Leopold and Loeb: The "Genius" Killers

hello everybody welcome back to another episode of the casual criminalist i as always i'm your host simon this is the show where talented scriptwriter callum will write me something i've got it right here it's leopold and loeb the genius killers this is actually an idea that i came up with i read about these guys that they were these super high iq people who got into killing people i was like well that sounds like a perfect subject for the casual criminalist and so i'm gonna read it as always i'm gonna add my thoughts and let's just jump into it shall we it's no secret that plenty of murderers make a big deal out of their own intelligence it's a trademark characteristic of a sociopath they think themselves above the petty morality of us mere mortals but honestly i think the trope of the genius killer is overused so much so that any old idiot with a smug smile and a murder conviction gets the label with that in mind i'd like to introduce today's case one of the most famous crimes in the history of chicago which chilled the city to the bone back in the 1920s high on a cocktail of trust fund wealth nihilistic philosophy and the promise of mass media attention two young men set out to commit what they believed would be the perfect crime when the story broke of two book smart rich kids tried to prove their intellectual superiority over the police press and well everybody else really the case was cemented in the american consciousness for decades after if they were after media attention while they certainly got it didn't they according to some the perpetrators had a decent claim to the title of criminal geniuses but in reality their execution was anything but flawless perhaps this deadly duo weren't quite as clever as they always thought so let me tell you the facts and we'll see if you agree without further ado here is the story of leopold and loeb the genius killers the crime on may 21 1924 14 year old bobby franks was walking home from playing baseball with his friends through the affluent neighborhood of kenwood on chicago's south side this wasn't the sort of place where parents worried about their kids walking home alone only wealthy people stayed here predominantly familiar faces from the jewish community the crime which plagued the rest of the city in the 1920s tended to not cross over into this particular postcode young bobby was one such wealthy resident son to a watch manufacturer named jacob franks he was well known and well liked around the area a keen young sportsman with a love of tennis his parents waited at home on that day to ask him about the game but dinner time came round and bobby still wasn't home the clock ticked on him by the evening their confusion had given way to fear they spread words that bobby hadn't made at home that day they asked around the neighborhood in the hopes that he might have gone off to dinner with a teammate but no such luck nobody had seen him since he left the baseball field after school eventually bobby's mother received a phone call with news of her son the exact kind of news that she and her husband had been dreading the man on the other end of the line went by the name of george johnson he had kidnapped their son that is not the call that i would most read like kidnapping is fairly terrible that is not good news but it's not yeah no he was he's lost or not lost he's killed that would be worse johnson instructed the terrified mother to await instructions on how to deliver the ten thousand dollar ransom which would secure bobby's safety which is roughly 150 000 in today's money sure enough after a sleepless night the next morning a typewritten message arrived in the post accompanied by another call with the first set of instructions this set bobby's father off on an anxious treasure hunt which was intended to send him to a string of locations and dead drops but unfortunately the whole thing ran into a brick wall pretty quickly the stress of the situation caused bobby's father to forget the address of the store which johnson had given out over the phone he couldn't receive the next part of the instructions this is one thing that i always find in movies is incredibly fake when someone reads out you know in this situation they'd be kidnapped it's like yes you need to meet me at like one two four nine sycamore drive at 3 20 p.m and i'll be like okay great and then i'd immediately forget like one for two something sycamore drive at some time or like when someone reads at a phone number and it's like nine digits long or whatever and the person's like yup got it and like no one no one can do that i ca i mean i'm sure some people can but it seems a bit unrealistic and in a stressful situation i'm sure i'm even more likely to forget before his wife could give him a slap around his head for his forgetfulness however the whole treasure hunt was cooled off apparently it had all been in vain from the get-go bobby was dead his body had been hastily abandoned in a railway culvert in hammond indiana his clothes were missing and he had acid burns over his face and body the apparent cause of death was severe bludgeoning to the head this front page news story sent a shock wave through chicago a city which was no stranger to murder but rarely saw the violent death of a wealthy suburban teen the pressure was on for investigators to find the culprits a task which would turn out to be far easier than anyone first thought how they solved it [Music] they're solving the crime already we're a page and a half in calum and i see there's a good 15 pages here see while combing through the area around the confidence stream the detectives found something which was distinctly out of place way out in the countryside a pair of circular horn-rimmed spectacles by the side of the stream admittedly knowing the prescription of the perp doesn't exactly narrow things down much but luckily these were no ordinary glasses yeah but if they find some other evidence and then the guy has the exact same prescription that is definitely going to add to your strong circumstantial case right there their unique type of spring fitted onto them meaning the police could trace them right back to the chicago optometrist who had sold them alma co this was a total bull's-eye because according to the shop records co-had only ever sold three pairs of these glasses two of the short-sighted suspects ruled out immediately leaving just one possible owner and his name was nathan freudenthal leopold jr another resident of kenwood and the son of a wealthy industrialist regardless he didn't seem to be the killing type a bookish law student with a seemingly bright future ahead of him it was extremely unlikely that they had found their man when the police confronted 19 year old leopold he explained that he must have dropped his glasses without bird watching the week before if you think that sounds like something you made up on the spot i would encourage you to trust your instincts but this is the thing because they're trying to commit this perfect crime these guys are just psychos interested in killing someone so the motive thing the traditional idea of motive is completely out of the window and so you got this kid and if i was the police and you go to this guy i was like it can't be him right i mean this guy it was enough to satisfy the detectives at first but they still had to follow up on the lead and although the glasses could be explained away the letters could not see leopold was a keen academic when the authorities searched his home they were able to run comparisons between pieces he had written on his typewriter and the ransom note sent to the frank's home the machine itself was missing but experts needed to only look at the printed characters themselves to confirm a match that seems a little bit more like a major i mean dropping your glasses it's like yeah you're gonna sweat over that but dude using your typewriter to write the ransom note it's like come on what are you doing sure enough leopold's documents were a match for the ransom note a fact made clear by the defective t and f on the machine that was used to type them leopold was well and truly done for but the police already suspected that he hadn't carried out the whole thing alone see leopold was inseparable from another local teen who happened to be a direct neighbor of bobby frank this was 18 year old richard albert low but the more charismatic and sporty half of this despicable duo witnesses attested to the fact that the two had been together on the day when the crime was committed meaning it was likely a joint endeavor the police brought them both in for questioning and when presented with the overwhelming evidence both leopold and loeb confessed to everything their statements were extensive with a boastful tone that showcased just how proud the two of them were of their master plan even though it had gone down like the hindenburg ten years before that was even a thing so there you have it one of the quickest and tidiest investigations that you're ever likely to hear about on this show case closed see you next time callum there is still a stack of pages in front of me i also read about this online and i thought these guys were super smart somehow and actually got away with stuff so i'm guessing there's a lot more to this story actually hold on a minute wait i can't let you go just yet we knew it come the actual crime and investigation are just a fraction of the whole story here until we can understand why this case is so infamous we're going to have to take a deep dive into some pretty dark corners of human psychology and american old money culture let's begin with the young men themselves why when both of them and the world laid at their feet had they decided to kill a child it wasn't for money both leopold and loeb already had more than they'd ever need so was it part of some horrible family feud nope loeb's family were friendly with the pranks they were second cousins in fact it's like they're just psychos right they just wanted to see if they could kill someone isn't there a film it's called like the perfect murder or something whether are these two guys and they try to commit this perfect murder and they just you know it has to be a random person that they kill i'm like this is so psycho also the perfect murder is not committed in a pair because i mean that's just way too risky like someone could tell on you the other partner of course the reality is that the only motives behind this killing were thrill-seeking and a grisly statement of moral superiority it's a bit of a weird one see leopold and loeb were by all accounts gifted young men the former had started university at just 15 years old and had already had several pieces published in the us's top ornithology journal yes ladies ornithology that's bird watching right so it does kind of make make sense that he would say that he lost his classes while bird watching likewise at age 17 loeb had beyond the university of michigan's youngest graduate he was enrolled at the university of chicago graduate school studying history at the time of the crime now have you ever met someone who skipped grades in school and went to university earlier i don't mean to generalize but they tend to mention it quite a bit and that sort of thing can give kids a major complex i don't think i've ever met anyone who went to uni i mean i've met like there were kids there was one kid in my class who was uh a year younger like they were moved a year ahead and there was one kid at university who had the same thing like they were 17 and they'd gone to university when everyone else was just 18. but other than that no it's relatively rare i think and to get 15. that's like three years i don't i didn't know any like super child geniuses don't super child geniuses go to like special schools such was the case with leo and loeb they had it bad leopold was especially interested in the idea of the ubermensch a term coined by friedrich nietzsche and overused by millions of the most obnoxious colleague students ever since yes in english it's usually translated to superman but not the spandex wearing type as with all big ideas the meaning of it is up for interpretation but for the purposes of this show all you need to know is how leopold took it he was obsessed with the idea that certain people by virtue of their superior intellect were above the morality of ordinary humanity his obsession was so great that he came to believe he and his buddy were prime examples of this kind of superior being boy was that guy a narcissist he heaps the majority of his adoration on lobe like was the better looking of the two the more socially successful and spent more time enjoying a life of leisure than actually studying the kiki alia pulled on the other hand dropped a monobrow to rival frida kahlo and had struggled to fit in during his teens his social awkwardness and frequent intellectual boasting made it difficult to relate others who knew yeah because everyone exactly no one likes someone who is constantly telling you how smart they are hmm so a guy with delusions of grandeur uses friedrich nietzsche to justify horrible violence hold on i swear i've heard this one before anyway when we just yeah anyway when these two insufferable teens buddied up the stage was set for a violent descent into narcissism which would eventually leave one young man dead and two behind bars leo and loeb had been acquaintances growing up but in their late teens the two of them had become partners in crime quite literally it was loeb who started it his apparent boredom with his comfortable existence that already led him to dip his toes into petty crime a few times by this point he fancied himself as something of a criminal mastermind even though he had just smashed a few shop windows hardly al capone stuff yeah this is i mean it's all great to have a trust fund you know and to be born not have to worry about this stuff and i mean if you don't have one you'll be like wow that sounds awesome but the reality is if you don't kind of have purpose and if you don't have anything to aim for it's like that's you know i feel like that's a really important part of humanity and if everything's just handed to you on a plate you're going to look to get your thrill somewhere else rather than you know the norm or human way of trying to make your own way in the world it's thought that leopold originally got on board with loeb's criminal pursuits because of a strong romantic attraction they entered into an unstable arrangement in which leopold could act as loeb's criminal sidekick in exchange for sexual rewards among their more noteworthy crimes were several acts of petty arson vandalism and burglary for example in november 1923 the pair drove to the university of michigan to raid the frat house which loeb had once belonged to their hall was underwhelming but included a certain typewriter with a couple of broken keys which leopold claimed for himself it was on his drive back to chicago that loeb revealed his plan for their biggest crime yet one which would finally register in the newspapers and make them the talk of chicago he charmed leopold with the story of the perfect murder committed by two young geniuses whose incredible intellects would ensure that they never ever could be caught well we know how that one worked out they got caught incredibly quickly because they left behind blindingly obvious clues confessions [Music] but regardless let's humor the boy geniuses for now ignore the fact that the crime was incredibly shortly executed and have a listen to them gloat about how exactly they plan to get away with it their confessions were taken by the chicago pd on may the 31st and as i said before they were not shy on the details we even know how much the murder weapon cost 75 cents if you were wondering if you're interested in seeking out the original copies you can find scans online provided by midwestern university i'm warning you though they both feature unashamed descriptions of every detail of the crime which might make your stomach turn instead let me just summarize the events for you both statements revealed much the same story the pair had discussed for months the best way to carry out a murder which would prove entirely unsolvable globe was an avid reader of detective novels and reckoned that that gave him a greater insight into how to plan a crime i wouldn't disagree it's definitely better than nothing although the typewriter thing like the matching the keys i feel is i've seen that maybe at least 20 times in you know true crime fictionalized crime television movies books everywhere it's the same reason i reckon i'd make a pretty good spy don't mean to brag but i've seen goldfinger three times to get things started leopold and loeb invented false identities for themselves and then planned every detail from the spot they would dump the body to the vehicle they would use to transport it their plan was so extensive that it was set in full motion about a month before any blood would be shed on the 20th of april leopold visited a rent-a-car shop in downtown chicago using the name morton d ballard he introduced himself as a traveling salesman and asked to rent a vehicle by way of identification he provided a bank book which matched the same fake name the parrot got this by depositing a hundred dollars into a new account that morning meanwhile loeb checked into a hotel called the morrison under the same name the imaginary mr ballard had had a busy day indeed when he arrived at the hotel there was even some mail waiting for him sent by the pair in the days prior getting the car was the toughest part though the rental company operator asked for the standard three references leopold complained that he was only in the city for a short while could only provide one mr lewis mason the worker called the number of mr mason was at which was actually connected to a drugstore pay phone where loeb was posted patiently wait so in the past when you rented a car you had to have three references and the person would phone up and ask them that seems bizarre very specific a massive hassle and kind of easily cheatable after securing the car at 11am the duo drove around for a few hours before returning it at 4pm the rental operator told mr ballard that his registration card would be sent to his hotel over the next few days when loeb returned to the hotel to check for it however he found that the briefcase he had left in the room was now missing apparently a suspicious maid had reported that nobody was actually staying in the room at all when the hotel staff opened the briefcase they would have found it filled with old magazines not exactly a crime but it would have drawn a sort of attention that you don't need when you're gearing up for a murder so they never went back these guys suck at being criminals i mean the guy went to university at 15. i'll be like dude you can do you could be a better criminal than this come on regardless they had all the pieces set up even without the registration card fast forward to the day before the crime the 20th of may driving in leopold's red sports car the two visited a hardware store to buy rope and another for a chisel yeah a red sports car that's a great idea to be driving around when you're trying to be incognito further down the street they hit up a couple of drug stores to collect some hydrochloric acid apparently pharmacists were a lot more chill about over-the-counter acid back in the day with all the materials in hand they went back to leopolds to prepare lobe wrapped tape around the sharp end of the chisel creating a makeshift makeshift club out of the handle slide they ripped up pieces of fabric to make a gag and leopold typed up a ransom note dear sir you no doubt know by this time that your son has been kidnapped please follow our instructions carefully and nothing will happen to him if you don't follow our instructions to the letter you will never see your son again number one do not communicate with the police if you have done so already please do not mention this letter number two go down to the bank and get ten thousand dollars in old bills be sure the bills are rolled any new marked bills will be noticed get two thousand dollars in twenty dollar bills and eight thousand dollars in fifty dollar bills number three be home by one o'clock do not let the phone be used importantly he didn't add any address alongside the very specific set of instructions see the two hadn't decided on exactly who they would be kidnapping just yet so they would have to fill it in after the fact all the epolled and lobe knew was that the victim had to be a child because these ubermensch were total cowards and they had to be wealthy that was a key requirement as the ransom note was intended to throw police off the trail if these two rich young men whose families would be worth about 150 million dollars combines nowadays wow so these guys weren't just you know regular wealthy they were wealthy wealthy this would stop money from looking like motive and the police would probably not look among high society in reality there was no material motive at all the thrill of ending a life and the ego trip of watching the police and media fail to solve it were the only rewards they really wanted and sickeningly for a short while they were able to get both i should warn you the part coming up is very violent and very uncomfortable but well here are the casual criminalists so what did you expect confessions the crime [Music] on the morning of the 21st of may 1924 the two young men met outside the university where leopold had just finished class for the day they drove his car to the rental office where mr ballard now a familiar and verified face had no problems renting a car for the second time it seems strange to me again like bringing up the car thing you need three references to rent a car or to like set up an account but you can go to the bank and just be like yeah yeah i missed a ballot here's a hundred dollars and they're like okay here's a bank account that seems way more sketch with one of them behind the wheel of each car they stopped into a diner for lunch before dumping the red sports car behind the back of leopold's place it was still early afternoon so they decided to head to town to park and wait as low put it they wanted to wait for the schools to finish before starting any operations the particular school they were focused on was the harvard boys school where they had both studied prior again like guys you want to commit the perfect crime don't go to the school where you studied go to some other random school in some other random neighborhood and don't use your red sports car come on come on guys you can do better at 2 15 they drove over there all the while looking out for an opportunity leopold waited in an alleyway while loeb went out to scout at the school grounds he later told the police i waited in the car while dick that's lobe went through the alley to a place where he could either command a view of the harvard school or if he saw any likely looking children he could start playing with them see what i mean about some parts of the interviews being extremely uncomfortable as part of his creepy reconnaissance loeb chatted with the teacher responsible for looking after the kids as they left school as well as a young boy called john levinson who was getting ready to head out dude and again what are you doing you just like gathering witnesses for later i mean if you didn't get caught on the glasses thing or the typewriter thing you'd definitely be caught in all of this stuff what is wrong with you out front of the school he bumped into his own little brother that's right loeb's own sibling went to the school and that didn't even make him stop and reconsider what he was about to do yes he's a psycho after chatting for a while he was called back over to the car as loeb told the investigators there were some children playing on ingleside avenue that leopold thought could be potential prospects after observing several groups of kids they set their sights again on one john levinson who they spotted playing on a patch of waste ground struggling to get a good look they returned to leopold's house to grab a pair of bird watching binoculars they were so set on ending that kid's life that loeb even went to a drug store to check the phone book hoping to ambush him on his way home once they learned his address not long after they returned levinson ran off the would-be killers were deflated at their lack of progress and the boy was totally unaware of how incredibly close he came to death that day this is another thing i wonder about like the number of times you've come close to dying like i once always got into a pretty bad car accident like i just it was entirely my fault i just didn't look properly i'd recently passed my driving test pulled out someone absolutely slammed on their brakes almost entirely plowed into the side of me and that was one of those times where you're like that would have been extremely bad i don't know if i'd have died but it was you know that was close and you think about all the other times it's like where you don't even know that you've been incredibly close to death i'd be fascinated to find out when was the closest that i came to that maybe you're on a plane and it almost crashes with another plane and you never find out or something like that anyway dark thoughts one who was not so lucky however was bobby frank's they happened across him by the side of the road and instantly decided that the plan was back on franks was an easy target on account of the fact that he knew loeb and it'd be easy to coerce into a kidnapping on top of that they knew that his father was very wealthy celia pulled pulled alongside bobby and loeb spoke to him through the backseat window he offered him a ride which bobby politely declined seeing as he was only about five minutes from home a positive low but changed his tune saying that he wanted to chat him about a tennis racquet which was enough to draw the loving bobby in with the unwitting victim in the passenger seat leopold drove off again at the first opportunity lo grabbed his weapon the chisel and leaned over and cut bobby's mouth and brought the handle smashing down onto the back of the boy's skull bobby struggled as he was struck in the head three more times spinning around to face his attacker and crying out all the while even after four hits bobby continued to groan something which loeb hadn't anticipated the reality of ending life was far less clean-cut than his detective novels so he dragged the victim to the back seat forced a rag into his mouth and taped it shut it was like that that bobby franks slowly passed away in the backseat of the car leopold claimed in his confession that the victim died instantly of suffocation shortly thereafter which is an inherently nonsensical sentence that is horrible at first the two killers had given conflicting accounts who actually killed bobby with each blaming the other however their stories converged more after that they told of how the boy was covered with a blanket while they proceeded onwards to indiana a total journey of around 25 miles i feel even if uh they're in concert so much i know modern law would label at least in the uk i believe in the us as well it would label them both as murderers because they were acting in console like i believe there are gang laws that that mean people are guilty like that not 100 sure but i mean you don't need to shift the blame you're both going to be guilty of murder guys come on now they stopped along the way to throw bobby's shoes into a bush removing his trousers and socks and putting them back in the car now all that was left to do was wait until dark they cruised around the countryside and stopped in at a sandwich shop for dinner and root beers it was as if they didn't have the body of a kid sitting in their car at all once twilight came they traveled onwards to the dumping point they had chosen weeks before originally they planned to kill their victim with an ether-soaked rag once there but he was already dead long before he arrived at the site they removed the rest of bobby's clothes and poured the hydrochloric acid on his face in an attempt to cover up his identity some reports mention that the same was done to his genitals as the fact that he was circumcised could help the police identify the victim as jewish although neither culprit mentioned this in his confession then they pushed him headfirst into the railway carvered leaving half the body clearly visible the airpod attempted to shove it further inside with his foot we can take a little bit of satisfaction over the image of the pair of horn-rimmed glasses slipping out of his pocket as he did so meanwhile loeb went off to wash his hands on the other side of the tracks they then set off homewood this was at about 9pm and on the way they stopped at a drugstore to check the address of their victim leopold called his parents to let them know that it'd be late it was he who on returning to chicago called the frank's household under the george johnson alias this was to be the start of an elaborate hunt which would distract the attention of the family and investigators and satisfy the killer's craving for mystery novel drama it's pretty clear that loeb's noir novel-filled imagination played a big part in cooking up this part of the plan i mean the final step was for the father to toss an envelope containing ten thousand dollars from a moving train near lake michigan with the two waiting in a car to collect it thankfully the family were spared taking part in that futile little game although it's not much consolation given the circumstances after leo and loeb put things in motion by mailing the ransom note they turned their attention to the bloodstains in the rental car they cleaned it up as much as possible buried the clothes in loeb's furnace and then headed over to leopold's house to hang out with his family as if nothing had happened waiting for their elaborate scheme to unfold but as we know the whole thing fell apart faster than a house of cards in a hurricane it didn't start off terribly the note arrived at the frank's household but there were a few other pieces to set up before they could topple the dominoes that would lead them to the ten thousand dollars first the car it was still very clearly bloodstained while the pair tried to scrub it clean in leopold's garage the chauffeur came down to offer a hand they were able to send him off with a story about spilling red wine we've all been there right cruising around drinking pinot noir straight from the bottle until some idiot breaks in front of you in the end the majority of the visible staining could be removed despite the close call again just reiterating how these guys are terrible at crime after that they drove downtown for with a series of typewritten notes that would direct the treasure hunt they tried to take one inside a trash can but it wouldn't hold so instead they went straight to the train station loeb disguised himself in a hat glasses and black overcoat he bought a ticket to philadelphia solely for the purpose of hiding a note on the train it instructed mr franks to move to the back of the train and watch until he saw a red brick factory with the name champion painted on the outside after waiting a few seconds he was to toss the boxed up cache as far eastward as possible while lowe planted this final instruction leopold was setting the whole convoluted sequence in motion he called a taxi to the frank's house and called them to direct the father to a downtown drugstore where he would receive another call on a pay phone honestly it seems like a completely unnecessary step when they already had him on the phone at that very moment but i guess i'm just not a criminal genius indeed it was around that point at around 2 30 in the afternoon that the duo had the first inclination that maybe they weren't so good at this crime business either driving past a newsstand they caught sight of a front-page headline boy's body found in swamp it had been less than 24 hours since they disposed of the body and it had already been found regardless leopold demanded they keep on with the whole charade they tried calling the drug store but as you already know paul mr franks had forgotten the address his pain thinking he let his son down was cut off by a deeper pain the police identified the body that afternoon for leopold and loeb a little game was over they decided just to return the car and head home lopes chauffeur told him about the murder when he arrived and the pair's anxiety started to build they began discussing what to do if questioned and set about destroying the last of the evidence the typewriter was tossed in the harbor and its bar heads scattered into a river in the park the blankets they doused in gasoline and burned an alleyway but there was one key piece of evidence they couldn't destroy in the newspaper they saw the police had found a distinctive pair of glasses near the body and the heat was really on now our two narratives have neatly tied together we understand exactly how this horrible crime took place every detestable little detail awful and horrible yes but could you really call this the perfect crime objectively no in fact the whole thing displays about as much genius as your average cornerstone robbery i don't mean to be crass but surely if two huge intellects plan the crime of the century for months they could come up with a better method than smacking someone with a chisel and all of that planning only for leopold to drop his glasses undone by the same achilles heel as velma from scooby-doo add to that all the blood over the rental car cleaning the car at their own home the shoddy concealment of the body and the amount of people who the two revealed their faces to while scoping out the school and you hardly have the portrait of two master criminals and that's just mentioning a few of the things not to mention the typewriter with the matching letters it's like yeah you got rid of the typewriter but you've written a whole lot of stuff on there it's gonna be matched up could it really be that these two weren't geniuses at all but a couple of bumbling sadists with good school report cards i mean there's a reason why crime shows don't usually feature a diabolical ornithologist as the villain murder and bird watching are two distinct fields with very different skill sets at the end of the day leopold and loeb were well out of their depth just two garden variety narcissists living out delusions of grandeur well that's my take on the story anyway the media at the time however spun plenty of different yarns about what might have caused the horrible crime to take place this was the early days of true mass media when radios had just started finding their way into millions of american households everyone had an opinion and an agenda to push with it the airwaves and papers were filled with all kinds of speculation for example some ran with the idea that the crime was the inescapable result of the new culture of libertarianism which had swept over the american youth church's synagogues and traditional values wearing a hard time competing against jazz bars and casual sex it's hard to imagine why evangelist billy sunday was one such proponent he rallied against the moral miasma of the youth of the day and their infidel minds likewise an unnamed individual referred to only as a jewish spokesman wrote in the chicago tribune that rich jewish parents were to blame for letting their children grow up spoiled and without any values and of course once news of the sexual dynamic between the two culprits came to light this was taken as evidence of moral corruption now remember this was the 1920s plenty of folks were on the lookout for chances to bash rich jewish people gay people and atheism i'll not be participating in any of that because i haven't lost my mind my aim is to give you a sense of the kind of media frenzy that was whipped up around this case the idea of the american dream itself was being put to the test after all two of its model families had produced offspring no better than the poor folk who were rotting in prison various academics were rallied to try and explain the whole thing psychologists attached significance to the fact that leopold had already been sexually abused by his governess that's nanny for our uk listeners although i feel like americans would also say nanny as well these days governance fills very old fashions there were even graphics published in the papers featuring analyses of leopold and loeb's skull shapes ah is it phrenology the science of like uh people feeling your skull to see what's up inside and it's all lies why is that important well there's an elderfunk pseudoscience called phrenology oh callum and i same page and i'm quite pleased that i remember that was called phrenology which claimed that it was possible to determine a person's psychological character just by looking at the shape of their head i'll give a quick rundown of leopold's for any phrenology fans listening in the slope of his brow meant that he lacked benevolent power the tops of his ears revealed a distinctive instinct his lips were sensuous i think maybe that chronologist needed to go take a cold shower yeah it's just all [ __ ] really the trial against this backdrop of media sensationalism the cook county state attorney was tasked with achieving the harshest possible punishment for both leopold and loeb death penalty for sure this was robert crowe a republican party man with mayoral aspirations he saw his shot to gain the goodwill of the public with a swift death penalty ruling he was pretty confident that he could pull it off in fact crowe told the papers this was potentially the most complete case he ever presented to a grand or petite jury wait are they pleading not guilty i assumed they they confessed so i assume they're going for non-guilty so is there a jury in the u.s in that case what does the judge just make just the judge ascends to sentence or maybe in death penalty cases i don't know but maybe this is correct that there is a jury to decide what punishment is dished out or maybe in the u.s does the jury decide how long you go to prison for i thought that was the judge's job anyway i'll stop talking because i don't know what i'm talking about when the defense counsel leopoldon loeb was revealed however crowe surely wished he had dialed down the bravado this was clarence darrow a legendary name in american legal circles and likely one to ring some bells even for the casual true crime listener daryl and crow had gone head to head before on a corruption case featuring a senior republican with darrow ultimately coming out on top the trial which started in july was all set up to be a major courtroom drama the kind of which the american public eats right up to this day local radio station wgn even considered setting up mics in the courthouse to broadcast the whole thing live but decided that it would be in poor taste yes it would be in poor taste fast forward 70 years and the whole nation would be gawking at the oj trial popcorn in hand i'll let you decide which setup is better oh yeah okay so you can have like cameras and stuff in u.s courtrooms in the uk i don't believe you can and so there's sketch artists who will draw what's going on and that appears in the paper rather than you know actual photos and stuff like that but unlike in the oj trial nobody even considered exoneration as an option i mean the two killers had given confessions over 30 pages long and were openly proud of what they had done no lawyer on earth was going to spin that into a not guilty but clarence darrow the bar was set much lower success meant avoiding the death penalty of course when it came time to enter a plea both leopold and loeb admitted their guilt this allowed them to completely bypass trial by jury okay good i thought that was the case i'm glad that we had the facts here which would have massively swung things in the state's favor instead darrow only needed to appeal to the judge himself all he had to do was convince the judge that leopold and loeb suffered from mental health problems rather than full-blown insanity which would be enough to win life in prison i think that should be achievable and if this is a very good lawyer that seems very likely because clear i mean there's that that lack of motive the trust fund rich kids just got nothing better to do spoiled it's that they're screwed up guys there's no one who could argue that they're not screwed up guys just can that lawyer spin that not spin that screwed up-ness into mental issues i believe probably yes i don't know i don't know the outcome of this one so both sides rolled out psychiatrists give conflicting explanations for the same evidence which caused a backlash against the field in the papers the defense played every card in their hand even arguing that the pressures of being from a wealthy family had caused the two teens to act out against their life of privilege man being rich must be so tough they painted a picture of both men as fanaticists leopold is a self-aggrandizing servant desperate to worship and serve loeb while lowe imagined himself as a criminal genius with need for someone to applaud him as evidence one of the psychological profilers quoted a conversation that he had with loeb when he asked what he thought of the possibility of death by hanging the killer said well it's too bad a fellow won't be able to read about it in the newspapers all of these narratives and counter-narratives were woven over a grueling 33-day trial which came to a head with a 12-hour closing argument from darrow his speech became a definitive aspect of not only the trial but his entire career in it he gave an impassioned argument against the death penalty and principle invoking all kinds of fresh science from the decades prior he eloquently argued that if it's inhuman nature or an individual's own nature to commit crime then they can't rightly be held fully responsible in the traditional moral sense making the death penalty barbaric it's a bit of a stretch but okay it's an interesting question to consider if we accept that inescapable factors like insanity result in diminished responsibility can that be extended to more basic parts of human or individual nature that might be taking things a bit far away from the casual criminalist and more into the hardcore criminologist territory so we'll just leave it for you to consider thanks callum yeah this is getting pretty it's getting pretty deep these moral ethical questions and anyway at any rate the closing speech was a home run leopold and load the child killers were sentenced to life in prison plus 99 years for kidnapping they dodged the noose and robert crowe was left to stomp his hat in frustration later that day he rallied against the judge in the press and was quoted as saying leopold and loeb had the reputation of being degenerates of the worst type it is unfortunate for the welfare of the community that they were not sentenced to death i don't know they're in prison what are they going to do i don't think that other than satisfy some need for vengeance i don't think the community is going to be particularly adversely affected they're still taken away and put somewhere where they will never get out of the two degenerates on the other hand seemed quite pleased with the result they were allowed to shake darrow's hand before being carted off to northern illinois penitentiary where i'm sure their nature quotes won them a lot of friends definitely didn't those i can't imagine child killers have a particularly great time in prison especially when they're they've got the superiority complex that these guys clearly had that brings us about to the end of our story of leopold and loeb so i'd just like to ask was this the crime of the century which the newspapers try to sell it as my answer there callum is absolutely not you kind of read about this online and it's like oh that sounds exciting these genius killers and then it's like oh no they were just smart kids but they were really terrible at crime maybe like cali said maybe they were really good at all mythology honestly without the money and status involved i doubt it would even be considered particularly noteworthy robert crowe put it pretty well in his own closing argument when he said take away their money and what happens the same thing that has happened to all other men who have been tried in this building who had no money clarence darrow once said that a poor man on trial here was disposed of in 15 minutes but if he was rich and committed the same crime and he got a good lawyer his trial would last 21 days well they got three lawyers and it has lasted just a little bit longer when someone without the privileged life enjoyed by leopold and local someone they're tarred as a natural criminal by default but add in a touch of wealth and suddenly the killers are given a platform to preach their philosophical justifications if that fact alone doesn't make you sick have i listened to this in a newspaper interview during the trial leopold told a reporter a thirst for knowledge is highly commendable no matter what extreme pain or injury it may inflict upon others a six-year-old boy is justified in pulling the wings from a fly if by doing so he learns that without wings the fly is helpless leopold is a total psycho only a total psycho would would say that like you can learn that flies helpless because someone will tell you so like the fly flies with its wings if you take off the wings it's not going to fly okay great now i don't need to take the wings off any flies problem solved i'm pretty sure most of us were able to figure that out without any practical experimentation yes thank you callum even with our puny intellect but that's beside the point all he's describing are the same basic impulses as every garden variety sadis just with added pretentiousness all this talk of psychology and philosophy just dressed up one simple fact these two men were child murderers and without any remorse to stop them where might their murderous line of logic have taken them if they weren't caught i can't say for sure what i can tell you is where they ended up in january of 1936 loeb fell foul of another prisoner named james day who was serving a bid for grand larceny day ambushed lobe in the prison showers slashing and stabbing him until he laid bleeding out on the floor he died of 50 wounds including a slashed throat at just 30 years old it didn't take kryptonite to kill this self-appointed superman just a simple shank did the job yeah like i said he wasn't gonna have a good time in prison was he he's a [ __ ] and a child murderer as for leopold he outlived his partner by quite a few decades in 1958 he was granted parole partly due to the advocacy of poet carl sandberg who was apparently willing to overlook the whole child murder thing carl what are you doing he got parole he was sentenced to life plus 99 years and narrowly avoided the death penalty why on earth did this guy get out of prison he started a new life down in puerto rico refusing to engage with the countless requests for interviews from u.s journalists he married a fellow expat gained a degree in social care and went on to work in leprosy research and nature writing until his death in 1971. so 1958 when did he go to prison just go back a little bit well it was shortly after the crime right and the crime was 1924 so let's say 1925. so he spent uh 33 years in prison right yeah good arithmetic 33 is in prison he should have been in prison for way longer than that he should never left prison two very different outcomes which appeal to two very different kinds of criminal justice retribution versus reformation if you don't know which side you believe try this little experiment which result made you less furious there you have your answer yeah yeah i mean to be fair that's a very quick assessment of it and obviously like prison can be for you know to reform people but also if you're a child murderer maybe we should just for no reason just a psychopathic child murderer maybe you should stay in prison dismember dependencies number one despite the lawyer winning one of the most unlikely victories of his entire career leopold's father was apparently unhappy with clarence darrow's work and refused to pay for his services it's unclear what he was hoping for i mean if your son kills a kid and brags about it anything short of the maximum sentence has to be considered lenient ah rich people one quirk of rich people crime is that the world of musical theater pays a lot more attention in 2005 a musical called thrill me the leopoldon loeb story premiered in new york to positive reviews if the idea of listening to a chipper number in which a child murderer tries to entice a kid into his car sounds utter unsettling to you while still steer well clear who on earth thought that was a good idea who gave this good reviews this is this is it's distasteful a hundred years later come on number three in 1958 leopold was given a further platform with the release of his autobiography life plus 99 years it was seen as part of his attempt to polish his image in game parole another book on the case by mayor levin named compulsion was made into a film one year later and leopold tried to stop it on the ground and damaged his reputation the judge on the case essentially said you the proud child murderer have no reputation left damage goodbye that has been a rather dark episode of the casual criminalist i do hope well not that you enjoyed it but i do hope you found it interesting if you are enjoying this show and you're listening to it as a podcast please do leave us a review if you are enjoying this show and you're watching it on youtube please do give us a thumbs up leave us a comment subscribe thank you for watching or [Music] [Applause] listening you

Channel: The Casual Criminalist

Views: 215,191

Rating: 4.9294496 out of 5

Keywords: true crime

Id: 4i5NKoG-Ky0

Length: 43min 56sec (2636 seconds)

Published: Tue Feb 02 2021