The "Crime of the Century"
The Lindberg Kidnapping
The Kidnapping
Charles Augustus Lindbergh Jr. was 20 months when he got kidnapped on March 1, 1932, from the nursery on the second floor of the Lindbergh home. then the investigators found a ransom note demanding $50,000 for the safe return of the kid on the nursery window sill. A second ransom note was by the father, colonel Lindbergh, on March 6, 1932, and stating that the ransom be raised to $70,000. Dr. Condon was given a fifth ransom saying where the sixth will be found. The sixth one said to meet the kidnapper at a cemetery. The doctor met an unidentified man who called himself "John". They discussed payment of the ransom money. The stranger agreed to furnish a token of the child's identity. In 1934 the FBI found the writing looked a lot like the writing of Hauptmann. He went to trial on Jan. 3, 1935 and was found guilty of the murder of Charles Augustus Lindbergh Jr.
Lindbergh Kidnapping Remembered
On April 2, Lindbergh and Condon met a man claiming to be the kidnapper. Condon gave him the $50,000 in gold certificates. The kidnapper produced a note saying that Charles Jr. was on a boat off the coast of Massachusetts. Lindbergh flew over the region for days and never located the infant.
In May, a truck driver discovered the remains of the Lindbergh baby in the woods along a road near the Lindbergh home.
In 1934 a gas station attendant in the Bronx, N.Y., got suspicious when a motorist paid for gasoline with a gold certificate. He noted the license plate number and notified the police. The car belonged to an illegal German immigrant named Bruno Richard Hauptmann. Police discovered $4,000 of the ransom money in his and arrested him.
The Trial of the Century
The "Trial of the Century" got underway in the small town of Flemmington, New Jersey on January 2, 1935. Sixty-thousand people-reporters, novelists, movie stars, and society matrons-crammed into tiny Flemmington. The town had only one hotel and one bar to accommodate some of the biggest names in journalism. Hauptmann was defended by Edward "Big Ed" Reilly, a flamboyant attorney. both Charles and Anne Morrow Lindbergh were called as witnesses. Charles testified that he recognized Hauptmanns voice when he delivered the ransom. Hauptmann denied all involvement with the crimes. He went on to say that he was by police to force him to alter the way he wrote so that it matched with the real criminal. Testimony ended in early February of 1935. following 11 hours of deliberation, the jury found him guilty of murder in the first degree. He was charged with the death penalty and electrocuted on April 3, 1936.
CNN: 1932, Lindbergh baby tragedy
Works Cited
"The Kidnapping." PBS. PBS, n.d. Web. 10 Apr. 2013.
"Lindbergh Kidnapping Remembered." Infoplease. Infoplease, n.d. Web. 9 Apr. 2013
"The Lindbergh Kidnapping." FBI. N.p., n.d. Web. 8 Apr. 2013.