of Gladys Kern's movements by LAPD detectives revealed she had last been seen the previous Saturday, Valentine's Day, February 14, meeting with a man at her Hollywood real estate office at 1307 North Vermont Avenue. The manager of a drugstore at the corner of Fountain Street and Vermont Avenue, directly across the street from the victim's office, saw her enter the drugstore at approximately 2:00 P.M. accompanied by a man she described as "having very dark curly hair, and wearing a dark blue suit." The two of them sat at a counter, had a soda, and then left the drugstore together.

  Possibly the last person to have seen the victim alive was radar engineer William E. Osborne, whose laboratory was next door to Mrs. Kern's office. Osborne saw the victim talking with a man at her Vermont Avenue office on February 14, 1948, at approximately 4:00 P.M. The witness told police that at that time, "She put her head in the door of my laboratory and told me she was leaving. There was a tall chap in the office with her." Osborne had the impression that she knew him, because, he told police, "They were talking generalities, not business."

  He provided the following description of the man, which was broadcast by the LAPD as an all points bulletin: "Male, approximately 50 years of age, 6' tall, long full face, graying hair, wearing a business suit with a moderate cut, well dressed and neat, with a New York appearance in his dress and manner."

  After their initial press releases, police told reporters that they had the names of live additional witnesses who had seen the victim with a similarly described individual, but the police did not release their names.

  Two additional witnesses, Japanese gardeners working across the street from the murder scene at the hillside mansion, were located by police and told of seeing "two men coming out of the mansion, and down the steps," on Saturday afternoon, the day of the murder. The gardeners saw the two men get into a parked vehicle and drive off, but the police provided no detailed description of these two suspects or their vehicle.

  During their search of the victim's office, police discovered that a "clients' book" containing Mrs. Kern's appointments and clients' names was missing from her desk. During their search of the victim's desk, police also discovered a small snapshot showing the victim standing with an unidentified man, whom they were attempting to identify.

  The strongest lead in the investigation was a bizarre handwritten note the police received that had been left in a downtown mailbox at 5th and Olive, on Sunday, February 15, the day after the victim's murder and a day before her body was discovered. The note, written on "cheap blank paper," was neither addressed nor stamped but had been folded in half, glued closed, marked "Hurry, give to police," and deposited in a mailbox in the same city block as the Biltmore Hotel. Its condition — glued and folded — was strikingly similar to the earlier Dahlia note left in the downtown cab driver's vehicle that said, "Take to Examiner at once. I've got the number of your cab." In the Dahlia murder, we recall, the suspect alternately directed his notes to both police and the press.

  The Kern note was found by the mailman and given to police. The mailbox, only two city blocks from my father's medical office on 7th Street, was on the same block where another 1947 note (exhibit 28) was left by the Black Dahlia Avenger. That Dahlia Avenger note told police to "Ask news man at 5+ Hill for clue. Why not let that nut go I spoke to said man B.D.A."

  LAPD detectives and forensics experts concluded that the Kern note had most probably been written by the suspect, who, they believed, had altered his handwriting and deliberately used odd phrasing and misspelled words. This note was excerpted, precisely as the writer had spelled and punctuated it, in the Los Angeles Examiner on February 17, 1948:

  I made acquaintance of man three weeks ago while in Griffith Park he seemed a great sport we got friendly friday night asked me if I wanted to make about $300. He said he wanted to buy a home for his family but he was a racketeer and no real estater would do business with him he suggested I buy a home for him in my name then he would go with person to look at property to make sure he liked and I was to tell real estater that he was lending me the cash so he had to inspect and I waited outside after while I went up to investigate, there I found her lying on floor, him trying to take ring off fingers he pulled gun on me and told me he just knocked her out he knew I carried money so he took my wallet with all my money tied my hands with my belt let lay down on sink and attached belt to faucet.

  After he left I got free and tried to revive her I turned her over, I was covered with blood pulled knife out then suddenly I came to I washed my hands and knife then I looked in her bag for her home phone and address then left and ran out while inside I found he put small pocket book in my coat pocket and threw it away, also in my pocket was an old leather strap.

  I knew this man as Louis Frazer he has 36 or 37 Pontiac fordor very dark number plates look like 46 plates but with 48 stickers about 5 ft.-10, Jet black curly hair wears blue or tan garbardine suit told me he was a fighter and looks it I won't rest till I find him I know every place we went together I know that man is my only aliby and without him I feel equally guilty.

  The Examiner article stated that the writer of the note "related that he himself was robbed and bound by the slayer, described as tall, dark and Latin."

  On February 17, 1948, an LAPD police artist obtained a composite drawing of the suspect as described by their unnamed witnesses. The sketch (exhibit 57) was published on the front page of the Daily News of February 18, 1948.

  Exhibit 57

  George Hodel, 1946

  1948 LAPD composite

  George Hodel, 1954

  The above two photographs of George Hodel were taken in 1946 and 1954. The only alteration made to the Hodel photos was the airbrushing out of the mustache, for comparison to the police composite sketch.

  The art of composite drawing in criminal investigations is particularly difficult, as the police artist is required to try and reproduce a physical likeness of the suspect from eyewitnesses' subjective and oftentimes varied verbal descriptions. While these composites frequently take on a generic appearance, in the Kern investigation it is obvious the police artist possessed unusual skill and ability. As can be seen, the overall likeness of the murder suspect bears a strong resemblance to that of Dr. Hodel. Of particular note are: the shape of the face, the nose, and left ear, the Asiatic appearance of the eyes, and the hair highlighting and style.

>   Five days after the Kern murder, the Los Angeles Times reported that a realtor associate of the victim, "A man cloaked in anonymity, a mystery man, possessing vital information, is aiding police in their investigation." The article said the man, who had "intimate details" about the transaction involving the victim and the sale of the house where she was murdered, had agreed to cooperate only if his identity was kept secret. Further, all the documents and papers relating to the sale of the house had disappeared, along with the victim's "client notebook."

  In exchange for the details and information, LAPD detectives pledged not to reveal the informant's name to the public.

  After what would normally seem to have been many strong potential leads pointing to a suspect — the composite drawing, the unidentified photograph of the man found in her office desk drawer, a confidential informant providing police with the identity of the victim's "secret client," various eyewitnesses providing a detailed physical description of the suspect, and a rambling, handprinted note — the Gladys Kern homicide remains in the LAPD files more than fifty years later as an "open" and unsolved case.

  Kern Physical Evidence: Kern Murder Weapon

  As in many homicide investigations, a critical piece of physical evidence would not be discovered until years, if not decades, after the crime. As if by chance, it would surface from an offhand remark made fifty years later, totally unassociated and unconnected to the actual investigation.

  In July 2001, I called Joe Barrett and we met for lunch in Santa Barbara, where Joe reminisced about his old friend Rowland Brown and the comings and goings at the Franklin House in the late 1940s when he was rooming there. He told me the following story:

  You know, Steve, that your brother Mike took a knife from my room there at the Franklin House, and I never got it back. Mike was only about eight or nine years old then and he told me that he "lost it." That was too bad because it had sentimental value to me. A good friend of mine had given it to me when we were overseas during the war years. Mike took it from my room, then he said he was playing with it in the vacant lot next door and must have lost it. That would have been in 1948.

  His words jarred me and, without trying to sound too anxious or too professional, I asked, "What did the knife look like, Joe?"

  "It was a jungle knife," he said. "A Navy buddy of mine, a machinist mate, had made it for me while we were serving together aboard a destroyer, in early 1945."

  "Would you recognize it if you saw it?" I asked him. Joe gave me a quizzical look. "Sure I would. There's not another like it in the world." We parted, and I told him I would send him a photograph I had, "just for curiosity's sake."

  Recalling the unusual description of the murder weapon used in the Gladys Kern murder in February 1948, I immediately pulled the file and searched for the picture.

  It was there! The homicide detective held it in his hands as the press photographer from the Daily News photographed it for the morning edition: a jungle knife precisely as Joe Barrett had described it. I cut off all references to the Kern murder and mailed the picture to Joe.

  Two days later, he called me back. "It is my knife, Steve. What's this all about?"

  "Are you positive, Joe? How do you know it's your knife? Isn't it just like any other jungle knife?"

  His response was measured and firm:

  I'm sure it's mine because he made it especially for me. If I could see the knife itself I could verify it positively, because he machined the handle. The knife had different-colored washers, which I think he had painted like blue and green and red and yellow and orange. He then put some kind of Plexiglas handle over the colored rings and the paint hadn't dried completely so they were smeared inside, but that was fine with me. I can recognize the knife immediately, even though it's been fifty or more years now. Your picture is black and white and the knife has multicolored inserts, which you can't see in the photo. I will draw you a picture of the knife as I remember it with the colors and everything. But Steve, I'm sure it's my knife. What is this all about? Where is it? Where is the picture from?

  Feeling I could no longer keep him in the dark, I told him the knife in the photograph had been used in a murder back in 1948. And though I couldn't provide him with any more information just then, I promised that "all would be made clear in the near future." He reiterated that he would draw as complete a description of the knife as he could, including the colors on the handle, and mail it to me.

  Exhibit 58 is the drawing Joe sent, which I received on July 26, 2001.

  Exhibit 58

  Joe Barrett drawing

  Kern 1948 murder weapon

  Joe Barrett's notations read:

  Steve . ..

  The knife was made for me by Frank Hudson, machinists mate 2nd or 1st aboard DD66 USS Allen (destroyer) sometime early 1945. Frank made several for different shipmates all in this fashion. Can't remember any of the other's names unfortunately.

  Frank was from Wyoming as I recall and would be in his nineties if he's still with us.

  This is an approximation though in the spirit of it 53 years later.

  Joe

  Hopefully, the Kern murder weapon, or a color photograph, remains in police evidence, so that they can be compared to Barrett's artistic rendering.

  Even before this latest discovery, we had a strong case connecting George Hodel to the murder of Gladys Kern: the matching composite, the handkerchief, the witness descriptions, the bizarre letter writing, not to mention that the Franklin house was only a mile from both the crime scene and the place where Gladys Kern was last seen alive. Now here was a witness who, unaware of the crime, positively identified the murder weapon as his own knife, stolen from him, he believed, by my brother Michael, in 1948.

  Unlike Joe Barrett, we can speculate what really happened. Father doubtless found his eight-year-old son in possession of Joe's knife, took it from him, and kept it. Just weeks, or perhaps only days later, he used it in the Kern homicide. Confident that the knife could never be linked to him, he simply left it at the crime scene in the sink after washing off the blood with water and wiping it clean of prints with his white handkerchief.

  Does the LAPD still have the Kern murder weapon in evidence? They should, inasmuch as it is LAPD's policy that "all unsolved homicides remain open until they are solved." If not still in physical evidence, is there a photograph of the knife in the murder book file? Is there a color picture? If not, the evidence reports should detail the color descriptions on the unique handle, as Joe had drawn them for me. Finally, is the knife in police custody handmade, a "one-of-a-kind" due to the smeared colors? If so, it would be distinct from the thousands of factory-tooled jungle knives issued during the war years.

  These are all questions to be answered by LAPD, along with the dozens of others that this investigation has raised. For now, it is enough to know that one witness has corroborated the identity and provided a highly detailed description of what is believed to be the murder weapon. Further, he has traced it to the Franklin House, and linked it to George Hodel.

  The Kern Handkerchief

  In the summaries of the crimes in this chapter, we have been forced to rely on what was reported in the newspapers at the time. But there were facts never reported to the newspapers by the police because it was, and still is, routine for the assigned investigators to withhold many findings from the public, because they often use them later in interviewing suspects and witnesses. Police often reserve information so that it can be used in developing key questions that can be used in polygraph examinations to exclude those who come forward and falsely confess to a crime. The Dahlia murder brought out many such people, most of whom were mentally disturbed or simply seeking momentary celebrity.

  In both the Jeanne French and the Gladys Kern homicides, white handkerchiefs were found near the bodies, which is highly unusual. In my experience — which includes the investigation of more than three hundred homicides — I have never encountered a case in which a suspect left a handkerchief at the scene of his
crime. It is as if this was a "calling card," like dropping an ace of spades on the body. Such information would not normally be released to the public, and if the killer had left his "calling card" at his other crime scenes, it could have been withheld by detectives in many of L.A.'s other unsolved murders.

  Of special interest are the comments about the handkerchief found at the Gladys Kern murder scene. According to the Los Angeles Times of February 21,1948:

  HANDKERCHIEF IN MURDER

  FAILS TO YIELD CLUE

  Only one shred of new information was turned up yesterday at the inquest into the murder of Mrs. Gladys Kern — the killer probably is a man whose laundry is done at home. This deduction was made from testimony given by Police Det. A.W. Hubka.

  Hubka said that when he and Det. Sgt. C.C. Forbes investigated the slaying in the six-room vacant home at 4217 Cromwell Ave., in the Los Feliz district, a balled-up man's handkerchief was found in the kitchen sink near the body. No laundry marks were on it.

  Dr. Hodel did not send his laundry outside to be done because he had a full-time live-in maid, Ellen Taylor, who did all his cleaning and laundering. Like the handkerchief found at the Kern crime scene, and possibly the French and later Newton homicides, his handkerchiefs would be without a laundry mark to aid in any tracing.

  The Murray, Kern, and Bauerdorf homicides are only three of the murders that took place during roughly the same period as the Black Dahlia that, in my opinion, are linked by the same suspect behavior and descriptions, as well as by victim profile.

  Just as compelling are the murders of Mimi Boomhower and Jean Spangler, which also occurred in Los Angeles during the key Dahlia years. Like the above three, they too bear distinctive, perhaps unique, thoughtprints.

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