Boston Strangler

For the 1968 film see The Boston Strangler (film).

Boston Strangler
File:Albert DeSalvo.jpg Mugshot of Albert DeSalvo, who confessed to being the Boston Strangler - although doubts remain.
Details
Victims	13
Span of crimes	June 14, 1962 – January 4, 1964
Country	U.S.
State(s)	Boston, Massachusetts
Date apprehended	?

The Boston Strangler is a name attributed to the murderer of several women in Boston, Massachusetts, United States, in the early 1960s. Though the crimes were attributed to Albert DeSalvo, investigators of the case have since suggested the murders (sometimes known as the silk stocking murders) were not the handiwork of one person.

Victims

First Stage (1962)

• Anna E. Slesers, 55, sexually molested with unknown object and strangled with the cord on her bathrobe; found on June 14, 1962
• Mary Mullen, 85, died from a heart attack but in the confession was said to have collapsed as the strangler grabbed her; found on June 28, 1962
• Nina Nicols, 68, sexually molested and strangled with her nylon stockings; found on June 30, 1962
• Helen Blake, 65, sexually molested and strangled with her nylon stockings; found on June 30, 1962
• Ida Irga, 75, sexually molested and strangled; found on August 21, 1962
• Jane Sullivan, 67, sexually assaulted and strangled with her nylon stockings; found on August 30, 1962

Second Stage (1962-1964)

• Sophie Clark, 19, sexually assaulted and strangled with her nylon stockings; found on December 5, 1962
• Patricia Bissette, 23, sexually assaulted and strangled with her nylon stockings; found on December 31, 1962
• Mary Brown, 69, stabbed and beaten, found on march 9, 1963
• Beverly Samans, 23, stabbed to death on May 8, 1963
• Evelyn Corbin, 58, sexually assaulted and strangled with her nylon stockings; found on September 6, 1963
• Joann Graff, 23, sexually assaulted and strangled on November 25, 1963
• Mary Sullivan, 19, sexually assaulted and strangled with dark stockings; found on January 4, 1964

Events

Between June 14, 1962 and January 4, 1964, 13 single women (between the ages of 19 and 85) were murdered in the Boston area. Most had been sexually assaulted in their apartments and were murdered in the manner indicated above. Without any sign of forced entry into their dwellings, the women were assumed to either know their assailant or have voluntarily allowed him into their homes. While the police were not convinced that all of these murders were the work of a single individual, much of the public believed so.

Gainsborough Street, site of the first murder attributed to the Boston strangler

Confession

On October 27, 1964, a stranger entered a young woman's home posing as a detective. He tied his victim to her bed, proceeded to sexually assault her, and suddenly left, saying "I'm sorry" as he went. The woman's description led police to identify the assailant as Albert DeSalvo and when his photo was published, many women identified him as the man who had assaulted them. Earlier on October 27, DeSalvo had posed as a motorist with car trouble and attempted to enter a home in Bridgewater, Massachusetts. The homeowner, future Brockton police chief Richard Sproles, became suspicious and eventually fired a shotgun at DeSalvo.

DeSalvo was not initially suspected of being involved with the stranglings. It was only after he was charged with rape that he gave a detailed confession of his activities as the Boston Strangler. He initially confessed to a fellow inmate George Nassar who reported to his attorney F. Lee Bailey who took on DeSalvo's case. The police were impressed at the accuracy of DeSalvo's descriptions of the crime scenes. Though there were some inconsistencies, DeSalvo was able to cite details which had not been made public. However, there was no physical evidence to substantiate his confession. As such, he stood trial for earlier, unrelated crimes of robbery and sexual offenses in which he was known as "The Green Man and The Measuring Man" respectively. Bailey brought up the confession to the stranglings as part of his client's history at the trial in order to assist in gaining a 'not guilty by reason of insanity' verdict to the sexual offenses but it was ruled as inadmissible by the judge.

DeSalvo was sentenced to life in prison in 1967. In February of that year, he escaped with two fellow inmates from Bridgewater State Hospital triggering a full scale manhunt. A note was found on his bunk addressed to the superintendent. In it DeSalvo stated that he had escaped to focus attention on the conditions in the hospital and his own situation. The next day he gave himself up. Following the escape he was transferred to the maximum security Walpole State Prison where he was found murdered six years later in the infirmary. The killer or killers were never identified.

Doubts

Lingering doubts remain as to whether DeSalvo was indeed the Boston Strangler. At the time he confessed, people who knew him personally did not believe him capable of the vicious crimes. It was also noted that the women killed by "The Strangler" came from different age and ethnic groups, and that there were different modi operandi.

In 1971, Texas legislator Tom Moore, Jr. introduced a measure to demonstrate the lack of legislative scrutiny. The measure's passage effectively meant that DeSalvo was commended by the Texas House of Representatives as being "officially recognized by the state of Massachusetts for his noted activities and unconventional techniques involving population control and applied psychology."

Susan Kelly, author of the 1996 book The Boston Stranglers, who has had access to the files of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts' "Strangler Bureau", argues that the stranglings were the work of several killers rather than a single individual. Another author, former FBI profiler Robert Ressler, said that "You're putting together so many different patterns [regarding the Boston Strangler murders] that it's inconceivable behaviorally that all these could fit one individual."

In 2000, Elaine Whitfield Sharp, an attorney specializing in forensic cases who is based in Marblehead, Massachusetts [1], took up the cause of the DeSalvo family and that of the family of Mary A. Sullivan. Sullivan was publicized as being the final victim in 1964, although other stranglings occurred after that date. A former print journalist, Whitfield Sharp assisted the families in their media campaign to clear DeSalvo's name, to assist in organizing and arranging the exhumations of Mary A. Sullivan and Albert H. DeSalvo, in filing various lawsuits in attempts to obtain information and trace evidence (e.g. DNA) from the government, and to work with various producers to create documentaries to explain the facts to the public. Whitfield Sharp pointed out various inconsistencies between DeSalvo's confessions and the crime scene information (which she obtained). For example, Whitfield Sharp observed that, contrary to DeSalvo's confession to Sullivan's murder, there was no semen in her vagina and that she was not strangled manually, but by ligature. Famed forensic pathologist Michael Baden observed that DeSalvo also got the time of death wrong — a common inconsistency with several of the murders pointed out by Susan Kelly. Whitfield Sharp continues to work on the case for the DeSalvo family. She established an informational website: bostonstrangler.org.

In the case of Mary Sullivan, murdered January 4, 1964 at age 19, DNA and other forensic evidence — and leads from Kelly's book — were used by the victim's nephew Casey Sherman to try to track down her real killer. Sherman wrote about this in his book A Rose for Mary (2003) and stated that DeSalvo was not responsible for her death. For example, DeSalvo confessed to sexually penetrating Sullivan, yet the forensic investigation revealed no evidence of sexual activity. There are also suggestions from DeSalvo himself that he was covering up for another man, the real killer. In his criminal encyclopedia, "Bloodletters and Badmen" Author Jay Robert Nash refused to list DeSalvo, due to these doubts.

Popular culture

• The song "Dirty Water" by The Standells is about the Boston Strangler. The song is written in the first person perspective of the Boston Strangler. In an aside toward the end of the song the words, "Have you heard about the Strangler?" are heard.
• According to RedSoxConnection.com, "The song was written by the band’s producer, Ed Cobb, who wrote it after a visit to Boston, during which he was mugged on a Massachusetts Avenue bridge over the Charles River. Hence the reference to 'fuggers and thieves down by the banks of the river Charles.'"
• The song "Midnight Rambler" by the Rolling Stones (from the album Let It Bleed) was inspired by and almost mentions the Boston Strangler. After a series of lines ending in "rambler" and "gambler", the words 'Well you heard about the Boston...' are sung, yet what follows is obscured by music. It also features the refrain "Oh don't do that!" over and over which were the last known words of The Stranglers last victim- Mary Sullivan.
• British power electronics group Whitehouse have a track called "Dedicated to Albert De Salvo" (album: Buchenwald, 1981)
• Japanese doom metal band Church of Misery has a song titled "Boston Strangler (Albert DeSalvo)" on the album of the same name. [2] Its lyrics are from the Strangler's point of view.
• The song "Boston Strangler" appears on the Macabre album Sinister Slaughter (1993).
• Former Philadelphia 76er Andrew Toney was given the nickname Boston Strangler because of his big game performances against the Boston Celtics
• Jack Valenti compared the VCR to the Boston Strangler, only to have home rentals become a major source of revenue.
• The song "Reality Check" by rapper Binary Star raps a brief statement about the Boston Strangler saying " Who's ever on the microphone let it be known, you're in danger, I got necks like the Boston Strangler."
• The song "Night Stalker" by the band Impact Unit makes a reference of the Boston Strangler.

References

• A Rose for Mary ISBN 1-55553-578-X
• A Death in Belmont Sebastian Junger ISBN 0-393-05980-4
• New England Remembers The Boston Strangler Alan Rogers ISBN 1-889833-52-5
• American Gothic episode "The Strangler"

External links

• FBI files (still partly classified)
• Albert DeSalvo - The Boston Strangler?
• The Boston Strangler (Court TV's Crime Library)
• The Boston Strangler
• "The Ayes of Texas". Snopes.com.
• Article about Sebastian Junger's Book A Death in Belmont TIME Magazine, 04/10/2006.