To take a break from murder…
Best bank robbery of the seond part of the 20th century…
They caught the perps tho, right?
I’ve always found the 1980 Harvey’s Resort Hotel bombing interesting; or more specifically, the bomb used in it. The crime itself is pretty straightforward; man loses a lot in a casino, tries to blackmail money out of them with a bomb. But the bomb he used was something out of a Hollywood thriller, the FBI even has a page on it.
This device was a pretty sophisticated, quite complicated piece of machinery unlike anything we’d seen before, or anybody in the bomb disposal business had ever seen before.
What we know about it afterwards is that it virtually was undefeatable. There were eight fusing systems, as it turned out. The timer simply was one of them. The anti-motion switch was another. The float mechanism was another. The device was enclosed in a metal box and the lid of the box was secured by some flat head screws around the perimeter of the lid. Those screws were attached to wires and contacts so that if they were removed that would detonate the device. There were layers of rubber and metal on the inside of the metal box so that of an entry was attempted–a drilling or some inspection entry was made–that that contact would function the bomb.
In the end they tried defusing it with a shaped charge, which failed and detonated it (nobody died). But as far as I know it’s pretty unique, nobody else has tried to build a bomb with so many traps in it. Especially one that worked. Most bomb builders try to make them as simple and reliable as possible for obvious reasons.
Non-native speakers may have a pass for errors in general, but this specific type of error is something a non-native speaker is unlikely to make, assuming that person learned the usual way: beginning in a classroom.
A non-native speaker of English will make all sorts of spelling errors, including confusing homophones and homonyms, but not ones where contractions are involved. Non-native speakers have a terrible time with their & there, and will throw in a thier for good measure, but do not get they’re confused with the others. They do not make the error “should of” for “should’ve”-- and in fact, will probably stick to “should have” unless they are long-term users of English as a primary language.
The error in this case is of the should of/should’ve nature.
The victim’s friends and some of her family, insisted she would not make the error (albeit, one niece, at least, said she would and did). It’s odd to me that her friends and family would rather see her killer go free than admit she was a C student.
The Omar who was her gardener did not speak French, only Arabic, and was not literate in anything. Not that one would attribute the writing to him anyway, though, because guilty or innocent, why accuse himself?
I think the defense tried to make a case that some 3rd person must have written it, to get the police on the wrong track.
The barricaded door was part of the mystery, though, because if she was at one point strong enough to do that, she probably didn’t think right away that she was dying, and only wrote the message as she felt weaker, meaning that since the door was barricaded first, she must have written it.
If some non-Omar wrote it, and left while she was strong enough to barricade the door, then she was probably also well enough to obliterate a false message.
But at any rate, apparently there were samples of letters or journal writings, or something, where she had actually made that error in her own hand-- maybe not the exact error, with that verb (tuer/to kill), but with some other verb in the same class of infinitives.
So, unlike in a novel, the most likely suspect probably did it. It’s also probably an example of one of those things that happens way more often in fiction, but does occasionally happen in real life-- a dying person leaves a message in their own blood. Creeps me the hell out every time I think of it.
They caught MOST of them IIRC. There was a younger couple also reportedly involved–he was a known petty criminal assosciate and his girlfriend–both were seen at or near the storefront they used to do the tunnelling. They both disappeared entirely before the arrests started. This has fueled the speculation and legend that some of the stuff stolen from the vault was important enough that they were “taken care of” by either the mob of the Royal Family (incriminating photos of the royals behaving badly are part of the legend of what was stolen).
I came in here to mention the Ken McElroy case but I’ve been beaten to it. To me, the most fascinating aspect of this case is that everyone who was involved and/or witnessed it is long in their graves. That means the case will never, ever, be solved.
This far down and nobody’s mentioned the Jeffrey MacDonald murders? I started reading Fatal Attraction on a Friday evening and didn’t put it down until sometime on Sunday. Not surprising, since I was so disturbed I couldn’t get to sleep at night.
Has anyone read Doc, the true story about a friendly country doctor impregating a townful of Mormon women during pelvic exams?
Mark Winger. Long story short, he wanted out of his marriage to Donna and was looking for his “out,” even if it meant murder. His opportunity came when his wife was driven home from the St. Louis airport back to Springfield, IL (about 100 miles) by one Mr. Harrington. Apparently Mr. Harrington upset Donna during the trip by talking about getting high and having orgies.
So here’s where things get interesting: Winger invited Harrington to his home to talk things over, and then he killed them both. He then convinced the cops that Harrington had broken in, in retaliation for Winger having complained to Harrington’s employer.
If I were Harrington and a customer had a complaint about how I did my job, I’d have referred him to my employer, not gone to his house to talk things over. Similarly, if I’m upset with how a person does their job, I’m calling their employer to complain, not inviting them to my house to talk things over.
I have several.
- The Richard Speck murders of 8 student nurses, Chicago, 1967. I was 10 and living in a Chicago suburb, and for a couple days, nobody knew where the killer was. One evening, my friend Karen and I went swimming at the local pool. I had a dime and was to call my mom for a ride home. When the pool closed, I realized I’d lost the dime. The area was poorly lit, so Karen and I decided it was unsafe to stay. The one-mile route home was on a well-lit road, so we walked. My Mom got nervous and drove to get us. She found us near a gas station half-way home. Man, we got in trouble. “There’s a killer loose! What were you thinking?”
As an adult, it still perplexes me that though he murdered the nurses one at a time by taking them to the bathroom and stabbing them, not one of them screamed first.
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The Maria Ridulph murder, Sycamore, Illinois (popl. 5,000-6,000), 1957. (I later attended university just down the road from Sycamore.) Maria was 8 years old the December evening when she and her friend Kathy played on their street. A young man who said his name was “Johnny,” and that he was 24 and single, gave Maria a piggyback ride. Kathy ran into her house to get mittens. When she returned, Maria and “Johnny” were gone. The case got national attention. Five months later and 90 miles away, mushroom hunters found Maria’s remains. Fifty years later, a neighbor, John Tessier (later McCullough) was convicted but was later exonerated. The case remains unsolved.
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The MacDonald murders, 1970. If this one has been listed here, I didn’t see it. As you probably know, Green Beret and physician Jeffrey MacDonald murdered his two daughters, ages 2 and 5 years old, and his pregnant wife, Collette. He claimed a band of hippies broke into the house, attacked him, and killed his family. His wounds were superficial, though a tiny self-administered stab wound (by a scalpel) collapsed a lung. By contrast, Kim and Collette had been viciously beaten and stabbed repeatedly. Kristen, the toddler, had 17 stab wounds in her neck and 17 puncture wounds in her chest.The Manson murders had occurred the previous summer, and MacDonald staged the scene (writing “pig” on the wall with Collette’s blood) to resemble them.
The evidence against him was solid and overwhelming, and MacDonald is still in prison, but a surprising number of people believe he’s innocent. The number of appeals is staggering. It’s one of the most litigated murder cases in US history. (What are the others?) There’s no confirmed motive, though plenty of theories. That missing motive–An amphetamine-induced rage at bedwetting? Collette finding him molesting Kim?–is what fascinates me. What the hell happened?
Beat you to it at 206! 
Thank you! I swore I’d read the entire thread. I don’t know how I missed it.
ETA: I was writing while you posted, that’s how. Thanks again.
It’s easier to use the search function. I tried “Jeffrey in this topic” before I posted my entry and came up empty.
Dammit, I misremembered the title. It’s Fatal Vision, not Fatal Attraction. I must be getting really old! 
From my hometown when I was kid. Pizza delivery driver was sent to a vacant house to deliver a pizza… murdered. Still technically unsolved.
Ditto! I remember reading the Sun-Times every morning and watching the 6pm news and being terrified, especially once the photos of him came out.
Also extremely frightening, in the same region in 1966, was the murder of Valerie Percy, the daughter of soon-to-be Senator Charles Percy, and twin sister of Sharon Percy Rockefeller. It happened maybe 2 or 3 miles from our house. An intruder broke in to their house in the night and stabbed her to death in bed. He ran out and escaped, but was briefly seen fleeing by their stepmother. Though the case has never been solved, recently a very likely theory came out. Has the Valerie Percy Murder Finally Been Solved? | Classic Chicago Magazine
Oh, my gosh! I’d forgotten about that case! I remember my parents and older siblings were pretty upset about it. And it was only 2 or 3 miles from your house? Whoa, that must have been very frightening!
I think my parents voted for Percy. I remember I was happy he got elected because he’d already suffered such a terrible loss. (I was 9, so my reasoning wasn’t always too solid.)
What a terrible crime. Interesting article, though.
Another personal tidbit from the two days Speck was on the loose. Our house was old and didn’t have a shower in the bathroom, so Mom, who was handy like that, made one in the basement: no stall or curtain, just over the drain in the basement floor. Our basement windows had no curtains. That was the fastest shower I took in my life. I kept thinking Richard Speck was out there, probably kneeling on the driveway to ogle my little body in the shower. For about 48 hours, Speck became the bogeyman.
Thanks for reminding me about the Percy murder.
The book is excellent, detailing tensions between Doc Story’s impassioned supporters and the victims and their families (largely Mormon).
One facet it mentioned minimally if at all was 60 Minutes’s coverage of the case before the trial and conviction. As I recall it, 60 Minutes was sympathetic to Story and implied that his accusers were hysterical women and that they had a religious motive (Story was a Protestant opposed to Mormon teachings).
I couldn’t find details of the 60 Minutes feature online to confirm my memory of the segment.
BTW, though Story was convicted of multiple rapes, there were a significant number of women he assaulted who were past childbearing age, and I don’t think there was proof any were impregnated.
What a creep he was.
I was on the fence regarding the Jeffrey McDonald case for many years, but what convinced me that he did it was when someone on another board said she’d lived briefly in a hippie commune around that time, and said that the only hippies she could have imagined saying “Acid is groovy, kill the pigs” would have been portrayed by John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd on the old “Saturday Night Live.”
I do think that the case rivals that of JonBenet Ramsey in the ineptness of the investigation. In short, do I think he did it? Yes. Is the evidence ironclad? No. (I also feel the same way about the Darlie “Silly String” Routier case.)
Back in the '90s, I loaned my copy of the book to a co-worker. The next time I saw her, I asked if she’d taken Doc to bed with her yet. 
Asha Degree, a little girl who left her home in Shelby, NC in the early morning of February 14, 2000. She was seen walking along a highway by a few eyewitnesses, and that was it…until her plastic-wrapped backpack turned up at a construction site over a year later, containing items that didn’t belong to her.
There have been some significant breaks recently, including the seizure of a car matching the color of one thought to be involved, and the search of some property once owned by the suspect(s).
Asha’s school picture (and an age progression) are featured on a missing children segment that runs on the screens at the local gas station’s pumps, so I think about this case a lot.