Crimes of the Centuries

When a beloved 3-year-old boy went missing, only to be discovered soon after in an outhouse with his throat slit, suspicion at first settled on the child's nursemaid in a London-area town in 1860. After local police failed to find any evidence, a brilliant detective was dispatched from the Metropolitan Police. Jonathan Whicher turned his attention away from the lower-class servants living in the h...

A fun-loving Chicago teenager convinced his mom to let him visit relatives in Mississippi over the summer of 1955. Three days after his arrival, 14-year-old Emmett Till was viciously murdered. Because his mother insisted that the world see the violence inflicted upon her son, the case made international news and galvanized the civil rights movement in the United States. " Crimes of the Centuries "...

On a crisp fall morning in 1935, two young boys made a grisly discovery in Kingsbury Run, an area in southeast Cleveland, Ohio. The boys, ages 16 and 12, had been playing catch but lost control of the ball. To retrieve it, they ran down a hill affectionally called Jackass Hill, and were stopped in their tracks by the sight of a man’s headless body. When police arrived, they'd find another emascula...

When members of the incredibly wealthy Osage Nation started dropping dead of mysterious ailments in 1920s Oklahoma, few people in state power paid it much mind. After all, many of those who could do something about it were benefiting from the deaths. Eventually, with the help of a still-evolving agency called the FBI, federal authorities uncovered an unthinkable conspiracy known today as the Reign...

It's possible no one would have known that Richard Biegenwald was a serial killer if he hadn't shown a dead woman's body to a friend he wanted to enlist as a murderous protege. Once police started digging into Richard Biegenwald, they uncovered decades of horrific crimes -- many of which he said he committed just for the thrill of it. " Crimes of the Centuries " is a podcast from Grab Bag Collab e...

When five college students in Florida were brutally slain in a four-day span in 1990, it sent shockwaves across the nation as newscasters made comparisons to serial killer Ted Bundy. Police frantically worked to stop this new madman before his body count got any higher. " Crimes of the Centuries " is a podcast from Grab Bag Collab exploring forgotten crimes from times past that made a mark and hel...

As soon as Leonardo da Vinci unveiled the Mona Lisa in the early 1500s, the art world recognized it as a masterpiece. But it wasn't until centuries later that her face became one of the most famous in the world -- thanks to one of the most brazen art heists in history. This crime of the century crosses the pond. " Crimes of the Centuries " is a podcast from Grab Bag Collab exploring forgotten crim...

Hey, COTC listeners! We're taking a break for the holiday this week, but we wanted to share an episode from another Obsessed Network show with you.  From "Strange and Unexplained with Daisy Eagan," this episode looks at the tragic death of Kendrick Johnson.  On January 11, 2013, the body of the 17-year-old high school student was found inside a vertical rolled up mat in the gymnasium. Was Kendrick...

A distraught young mother pounded on the door of a stranger's house and told a story that riveted the nation: She'd been carjacked while driving an empty stretch of road, and the man who'd held her at gunpoint took not only her car, but her two young sons strapped into the car seats. As Susan Smith publicly pleaded for her boys to be returned unharmed, she hid a terrible secret that would shock th...

To outsiders, Julius and Ethel Rosenberg seemed like a typical, if not downright boring, American couple. But then the U.S. government got a tip that the parents of two young boys had provided top-secret information about the nation's efforts to develop the first atomic weapon. Soon, the couple would face trial in one of the highest-profile espionage cases in the country's history. " Crimes of the...

People enjoying a warm, sunny Saturday in New York City first noticed smoke arising from a building at about 4:40 p.m. and rushed to gather at the base of a 10-story building that was quickly engulfed in flames. The scene greeting them was horrific: Dozens of workers were trapped on the building's ninth floor. With the flames closing in, some chose to jump to their deaths.  More than 100 years lat...

For years, famed architect Frank Lloyd Wright had made headlines for his personal life. After all, he'd left his wife and six children for a married woman during the Victorian era, and made no apologies for the two "living in sin" in a home he built on family land in Wisconsin. Then, on a hot August day in 1914, Wright's whole world came crashing down: A murderer had attacked his so-called Love Co...

Judy Johnson was horrified when her 3-year-old son told her he'd been abused by a teacher at his preschool. So, too, was her community. Soon, hundreds of parents throughout Manhattan Beach, California, heard horrifying tales from their children describing sexual abuse, animal torture and even murder in a case that epitomizes what came to be known as the "Satanic Panic" of the 1980s. " Crimes of th...

When a group of kids cooling off along New York City's East River spotted a parcel in the water, they figured a passing freighter had dropped some goods. When they opened the package, however, they discovered a human torso, its arms still attached. So began a murder mystery that helped ignite a news war and forever altered how journalists covered crime in America. " Crimes of the Centuries " is a...

Andrew Kehoe really didn't like the new property taxes being leveled to pay for his community's fancy new school. This was well known throughout his hometown of Bath Township, Michigan.  What residents didn't know was that his displeasure would turn to murderous rage that culminated on May 18, 1927. To date, the horror unleashed by Kehoe that day remains the deadliest school attack in American his...

Hey, COTC listeners! We're taking a break for the holiday this week, but we wanted to share an episode from another Obsessed Network show with you.  From "Strange and Unexplained with Daisy Eagan," this episode tells the tale of the vanishing colony of Roanoke, who came to America in the 16th century and then mysteriously disappeared. Daisy explores all the bizarre elements of the story, but as a...

Tobacco heiress Doris Duke got upsetting news on Oct. 7, 1966. Her longtime friend and art curator, Eduardo Tirella wanted to end their work relationship. Within hours, Tirella was dead, having been hit by a car driven by Duke.  Though the crash was quickly dismissed by police as an accident, Tirella's family always believed that the volatile billionaire had killed Tirella on purpose. If so, Duke...

When the granddaughter of one of America's best-known publishing magnates was kidnapped in 1974, the news of course grabbed headlines. But that was nothing compared to the attention the case would receive after Patricia Hearst joined forces with her abductors. The group at the heart of the kidnapping was known as the Symbionese Liberation Army, a radical group of young adults considered to be the...

The book The Man from the Train describes dozens of axe slayings in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, many of which authors Bill James and Rachel McCarthy James believe were committed by what would be the nation's most prolific serial killer. But a 1911 double homicide near Scappoose, Oregon, doesn't fit the mold. On Sept. 3, 1911, someone entered a cabin and fatally shot Daisy Wehrman and h...

The Moore house seemed awfully quiet one June morning in 1912, prompting neighbors to investigate. Inside, they discovered a horrific scene: All eight people who'd been inside -- a mother, father, their four children and two young guests -- had been brutally slain in their sleep. The case that followed would be one of the highest-profile, longest-lasting mysteries in the history of the Midwest --...

Charles Lindbergh became an American and worldwide hero after becoming the first person to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean in 1927.  But five years later, his world was upended when his toddler son was stolen from his nursery.  The ensuing investigation into the kidnapping would involved a host of characters, including an amateur detective named Jafsie and a mysterious man named Cemetery John. ...

The sight that greeted arriving medics in February 1970 was so upsetting that at least one had to rush from the scene to vomit. Inside of Army surgeon Jeffrey MacDonald's home were three dead bodies belonging to his two daughters and pregnant wife. MacDonald, too, was injured. But who really killed the Green Beret's family? Was it a quartet of acid-dropping hippies -- or MacDonald himself? " Crime...

Hey, Crimes of the Centuries listeners! We're so excited to bring you the new show from the Obsessed Network, "Murder in Alliance." We've got the first episode here for you in this feed, and two more available right now wherever you get your podcasts. Listen to the first three episodes and follow "Murder in Alliance" on your favorite podcast player HERE ( https://lnk.to/98BXWuip ). In the podcast,...

When an Indiana home caught fire and burned to the ground in 1908, townspeople mourned the poor mother and two children believed trapped inside. But then someone started to dig on the property, they realized that the woman of the house had a sinister secret.  Belle Gunness had been luring would-be suitors to her farm and brutally slaying them in a scheme that lasted years. " Crimes of the Centurie...

In the early 20th century, one of the best jobs for a young woman to land in America involved a new discovery: radium. The substance discovered by Marie Curie could be tweaked and turned into glow-in-the-dark paint.  But as the women working with the paint started falling ill, their employers began a calculated coverup that landed them in court -- and changed laws nationwide regarding the duty emp...