Between 1934 and 1938 in Cleveland Ohio, near Kingsbury Run, 13 people, comprised of six women and seven men were killed by a serial killer. Of those 13 only three were identified. And almost all of them were vagrants or sex workers. All of the victims were decapitated, and in some cases the head was never found.
Cleveland Torso Murderer targeted sex workers and vagrants
The killer often dismembered the body through the torso. And in no instance was a body found fully intact. These gruesome tendencies earned the killer the name the Cleveland Torso Killer or the Mad Butcher of Kingsbury Run. Here’s a little background on Kingsbury Run. In the 1930’s, Cleveland’s Kingsbury Run was a bleak, dangerous place, where many poor lived in terrible conditions. Sometimes called, a “hobo jungle”. Just east of Kingsbury Run was a sketchy area called the Roaring Third, known for it’s bars, gambling dens, and brothels.
With the stage set, let’s jump into the timeline of the killings. On September 5, 1934, the first victim, an unidentified woman in her 30’s, was found on the shores of Lake Eerie. All that was found was part of her torso, thighs, and other body parts. But no head. Her skin was leathery and red from a chemical preservative. On September 23, 1935, the second victim, a 28 year old man named Edward Andrassy, was found near Kingsbury Run, at the base of Jackass Hill.
Cleveland’s infamous Torso Murders: 80 years later, the fascination endures
Victim #2 – Edward Andrassy
Andrassy was a hospital orderly and a regular around the Roaring Third. The body was drained of blood, naked, and emasculated. With rope burns on the wrists. On that same day, the third victim was found nearby. An unidentified 40 year old male, and was also decapitated and emasculated. The body also had the same chemical preservative from the first killing. On January 26, 1936, the fourth victim a woman named Florence Polillo, was found wrapped up in newspaper inside half bushel baskets by the Hart Manufacturing building. Polillo was a sex worker, barmaid, and waitress, who lived in the Roaring Third.
On June 5, 1936, the head of the fifth victim, an unidentified man, was found wrapped in trousers in Kingsbury Run, the rest of the body was found the next day in an even more audacious location. In front of the Nickel Plate Railroad Police Building. On July 22, 1936, the sixth victim, an unidentified 40 year old man, was found in the woods near Clinton Road.
The man had been dead for two months. One noteworthy observation was the blood on the ground, suggesting he had been killed on-site, and not dumped there, as indicated by the other body sites. On September 10, 1936, the seventh victim, an unidentified man, was found near the train tracks in Kingsbury Run, he had been killed by decapitation. In a manner that the coroner noticed was confident, in one stroke, which implied that the killer was both brazen and educated in human anatomy.
Cleveland torso murders became front page news
At this point many local papers reported the murder spree on a near daily basis, and yet, there were no suspects or clues. As expected, this put a considerable amount of heat on the investigating authorities. Detectives Peter Merylo and Martin Zelewski interviewed over 1,500 people on their own.
Jumping back into the timeline, on February 23, 1937, parts of the eighth victim, an unidentified woman in her 20’s, were found on the shore east of Brahtenahl. On June 5, 1937, the ninth victim, determined to be a woman name Rose Wallace, was found under the Lorain-Carnegie Bridge. Her remains were merely a skull and a bag of bones. On July 6, 1937, the tenth victim, an unidentified man in his mid to late 30’s, was found in the Cuyahoga River. His heart was ripped out and the abdominal area was gutted.
In April/May of 1938, parts of the eleventh victim, an unidentified woman was found in the Cuyahoga River. Interestingly, this was the first time that a victim had drugs in their system. This left authorities to wonder whether the drugs were recreational or used to keep her from moving.
Eliot Ness feeling the pressure from mayor to solve the cases
As all of these gruesome murders were ongoing, Mayor Harold Burton, increasingly pressured Safety Director Eliot Ness to make headway. You may know Eliot Ness as the famed G Man, who led his illustrious group of untouchables to bust Al Capone’s breweries. Other credits to Ness’s glowing resume included defeating the Mayfield Road mob, crooked police, and labor racketeers. Contributing to his status as a law enforcement legend. As City Safety Director, Ness was involved with both the fire and police departments, and given his decorated track record, Ness was at serious risk of tainting his reputation should he not make headway on the torso case.
On August 16th, 1938, the twelfth and thirteenth victims both unidentified were found in perhaps the most reckless location of all. The bodies were found within view of Eliot Ness’s office window, a taunt that obviously resonated with Ness. Two days later on August 18th, 1938, at 12:40 AM, Director Ness, and a squadron of 35 detectives and police officers raided Kingsbury Run’s hobo jungle. They rounded up 63 men, and scoured the shacks for an sign of the killer. Most noteworthy, in a move that has been criticized, Ness then ordered the shacks to be burnt down, the people displaced were then charged with being homeless, which they plead guilty for. Ness’s involvement in this episode of the investigation has been referred to as cruel and draconian.
According to James Badal, the preeminent expert on this case, Ness’s raid was intended to protect the transients in a bizarre and backwards way. Ness wanted to eliminate the pool of potential victims, thinking that the killer targeted transients. Which, to be fair, was true. He also wanted the transients’ fingerprints, in the event that they were later killed.
Either way, the killings did stop after the raid. Whether or not the raid had anything to do with that is debatable. Certainly, Ness’s shiny reputation was damaged by this action, and it also brought the investigators no closer to identifying the killer. That being said, the case is considered by some to be unofficially solved, and furthermore, the solution was reached partly by Ness himself.
Cleveland Torso Murder Theories
Suspect #1 – 52-year-old brick layer Frank Dolezal
In July of 1939, Dolezal was arrested by county sheriff, Martin O’Donnell, for the murder of Florence Polillo, the fourth victim.
Dolezal had actually lived with Polillo for a time. Furthermore, Dolezal also knew victims Edward Andrassy and Rose Wallace. Following his arrest, Frank Dolezal confessed, to murdering Florence Polillo. However, he later said he had been beaten and recanted his confession, in fact, Dolezal had suffered six broken ribs while in the custody of the sheriff. Further casting doubt upon the confession. The confession appeared to be coached, as it was a mix of prepackaged details and incomprehensible ramblings. According to case expert James Badal, the lead detective on the case later said in his memoirs, “this is the first time that I’ve ever known anyone to confess to a crime that didn’t know the details of the crime to which he was confessing.”
Nonetheless, Dolezal remained incarcerated for the crime. Which makes the event that followed all the more suspicious. One month later, in August 1939, Dolezal committed suicide in his jail cell before going to trial. Hanging himself on a hook that was five feet and seven inches from the ground. The problem with that is, Frank Dolezal, was five feet and eight inches tall. Logically, how could a person hang themselves from an object that they were taller than?
In addition, James Badal interviewed forensic science experts that looked at Dolezal’s autopsy. The experts concluded that he didn’t end his own life the way people were told he did. Though, the experts don’t explicitly say he was murdered while imprisoned. Either way, virtually no one believes Frank Dolezal was the killer. A marker, purchased by James Badal and his team, was laid on Dolezal’s grave in August 2010, with Dolezal’s family members in attendance, that reads “Rest Now” Thus vindicating Dolezal posthumously.
Suspect #2 – Dr. Francis E. Sweeney
In the 1970’s Sweeney was discovered to be Safety Director Eliot Ness’s secret suspect. Sweeney is also thought to have been the killer, according to case expert James Badal, who as of 2014, had spent 18 years researching the killings.
Dr. Francis E. Sweeney fit the profile. He was a doctor, and would’ve had the necessary skill and anatomical knowledge to perform the killings. Sweeney had also been probate court multiple times. And his wife noted his problems with alcoholism. His abuse of her and their two sons, his days long disappearances, and his neglect of his practice. Shortly after the final murder, Sweeney checked himself into a mental institution, after which the killings stopped. In 1956, Sweeney was diagnosed as schizophrenic.
In May 1938, Eliot Ness secretly apprehended Sweeney, taking him to the old Cleveland Hotel. Ness kept Sweeney there for about 10 to 14 days, as it took Sweeney three days to even sober up.
Miranda Rights were not in place yet. Though, this process was still in conflict with the rules of civil liberties of the time. The inventor of the modern polygraph, Leonard Keeler administered a lie detector test to Sweeney. Which he failed, twice. Keeler told Ness,”That’s your man. I might as well throw my machine out the window if I say anything different.”
Ness played it safe when investigating Sweeney
Ness had to proceed carefully, because Sweeney, was a cousin of congressman Martin L. Sweeney. Ryan wonders if this affiliation, along with the detention, violating civil liberties, contributed to Ness keeping the lie detector test a secret. Regardless, despite this revelation, Francis Sweeney was released, and less than three months later, the final two torso victims were placed within view of Ness’s window. Seemingly to mock him. Ness would continue to get mocked well after the killings. In the 50’s Ness received taunting note cards from someone claiming to be Francis Sweeney. And since Sweeney was a secret suspect, it’s likely that the sender was indeed Sweeney.
Unfortunately, despite feeling he had solved the case, Ness didn’t have enough to take Sweeney to trial. Though, the case against Sweeney doesn’t end there. In 1938, a vagrant named Emile Fronek told authorities that in 1934, a doctor tried to drug him. He remembered the office was somewhere around East 50th and East 55th on Broadway Street. Unfortunately when authorities drove Fronek up Broadway, he couldn’t find anything that appeared to be a medical office, and from there, his story was dismissed as irrelevant.
However, more than 70 years later, case expert James Badal, discovered that Francis Sweeney practiced medicine out of a modest looking building, at the corner of Broadway and Purshing Avenue. This building closely matches where Fronek remembered getting drugged. It’s in this building that Badal believed Sweeney could’ve drugged Fronek as well as other victims. Though, the torso killer murders would’ve resulted in a large amount of blood evidence. So, how could Sweeney have carried out those murders in these offices, without eventually being caught?
The answer may lie with David Cowles, the leader of the Scientific Identification Bureau, who was interviewed by the Cleveland Police Historical Society in 1983. Cowles suggests that Sweeney may have had an agreement with an undertaker. That he could practice surgery on the unclaimed bodies in the undertakers funeral home. If this is true, a funeral home would function nicely as a way to dispose of blood evidence.
This arrangement, however, does seem to be possible, as directly next door to Sweeney’s office was a funeral home, in fact, the funeral home had a concrete ramp located behind the building, that conveniently led to the undertaking facilities. Both Sweeney’s medical office, and the funeral home are a short car ride away from where the September 1935 victims were found, which was not far from the Roaring Third In Badal’s opinion, Sweeney could’ve visited bars near the center of town, to lure people back to his office with promises of alcohol or drugs.
Sweeney may have been the Cleveland Torso Murderer
Badal, with the help of the great nephew of one of Francis Sweeney’s colleagues, was able to use photos and diagrams to compare the torso killer and Sweeney’s movements. Badal calls the results, “Creepy as hell.” All this information allowed Badal to conclude that Sweeney was indeed the killer, though Badal cautions, “I think I put together a pretty good circumstantial case, I realize you couldn’t take it to court, and Ness realized back then, he couldn’t take it to court.”
There are however some criticisms of the Sweeney explanation police and crime reporter Doris O’Donnell, believes that somebody at the funeral home would have noticed something weird was going on. Yet, O’Donnell may be biased, since her uncle was the sheriff who arrested the controversial suspect, Frank Dolezal in 1939.
Also even Badal acknowledges that the medical office setup could have only been utilized for the initial murders, before colleagues could become suspicious. He doesn’t know where the murders that followed occurred. Others including lead Detective, Peter Merylo, believe the torso murders were committed by the same person that committed murders in New Castle, Pennsylvania. Detective Merylo felt that Sweeney was too overweight to make the rail trip back and forth between New Castle and Cleveland. Which consequently led to Merylo’s discounting of Sweeney as a suspect. But, to be fair, Merylo had also been kept in the dark about Sweeney’s secret interrogation and lie detector test.
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