The Mammoth Book of Unsolved Crimes

by Wilkes, Roger

  But hadn’t he been idle during the demise of each of his television series and Super Dad?

  “No,” he replied. “I had an extremely hectic time. I was all over the place. I did some specials, I hosted some local TV shows. I was master of ceremonies for top events, like beauty pageants, and picked up good money doing it. I flew to New Zealand for a convention of prisoners of war because of the other series. I taped radio shows and took part in sports events. I did some stage work and came back to Hollywood to do some pilot shows for series that never made it to air.”

  There were some rumors at the time of Super Dad that the Disney Studios had some misgivings after signing him for the film because of Crane’s un-Disneylike offscreen image.

  “Yeah, yeah,” he replied in a brush-off sort of way, “I read about that, too. But nobody at the studio really said anything. I mean, not officially. They didn’t know about my hobby of playing the drums in topless – bottomless bars around town!”

  Very un-Disneylike behavior, to say the least.

  “But,” he continued, “what was wrong with that? I loved sitting in with small groups to play the drums and naturally I like looking at those naked ladies. I’m a normal, red-blooded guy and I was only looking,” he emphasized, “at those ladies. I wasn’t doing anything with them. It happened that they were at the places where I could play drums.”

  A month following the murder, law enforcement officials in other agencies expressed private concern about the Scottsdale Police Department and its ability to handle the high-profile and complex murder investigation of such a prominent person. The city, it should be pointed out because of its size, did not have a “central” homicide bureau, or detective squad. The same detectives who investigated burglaries, robberies and other crimes, also investigated the few murders that were committed in the retirement city.

  One private investigator voiced an opinion that Crane’s killing could have been a “murder for hire” by a cuckolded husband. Because noise was a factor, as in the Vicki Morgan killing, a bludgeon-type weapon was used. But the PI could not come up with a motive with the exception of the “cuckold syndrome” which a lot of people had come up with when the news of the videotapes and still pictures came out.

  The Scottsdale police were bombarded with “theories” but came no closer to solving the murder of Bob Crane. A man of Crane’s prominence, involved as he was with sex and porno films, invited conjecture about jealous husbands and lovers.

  Such stuff, said the police, was the grist for tabloids; not serious police work. Theories were also advanced from Hollywood that the husband or boyfriend of one of Crane’s paramours who possibly “starred” on one of the tapes, “ordered” the hit and then managed to have it hushed up in the Arizona city. The oligarchy tentacles had been known to reach that far—and farther.

  Crane’s lifelong friend, John Carpenter was, for a time, the number one suspect in the killing. While the Maricopa County District Attorney would not confirm—at least for the record—that the Los Angeles businessman was the “prime suspect,” other sources confirmed at the time that he was.

  When Carpenter was reached at his Los Angeles office, he was speechless when told the news by a reporter. “I’m shocked. Completely shocked,” he said. Carpenter declined any further comment until he had consulted with a lawyer.

  Carpenter had volunteered the information to the police that he was probably the last person to see the actor alive or talk to him the day (or early morning) he was killed.

  Crane, said Carpenter, finished his Wednesday evening performance, as usual, around 10:30 p.m. As was his custom, he hung around the lobby for several minutes chatting with fans, something he liked to do, and signing autographs.

  Friends say he was tired. Very tired. It wasn’t a large crowd that night. In fact, the play, which was owned by Crane, had not drawn more than half a house for three weeks. The theatre management told Crane that it was cutting his five-week run short by a week.

  This did not upset Crane, and he was looking forward to a week off. His friend, Carpenter, had flown in a few days earlier on business, and to visit Crane. He was staying at the Sunburst Hotel, not far from the Winfield Apartments.

  When he left the theatre Wednesday night, Crane told a theatre employee he was going to go home, even though a woman and her girlfriend were at the performance that night at Crane’s invitation.

  Carpenter said that Crane did return to the Winfield and received a call from his wife. As the conversation was rancorous and loud, neighbors in the apartment complex heard the ruckus and parts of the conversation.

  Crane and Carpenter then went to an East Phoenix bar with the two women whom they had arranged to meet (after stopping off at Crane’s apartment). At 2 a.m. all went to the Safari, where Carpenter said he had last seen his friend around 2:30 a.m. before leaving for his hotel to pack and catch an early morning flight to Los Angeles. Carpenter said he also telephoned Crane when he got back to the hotel. The subject of the call was not disclosed, except that the major reason was to say goodbye.

  Carpenter checked out of the Sunburst Hotel “very hurriedly” early the next morning, said a hotel employee. He seemed nervous and demanded a limousine to take him to the Sky Valley Airport in Phoenix. None was available so the desk called him a cab.

  About 2:30 p.m. from Los Angeles on Thursday afternoon, Carpenter called the theatre and asked for Crane. An employee told Carpenter she didn’t know where Crane was and suggested he call the theatre’s other office. The girl said as the call was long distance, she would check for him. Carpenter held on and in a few minutes was told Crane was not there. The employee then checked with the Winfield and learned the news from Victoria Berry who told her what had happened. The employee relayed this information to Carpenter who hung up aghast at the news.

  The police investigation stumbled along at The Windmill. Employees said the police were not even aware of the theatre’s “second office” referred to in Carpenter’s call to the theatre. They were never even told of Carpenter’s inquiries until much later in the investigation.

  Also, the police only made a cursory inspection of Crane’s dressing room at the Windmill and one of the employees was entrusted to pick up Crane’s personal belongings.

  On Thursday evening, Crane’s eldest son, Robert, and Lloyd Vaughan, Crane’s business manager, the man who handled all of Crane’s business and financial affairs, arrived in Scottsdale and talked to the police about the situation. Vaughan, the police said, appeared to be very nervous and preoccupied and just going through the motions of tending to business. He put it down to being very upset over his client’s death.

  According to Vaughan, the next day police took them to Crane’s living quarters at the Winfield. They gave Vaughan and Robert a bottle of wine and some beer from the refrigerator which, to anyone’s knowledge, were never checked for fingerprints. (At least no one noticed any “dusting powder” on the bottles). They allowed the two men to pack all of Crane’s belongings in suitcases that were already in the apartment.

  Sources both inside and outside the Scottsdale Police Department say none of the items were checked for fingerprints and the murder weapon was never found. This could not be confirmed and the police may be withholding information on prints in case the murderer is ever caught. The trunks of rental cars at the airport should have been checked for missing or bloody lug wrenches. One rental car was checked at the Phoenix airport but the results were never made known. We understand that they did lead to a suspect, however, who did not hold up.

  All in all, everyone connected with the case agreed that the police bungled it and conducted a very inept investigation. Most outsiders feel a suspect should have been arrested within forty-eight hours of the murder.

  None of the following questions have ever been satisfactorily answered:

  How did the murderer gain entrance to the apartment? There were many keys given out over the years to various performers. Was a window left unlatched, a door unlocked from
an earlier visitor? Crane always double-locked the door when he went to bed;

  Why did the police not try to track down the bottle of Scotch found in the apartment? Why was it not “dusted” for fingerprints. (If it was “dusted,” then the police are not saying what they found);

  It was a well-known fact that Crane never kept any spirits in the apartment. He seldom drank anything except an occasional beer and orange juice and vodka. If this is the case, who brought the Scotch to the Winfield? Did the police check the drinking preferences of Crane’s close friends—or visitors?

  Were all the “players” in the videotapes showing Crane having sex with many different women ever checked out AND their husbands and/or boyfriends for possible motives?

  What was in Crane’s “Little Black Bag” with all the zippers that was so important to the murderer that he took it out of the closet where it was always kept and rummaged through it on the bed next to Crane’s lifeless body?

  All the Scottsdale Police would say about the “black bag” was that when they found it on the bed, all it contained was “a few personal items.” Otherwise, it was almost empty.

  On 11 June 1981, officials of the Maricopa County Attorney’s office and the Scottsdale Police confirmed what the unseated County Attorney, Charles Hyder, had maintained all along:

  “There was simply not enough evidence to charge anyone with the crime!”

  As part of his successful campaign platform to unseat Hyder at the previous November election, County Attorney Tom Collins promised Scottsdale that he would take another look at “the Bob Crane murder case.”

  Some Scottsdale Police officers who investigated the 1978 homicide were disgruntled and threw their election support to Collins because of this campaign pledge. They were disgruntled because charges were not filed by Hyder and his staff against a man they suspected in the killing.

  A County Attorney’s investigator and the Police completed “another look” at Crane’s killing on 11 June 1981.

  Major Dave Townsend of the Scottsdale Police Department said that the review added another “key suspect” to the case, a woman. He would not reveal her identity.

  “However,” said Townsend, “both offices [Police and County Attorney] agree there is not enough evidence to file any charges. I am,” he concluded, “very satisfied with the present County Attorney’s attempts to help in this investigation.”

  Townsend concluded his remarks that the investigation will never be closed until someone is charged with Crane’s murder. It would appear at this late date that it will be a cold summer day in Scottsdale before this occurs.

  Today, the killer of Bob Crane still walks free—probably on the streets of Beverly Hills or Los Angeles. Crane is, many believe, the victim of a husband or boyfriend of a wife or a girlfriend who was “featured” in one of the sex tapes discovered in the apartment—and that a particular tape was stashed in the little black bag.

  Or …

  “The killer will never be free from the guilt of that act,” said Gary Maschner of the Scottsdale Police Department. And Maschner hopes that “someday that guilt will one day break open the murder case,” he said in June, 1984, the sixth anniversary.

  “The killer has got to live with it,” said Maschner. “Knowing what I do about random murderers or first time killers—it preys on his mind every time he thinks about it.”

  Maschner also says he thinks the killer has tried to contend with the guilt by confessing to somebody. “People like to talk; people need to talk.”

  But until the Scottsdale Police get some new information, their investigation of the case will remain stymied.

  “As for now,” said County Attorney Collins, “there’s nothing new.”

  Collins said that new “leads” come in every week, but none of them lead anywhere but to a dead end. “Just a couple of weeks ago,” he laughed, “someone ‘confessed’ to the murder, but we later proved they couldn’t be the murderer because of some evidence we have held back from the press and public,” he said.

  What the police do know to date is this—and it is all the information they will release:

  Crane was last seen alive on the morning of 29 June 1978, at 2:45 a.m. by patrons in the Safari Coffee Shop in Scottsdale, and by John Carpenter.

  Crane’s body was found at 2:20 p.m. the following afternoon in the Winfield Apartments, which are now the Winfield Place Condominiums at 740 East Chaparral Road, Scottsdale.

  There was no sign of a forced entry and the front door was unlocked when Victoria Berry arrived at 2:20 p.m. There were no signs of a struggle.

  The police have always been drawn to one suspect in Crane’s murder, and they still lean towards that suspect, the last known person to see Crane alive and talk to him.

  The police have never had enough conclusive evidence to convince the County Attorney’s office that the suspect should be indicted.

  The Scottsdale Police probably did bungle the investigation at the start as many people and outside law enforcement agencies say.

  But there is also the possibility that Bob Crane “entertained” the wife or girlfriend of some powerful figure in the oligarchy. Many in Scottsdale believe this may be the case and, therefore, the police department AND the County Attorney have “backed off” filing any charges.

  On the other hand, Scottsdale, Arizona, is a very close-knit retirement community in the Arizona desert. It is a wealthy area and it is highly possible that Crane could have also “entertained,” and featured in living color on a videotape, the wife and/or girlfriend of one of Scottsdale’s leading citizens, with access to many sources of information and the seat of power in Scottsdale.

  Nevertheless, it would appear that now, over ten years after his murder, the killer of Bob Crane will never be brought to justice—unless the killer confesses, or gives himself absolution on his deathbed by confessing to the crime. Either of the latter two options seems highly unlikely.

  But as the American theologian Tyron Edwards wrote in the 19th Century:

  Sinful and forbidden pleasures are like poisoned bread; they may satisfy appetite for the moment, but there is death in them in the end.

  It may well have been “poisoned bread and forbidden pleasures” that were the catalysts which precipitated the murder of Bob Crane.

  But Hollywood and television are the losers for the loss of the witty, brash and personable high school dropout from Waterbury, Connecticut. His murder, and who did it, might always be considered another of Hollywood’s unsolved mysteries.

  Editor’s Postscript

  John Carpenter was arrested in 1992, fourteen years after the murder of Bob Crane. Cold-case investigators had concluded that fragments of tissue from Crane’s brain, found in the car Carpenter had rented on the murder night, matched those found at the murder scene. But the evidence had not improved with age: the tissue existed only in photographs. After a two-month trial, John Carpenter was found not guilty and he died in 1998 aged seventy, leaving Bob Crane’s murder unsolved.

  MURDER HATH CHARMS

  (Edwin Bartlett, 1875)

  Christianna Brand

  The case of Adelaide Bartlett is one of a clutch of Victorian poisoning dramas that galvanized the British murder-reading public during the closing years of the nineteenth century. There mere several crowd-pleasing features: the accused woman, at thirty, was still young and presentable, born in France, and the widow of a prosperous grocer ten years older than she was. Adelaide was accused of murdering him with liquid chloroform. The fact that she had slept with her husband’s brother within a year of her marriage furnished a further frisson. Although acquitted, most observers of the case believe that Mrs Bartlett was a very lucky woman. Her case has prompted a number of full-length books, including a novelised interpretation by the crime writer Julian Symons, Sweet Adelaide. This miniature treatment first appeared in 1974, in a collection of (mostly fictional) short crime stories by the detective writer Christianna Brand (1909–88). Her mystery novels (including Green
for Danger, which was filmed starring Alistair Sim) appeared over a period of some forty years. She also wrote books for children, most notably Nurse Matilda (1963), illustrated by her cousin Edward Ardizzone.

  Murder hath charms, we must confess, for those of us not too closely brushed against it; and how much more so “when a lady’s in the case”—those delicious pouter-pigeon ladies who so closely followed each other into the dock in the latter half of the last century: with their bosoms and their bustles and their tight little waists, all starry-eyed. And when, furthermore, the truth of their innocence or guilt must now be for ever in doubt—they are surely irresistible? Mrs Bravo so plump and pretty, lacing the wine or the water with antimony—did she or didn’t she? Poor Florence Maybrick, adding to her elderly husband’s already sufficient consumption of aphrodisiac arsenic—did she or didn’t she? And Adelaide, sweet Adelaide, with her great big brown eyes and her great big brown bottle of chloroform—did she or didn’t she … ? We shall never know now.

  It was in the year 1875 that the friends of Miss Adelaide Blanche de la Tremoille purchased for her a husband—in the shape of a Wicked Grocer named Edwin Bartlett, who thenceforward kept her in a cage most cruelly all day—and in a separate bed most cruelly all night. Or so said Adelaide, on trial for his murder eleven years later. For he believed that a man should have two wives, one for use and one for companionship; and Adelaide, he explained to her, was to be the one for companionship.

  To add to the improbability of her name, Adelaide Blanche de la Tremoille was, as Miss Austen would say, the natural daughter of Somebody—rich enough to have provided for her adequately, “decent enough to have wished for concealment”. She was nineteen when the marriage was arranged but Edwin, having “a reverential regard for advanced learning” of which he himself had very little, packed her off to boarding school for the next three years and only then received her permanently into his home. He had invested his own purchase price in the family grocery business and now had a chain of flourishing shops. They set up house in rooms over one of these establishments in Herne Hill.