Black Dahlia: Cadaver Dog Alerts In Dr. Hodel's Dirt Basement

[Archaic]

Cadaver dog alerts 4 times in original dirt basement of suspected Black Dahlia killer Dr. George Hodel:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2272640/Black-Dahlia-case-Cadaver-dog-discovers-death-scent-Hollywood-home-suspect-66-years-murder.html#axzz2JuZuCibO

(Scroll down for video and another link.)

Best regards,
Archaic

[Archaic]

Good article

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/02/03/can-this-dog-solve-the-black-dahlia-homicide.html

Archaic

[RivkahChaya]

I've been following, and it looks like the dogs are really alerting on something. The problem I see, is that without an exemplar, cadaver dogs alert on any human decomp. I can't tell you what the dogs would do with an exemplar, and decomp that old. In other words, I don't know whether decomp that was residua from Short would have any of her living smell left, even if someone did manage to produce clothing she had worn, that had been packed away, and not washed.

Yes, dogs can detect decomp that old, particularly in a place like a basement, I just don't think the police will find anything if they dig, since nothing was missing from short, IIRC. If they should find another body, that certainly suggests Hodel was a killer, and someone who killed one person could do it again, but that kind of thing isn't especially meaningful. The man was a doctor, so who knows what might have been going on. It was the 1940s, and Hollywood, and the doctor apparently was involved in a string of suspicious activities, so he may have performed abortions, since the area certainly had a market for back-alley abortions. Or he may have treated people wounded during criminal activity, who didn't want their wounds reported to the police. Cadaver dogs would probably alert on large amounts of medical waste had been buried in the basement, or even just held there in containers that leaked.

The thing that bothers me is that Hodel had other ways of disposing of a body than a dump, and the disarticulation, the police thought, was for ease of transportation, not part of post-mortem mutilation that the killer enjoyed.

A doctor had means of covering up an accident that qualifies as manslaughter, by simply pronouncing someone death of natural causes, or genuine accident, himself. A doctor has ways of killing someone without it looking like murder. I realize there was a distinct facial mutilation, but I still think a doctor with some sort of compulsion to kill women just to mutilate their faces would do a better job of getting rid of the body.

[RivkahChaya]

Bizarre

This is very odd. It's a quote from the Los Angeles Times (1991) I ran across:

Los Angeles Police Detective John P. St. John, one of the investigators who had been assigned to the case, said he has talked to [Janice] Knowlton and does not believe there is a connection between the Black Dahlia murder and her father. "We have a lot of people offering up their fathers and various relatives as the Black Dahlia killer," said St. John.

Janice Knowlton is a woman who claimed her father, George, murdered Elizabeth Short. She said she "recovered memories" during therapy, of witnessing the murder.

Aside from the whole "recovered memories" morass, what's up with so many people apparently wanting their father to be Elizabeth Short's killer?

[Magpie]

Just some background. This guys has gained some noteriety and not a little scorn over the years with his repeated attempts to find alleged bodies at the Barker Ranch, where it is claimed that the Manson buried numerous bodies. Not a one has ever been found.

[Magpie]

Janice Knowlton is a woman who claimed her father, George, murdered Elizabeth Short. She said she "recovered memories" during therapy, of witnessing the murder.

Aside from the whole "recovered memories" morass, what's up with so many people apparently wanting their father to be Elizabeth Short's killer?

Janice Knowlton was a serious, grade-A kook. But it is weird that there are are so many people clamouring to be recognized as the offspring of the Black Dahlia Avenger...

[Archaic]

Hi Magpie.

Here's an LA Times article about Knowlton. I didn't know that she had passed away, apparently from an overdose:

http://articles.latimes.com/2004/dec/19/local/me-knowlton19

Best regards,
Archaic

[Magpie]

Hi Magpie.

Here's an LA Times article about Knowlton. I didn't know that she had passed away, apparently from an overdose:

http://articles.latimes.com/2004/dec/19/local/me-knowlton19

Best regards,
Archaic

She pestered me something miserable for about 6 months before I finally blocked her email. She was also banned from just about every forum dealing with the Black Dahlia (bethshort.org has an archive of the exchanges that got her banned from there) She was also banned from the Gene Autrey fan site (she believed that Autry was part of the pedophile ring that short worked for).

A tragic case, and yes, she committed suicide by overdose about a year later.

[HollyDolly]

Black Dahlia: Cadaver dog alerts in Doctor Hodel's basement

I don't know if in the UK you get the american show Ghost Hunters;but they did an investigation of the house Dr.Hodel was living in at the time of the murder. One of the people who lived in the house after Hodel moved out said they always felt there was some sort of presence in the house.On Youtube or SyFy they may have that particular episode you can watch.
I don't think we will ever know who really did kill Elizabeth Short. Dr.Hodel did have the medical knowledge and the place or knew of some place to do the deed.Or he was covering up for someone who was the real killer if he didn't do it himself.Has anything more been heard about this yet?

[RivkahChaya]

I don't know if in the UK you get the american show Ghost Hunters;but they did an investigation of the house Dr.Hodel was living in at the time of the murder.

Whether or not Dr. Hodel killed Elizabeth Short, I don't think we're going to find out from Ghost Hunters. Honestly, your first clue should be that it's on the Syfy channel, which is an oh-so-cute abbreviation for "Science fiction."

What happens on the show, for people who haven't seen it, is that a couple of guys, whose professional training is as plumbers, go to a house where the owners already think something paranormal is happening, and they set up equipment, mostly night-vision cameras, because the get lots of spooky, green footage, but they check areas of the house with digital thermometers, and use very sensitive recording equipment to "listen" for tapping sounds, and they measure the area with electronic field probes, check it with Geiger counters, and then they analyze the "data" with a computer for blips. They then check the "blip" areas for drafty windows, critters in the walls, and other non-paranormal explanations, using much less sophisticated equipment, ie "Can you feel a draft?" over the space of a couple of hours.

If they can't explain every tiny variation in equipment designed to measure minute variations that, say, NASA engineers need, but not house-builders, and for all anyone knows could be the natural result of biological materials in a house decaying, then they say "must be ghosts." Well, no, they say "could be." Their lawyers probably told them to.

The smaller problems of things like "argument from ignorance" ought to be obvious, but there is an even larger problem, in that none of their equipment has ever been demonstrated to detect ghosts. Can you see ghosts with night vision goggles? who knows? there's no data on it, and the manufacturers certainly don't claim you can. Do variations in temperature indicate ghosts? who knows? there's no data, and the manufacturers of digital thermometers don't claim that you can. Do ghosts alter electromagnetic fields? who knows? there's no data...etc., etc.

I'm not even claiming ghosts don't exist. They may. I'm just claiming these guys have no legitimate credentials, knowledge, or skills whatsoever, but who are, after all, on the "Science Fiction" channel.

[Archaic]

She pestered me something miserable for about 6 months before I finally blocked her email. She was also banned from just about every forum dealing with the Black Dahlia (bethshort.org has an archive of the exchanges that got her banned from there) She was also banned from the Gene Autrey fan site (she believed that Autry was part of the pedophile ring that short worked for).

A tragic case, and yes, she committed suicide by overdose about a year later.

Hi Magpie.

I just saw your post.

Gene Autry, huh? Weird. She does sound like a sad case.

Best regards,
Archaic

[Errata]

I don't suppose anyone can explain to me why people think she was a prostitute?

[RivkahChaya]

I don't suppose anyone can explain to me why people think she was a prostitute?

Elizabeth Short? she went out alone one night and got herself murdered. Duh.

Actually, she used to do what was called "dating for dinner." It was pretty common, back when there really weren't a lot of things women could do to support themselves, that didn't involve getting sexually harassed anyway. Young women went out on dates, and the men paid for dinner. They were pretty, companionable, and they'd be dancing partners, whatever, and they got a meal out of it. It didn't lead to cash exchanging hands, and it didn't lead to the bedroom, but without it, they'd be pretty hungry, because they had only occasional work otherwise, as film extras, or doing seasonal work, or something.

Now, that doesn't mean that in some cases it didn't lead to a relationship, and that didn't lead to the bedroom, but "dating for dinner" wasn't prostitution, as it's legally defined. It's close enough for some moralists to condemn it, though. In my opinion, anyone who thinks that the only reason two people would ever go out is that they are vetting each other as marriage partners, either needs to grow up, or is being disingenuous, and probably voted for Michelle Bachmann at some point.

[Errata]

Elizabeth Short? she went out alone one night and got herself murdered. Duh.

Actually, she used to do what was called "dating for dinner." It was pretty common, back when there really weren't a lot of things women could do to support themselves, that didn't involve getting sexually harassed anyway. Young women went out on dates, and the men paid for dinner. They were pretty, companionable, and they'd be dancing partners, whatever, and they got a meal out of it. It didn't lead to cash exchanging hands, and it didn't lead to the bedroom, but without it, they'd be pretty hungry, because they had only occasional work otherwise, as film extras, or doing seasonal work, or something.

It's not like I've never done it, though it is not something I am particularly proud of. I never misled a guy for fine dining, but I may have seemed more open to changing my mind than I really was. And I'd feel better about it if I had been starving or desperately poor. But really I was just a lower middle income foodie who occasionally had a lapse in moral judgement when it came to kobe beef, lobster, little tinfoil swans of leftovers...

Damn. Now I'm hungry. Fortunately since my fiance is an ex chef, I can just hit up his friends still in the biz for a seat at the chef's table. No wonder I'm fat.

[RivkahChaya]

It's not like I've never done it, though it is not something I am particularly proud of. I never misled a guy for fine dining, but I may have seemed more open to changing my mind than I really was. And I'd feel better about it if I had been starving or desperately poor. But really I was just a lower middle income foodie who occasionally had a lapse in moral judgement when it came to kobe beef, lobster, little tinfoil swans of leftovers...

Well, FWIW, people were disinclined to let on that it was happening, even when everyone knew it was, to the point that it wasn't quite nice to take home the leftovers, and you had to ask for a "doggy bag." Even married couples asked fro the euphemistic "doggy bag." I remember my mother asking for one once, when I was really little, and I piped up that we didn't have a dog, and got shushed very quickly. Later when we had one, I was always puzzled that he never got any of the "doggy bag" food. Restaurants were prepared, with bags that had actual pictures of grateful-looking dogs on them.

I was in high school around the time that it became acceptable to ask for a carry-out, or take-home bag.

That's around the time that restaurants started supplementing their intake by advertising their carry-out menus prominently, and charging more, but serving larger portions, that a person really couldn't eat in one sitting. Even places like Tony's, and other really, well, "tony" restaurants that charge for the atmosphere started advertising carry-out.

I still don't understand why Hooters has a carry-out menu, though.