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     July 1936: A teenage girl came across the decapitated remains of a forty-year-old white male while walking through the woods near Clinton Road and Big Creek on the near west side. The victim had been dead about two months and his head, as well as a pile of bloody clothing, was found nearby. Judging by the enormous quantity of blood that had seeped into the ground, this man apparently had been killed where his body was found.

     September 1936: A transient trips over the upper half of a man's torso while trying to hop a train at E. 37 Street in Kingsbury Run. Police searched a nearby pool, which was nothing more than a big open sewer, and found the lower half of the torso and parts of both legs. Police sent a diver in to make the recovery. The number of onlookers that turned out to watch the grim spectacle was estimated at over six hundred. Ironically, the killer may well have been among them. Victim number six was in his late twenties, and the cause of death, yet again, was decapitation. Coroner Pierce noted that the lack of hesitation marks in the disarticulation of the body indicated a strong, confident killer, very familiar with the human anatomy. The head had been cut off

with one bold, clean stroke. The victim died instantly. Identification was never made. Six brutal killings in one year and the police had neither clues nor suspects. The Cleveland Press, The Cleveland News and The Cleveland Plain Dealer all reported almost daily on the killings and the lack of a suspect. Tension was high. Who was the "Mad Butcher" of Kingsbury Run?
       Giving in to mounting pressure from Mayor Harold Burton, recently appointed Safety Director Eliot Ness gets more involved in the case. Coroner Pierce calls for what the newspapers dub a “Torso Clinic”: a meeting of police, the Coroner and other experts to discuss information and to “profile” someone who could be responsible for these gruesome killings.

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