"WHY NO INQUEST? DO IT NOW, DR. GERBER."
AN EDITORIAL
Why hasn't County Coroner Sam Gerber called an inquest into the Sheppard murder case? What restrains
him? Is the Sheppard murder
case any different from the countless other murder mysteries
where the coroner has turned to this traditional method of investigation? An
inquest empowers use of the subpoena. It
puts witnesses under oath. It makes possible the examination of every
possible witness, suspect, relative, records and papers available anywhere. It
puts the investigation itself into the record. And--what's
most important of all-it sometimes solves crimes. What good reason is there now
for Dr. Gerber to delay any longer the use of the inquest? The murder of
Marilyn Sheppard is a baffling crime. Thus far it appears to have stumped
everybody. It may never be solved. But, this community can never have a
clear conscience until every possible method is applied to its solution.
What, Coroner Gerber,
is the answer to the question-Why don't you call an inquest into this
murder?
Cleveland Press, July 21, 1954, Pg. 1
This editorial, and many others like it splashed across Page 1 of The
Cleveland Press after July 4, 1954 when the young, pregnant wife of a prominent
Bay Village doctor turned up murdered inside her Bay Village home. Written by
the editor of The Cleveland Press, Louise B. Seltzer as mainly editorials to
get things to happen when he felt that the Bay Village and Cleveland Police
Departments or County Coroner Samuel R. Gerber weren't doing enough to get
justice, Seltzer helped ruin any good chances of Dr. Samuel Sheppard ever
getting a fair trail.
An Overview of Murder
"My God, Spen, get over here quick! I
think they've killed Marilyn!"
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| Dr. and Mrs. Samuel Sheppard on their wedding day |
It was sometime during the early
hours of July 4, 1954 that prominent Bay View Hospital doctor Samuel Holmes
Sheppard's pretty four-month pregnant wife Marilyn Reese Sheppard was found
brutally murdered in her bed in the family's Bay Village home. Down the hall
from her room slept the couple's seven year old son Chip, as he was called, while
Marilyn's husband Sam slept on a day bed in the living room, having fallen
asleep earlier in the evening while he and Marilyn had entertained their friends
Don and Nancy Ahern.
On July 4, in the early morning
hours, Dr. Sheppard recalled that he was woken up by Marilyn crying out his
name several times. As he ran up the stairs to check on his wife (he assumed
that Marilyn was having a reaction similar to convulsions that she had had in
the early days of her pregnancy), he wound up being hit in the back of the head
and knocked out. When he gathered his senses, he was in a sitting position next
to the bed, his feet facing the hall. After checking on his wife and
determining that she was dead, he went and checked on his sleeping son. Hearing
a sound downstairs, he went downstairs and saw a form somewhere between the
front door towards the lake and the screen door. Following the figure, they
wound up down on the beach where Sam was again knocked unconscious. This time,
he came to by the tide washing up on him. Going back to the house, Sam again
claims that he checked again on Marilyn, for sure once, but possibly several times
before calling the first number that came to his mind-Mayor and Mrs.
Spencer
Houk. After they arrived, Mayor Houk called the police as well as Sam's
brothers Dr's. Richard and Steve Sheppard, who upon arriving at the house, took
Sam to their family hospital, Bay View, where Sam was treated for bruises on
the right side of his face, a swollen eye socket, two slightly chipped teeth,
slightly elevated blood pressure and for hypothermia.
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| The Sheppard Doctors Richard A. (Father), Steve, Richard N and Sam |
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| Dr. Samuel R. Gerber, MD Cuyahoga County Coroner |
At 7:50 AM on July 4, 1954,
Cuyahoga County Coroner Dr. Samuel R. Gerber, MD arrived on scene, and by 8:10,
Cleveland detective Michael Grabowski arrived on scene, per the request of both
Bay Village police department and Dr. Gerber. The crime scene was processed,
Sheppard was questioned both by detectives and Dr. Gerber at Bay View.
By 12:30 PM, Dr. Lester Adelson,
Deputy Coroner for Cuyahoga County began the autopsy of Marilyn Sheppard. It is
important to note, that unlike Dr. Gerber, who was trained as strictly a
physician and a lawyer; Dr. Adelson had
been trained as a pathologist, who
believed that "...in a murder case the body was the best witness. 'Unlike
a living witness, a victim's body does not shade the truth, tell lies, or plead
the Fifth Amendment.' he liked to say." 1 During autopsy,
Adelson determined that rigor mortis was complete, allowing him to place Marilyn's death somewhere between 4:15 and 4:45 AM. Her stomach was found empty,
and as a person needs five to seven hours to digest a large meal as the
Sheppard's and Ahern's had had the night before, this was very important. Also found during the autopsy
were fifteen crescent-shaped lacerations on the forehead and scalp, most of
them about one inch long and a half-inch wide; thirty-five body wounds; a
broken nose; eyelids bruised and swollen shut; two upper medial incisors
snapped off; fractured skull plates from the fifteen blows; cracked skull; and
her frontal blows separated; lungs and windpipe were congested with blood, but
with no blood in the stomach, she was unable to swallow suggesting she was
already unconscious; cyanosis in her fingernails; four blows to her left hand
and wrist; a quarter-size bruise on her left shoulder; right little finger
broken; the fingernail on the left ring finger was torn off; "creamy white
exudate" in her vagina; "abundant" amounts of epithelial cells
and bacteria in the vagina; and a four-month gestational male in her uterus. On
her death certificate, Dr. Adelson listed Marilyn's time of death "at
about 4:30 AM" on July 4, 1954 due to massive head injuries, the manner
being homicide.1
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| Dr. Lester Adelson, Deputy Coroner for Cuyahoga County examines X-Rays of the hands, feet and head of Mrs. Marilyn Sheppard. |
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| "Death Mask" of the head injuries of Mrs. Marilyn Sheppard. The real death mask resides in the museum of the Cuyahoga County Medical Examiner's Office |
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| Marilyn Sheppard lies dead in her bedroom at her home in Bay Village, Ohio |
The Press Coverage Begins
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| Mrs. Sam H. Sheppard, an expectant mother, was murder victim in her Bay Village home  |
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| Samuel H. Sheppard Jr. "Chip" |
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| Mr. and Mrs. Samuel Sheppard |
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| Mr. and Mrs. Samuel Sheppard |
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| Marilyn, Chip, and Sam |
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| Sam and Marilyn Sheppard wedding day |
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| Marilyn and Sam water-skiing |
Louis B. Seltzer and the Cleveland Press
Seltzer's
background was the near opposite of Sam Sheppard's. He had grown up
impoverished, the oldest of five, the son of an out-of-work carpenter who tried
to make a living writing dime novels. His mother made his clothes by cutting up
discarded men's suits and shirts. Louis dropped out of sixth grade to work as
an office boy at the Press and fell in love with the thrill of big-city
news-papering during the Front Page Era, when cutthroat competition and
entertainment trumped the need to be responsible civic force. As a police-beat
reporter, he entered apartments and houses to "borrow" photographs
from families of crime victims to splash on page 1, a routine practice.
Firehouses' coded alarms sounded in the newsroom, and he literally ran from the
newsroom to be first on the scene. He witnessed seven electrocutions and took
part in circulation-building stunts, such as using magician Harry Houdini to
obtain evidence in exposing phony spiritualists who were preying on
unsuspecting immigrants. He even got himself locked into the huge, antiquated
Ohio State Penitentiary to expose its brutal conditions. He shot up the ranks
at the Press, the flagship of the
nineteen-paper Scripps Howard chain, and at only thirty years old was named
editor in 1929. By 1939, he was earning seventy-five thousand dollars a year, a
huge salary for an editor, as well as a bonus of 5 percent of any increases in
the Press's operating profits. If the Press did well, so did he,
which gave him a financial incentive to create circulation-boosting crusades.
Seltzer was an astute marketeer; he preached that a newspaper had to connect
with the everyday lives of its readers from womb to tomb. Among his
innovations, his staff sent cards to parents of newborns and invited couples
reaching their fiftieth anniversary to a free banquet. Early in his career as
editor, Seltzer set aside part of each Friday to visit one of Cleveland's
forty-six ethnic neighborhoods with his wife, Marion. Many days he gave two or
three speeches to clubs, women's societies, or church groups, speeding from
address to address, arriving at one for the first course and hitting the other
by dessert. Typically, he was home for an early family dinner at around 4 PM.,
just after the late stock edition hit the streets, then changed suits and hit
the dinner-speech circuit. Clevelanders felt they knew him and trusted him.
They believed his newspaper would tell it like it is. Seltzer ran a loud,
loose, profane newsroom. He encouraged practical jokes. Once he threw a
firecracker under the chair of a reporter interviewing a woman on the
telephone. "What was that!" the startled woman demanded. A
firecracker, the reporter said calmly. "What would Mr. Seltzer think about
that?" she wanted to know. "Ma'am, he's the one who threw it."
By the time of the Sheppard murder, Seltzer was known as "Mr.
Cleveland," the most powerful man in the region, a political kingmaker. He
believed that his newspaper, with information and a loud voice, could solve the
city's problems. The Press was a "fighting paper" that
"fought like hell for the people" he liked to explain. When local
government did not function, the Press struck with editorial might, even
if it meant using the sledgehammer to crush a gnat. Overkill could be
rationalized by it editors because the cause was just, for the little guy.
Anyone who tried to play outside these rules or who was perceived as looking
down on his mostly blue-collar readers, Seltzer enjoyed taking down a peg. The
players in the Sheppard murder were perfect fodder for his audience. The
Sheppard family was affluent, suburban nonveau riche, osteopaths with a hint of
immortality, and they had quickly retained lawyers, one of Seltzer's favorite
editorial targets. Seltzer decided that the Drs. Sheppard, with status and
wealth, were impending a murder investigation and thwarting justice, thereby
mocking the people's will. They needed a comeuppance. For the rest of the
Sheppard murder investigation, Seltzer and Gerber worked together closely, one
creating news, the other inflating it."
Even in Seltzer's autobiography The
Years Were Good, he devoted the entire 26th chapter to the Sheppard murder
case. In the chapter, he attempted to answer the question of why the Press
went "on a killing-spear" one could say about the case.
"It was a calculated
risk-a hazard of the kind which I believed a newspaper sometimes in the
interest of law and order and the community's ultimate safety must take. I was
convinced that a conspiracy existed to defeat the ends of justice, and that it
would affect adversely the whole law-enforcement machinery of the County if it
were permitted to succeed. It could establish a precedent that would destroy
even-handed administration of justice."
Seltzer also acknowledges that The
Press had been applauded and criticized, because of how it "inflamed
public opinion by its persistent and vigorous pounding away at the case."
and that some believed that the Sheppard case had been "tried" in the
press, rather than in the courtroom, and that he would do the same thing over
again. The most noble thing that he did, was that he wrote the editorials
himself, rather then having his staff taking the risk.
The Inquest
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| Dr. Samuel Gerber, Cuyahoga County Coroner holds an inquest. Dr. Sam Sheppard (right) answers Gerber's questions |
On July 21, 1954, The Press publishes an editorial with the headline
"WHY NO INQUEST? DO IT NOW , DR.
GERBER!" Later in the day, Dr. Gerber announces that he is calling an
inquest that will begin the next day on July 22 at the Normandy High School in
Bay Village. There is heavy media presence at the inquest and the inquest lasts
for three-days.
In his thesis paper, PRESSING
CHARGES: The Impact of the Sam Sheppard Trials on Courtroom Coverage and
Criminal Law, Tali Yahalom quotes The Press' Bill Tanner about the
inquest for the Sheppard case. Tanner admits that, "If it hadn't been for
the newspaper urging this, it probably wouldn't have happened."
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| Mug Shot of Sam Sheppard August 2, 1954 |
The Trails
The media coverage of Marilyn Sheppard's murder only gets worse, and the Cleveland
Press and Louis B. Seltzer continues to slaughter all involved parties of
the case. His "editorials" scream of justice for Marilyn and continue
to demand action in solving this brutal crime. After the Press runs an
editorial asking why Sam Sheppard isn't in jail, Sam is arrested at the home of
his parents. That would be the last time in ten years that Sam Sheppard would
be a free man.
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| The Jury visits The Sheppard's Bay Village home |
The start of the 1964 murder trail of Marilyn Sheppard is a nightmare the
moment it begins. Despite the case having already been covered extensively in
the newspapers, the judge never sequesters the jury and their names, addresses
and faces are printed countless times in the press. When asked numerous times
for the case to be ruled a mistrial or to be thrown out because of the 'circus
like' manner the court room is being run, Judge Edward Blythin refuses and on
November 3, 1954, the murder trial of Marilyn Sheppard begins with a visit to
the Sheppard's home with the jury, Dr. Sheppard himself and of course, the
media. It is not until December 17, 1954, a little over a month after the
trial started that the jury on the case finds themselves sequestered for the
first time, but by then the damage is done. Sam Sheppard has been denied his
right of a fair trial due to the media coverage. On December 21, 1954 Dr.
Samuel Holmes Sheppard is found guilty of murder in the second degree.
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| Dr. Sam Sheppard, now a free man with his son Chip and 2nd wife Ariane Tebbenjohanns |
Appeals for a new trial begin almost immediately and every time, Sam is
denied his sixth amendment. For the next ten years, Sam Sheppard remains
behind bars in a maximum security prison near Columbus until defense lawyer F.
Lee Bailey files a petition for habeas corpus in federal court on April 13,
1963. In his petition, Bailey argues, among other things, that prejudicial
publicity in the trial violated Sam's right to due process. On July 15 and 16,
1964 Judge Weinman tosses out Sheppard's conviction on what he calls
"constitutional grounds" calling his trial a "mockery of
justice." For the first time in ten years, Sam Sheppard is released from
prison on $10,000 bond and marries Ariane Tebbenjohanns.
Between October 8, 1964 and March 4, 1965 the Sixth Circuit Court of
Appeals in Cleveland hears the state's appeal of Judge Weinman's decision and
on a 2 to 1 vote, the decision is reversed. Sam is allowed to remain free on
bail pending his appeal to the United States Supreme Court.
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| Sam Sheppard with F. Lee Bailey |
On February 28, 1966, the United States Supreme Court begins to hear oral
arguments for Sheppard V. Maxwell. Sheppard is represented by attorney
F. Lee Bailey. The state is represented by Ohio Attorney General William Saxbe.
On June 6, 1966, almost twelve years after the murder of Marilyn Sheppard, the
Supreme Court reverses Sam's murder conviction on due process grounds on an 8
to 1 vote. They cite "virulent publicity" which might have affected
the jury's verdict.
On October 24, 1966, now twelve years after a jury hears the
murder trail of Marilyn Sheppard, Cuyahoga County Common Pleas judge Francis
Talty is assigned to hear the second murder case against Sam Sheppard.
Determined to avoid another 'Circus Trial' Judge Talty laid down the
following rules in his court room:
- 1. There were to be no cameras on the premises of the court building and not even sketch-makers in the courtroom. No press table inside the bar. No room for radio equipment. No freedom to move about the courtroom-nobody could leave or enter while court was in session. No statements to the press by lawyers or witnesses.
- 2. The number of benches for spectators and reporters were cut down to three totally 42 seats, which were assigned to the media. There were four for the two Cleveland newspapers, the Plain Dealer and the Press; eight for local radio and TV stations and one each for the AP and UPI. There were none for out-of-town newspapers, for national publications or for television networks.
Naturally, the media was upset at this order, but after the Supreme
Court ruling, they weren't about to challenge this.
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| Dr. Sam Sheppard and third wife Colleen Strickland |
Unlike the first case, the seven men, five women and three alternates were
sequestered in a downtown hotel. Phone calls home would be monitored and their
only news would come from newspapers that had been clipped of the Sheppard
case.
On Friday, November 16, 1966, just shy of a month after the trial started
it was over. At 9:30 PM that evening Judge Talty read Sam Sheppard his
verdict-"We the jury impaneled in the above case find the defendant not
guilty." It was music to Sam's ears, provided that he actually heard the
verdict. By now, the toll of Marilyn's murder and three trials had drove the
once promising physician to booze and pills. His family had been destroyed.
Both his parents and Marilyn's father were dead, and he was on to wife number
three.
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| The Cleveland Press headline for April 6, 1970 |
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| "The Killer" |
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| Knollwood Cemetery- The final resting place for Sam and Marilyn |
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| The crypt for Sam and Marilyn Sheppard and their unborn son |
Disgraced Journalist?
Is Louis B. Seltzer a disgraced journalist? Personally, I'm in favor
of labeling him one. However, there are people who lived through the era of
Seltzer that would swear his the best thing since sliced bread. A disgraced
journalist is one who makes up stories like Stephen Glass or Piers Morgan, but
Seltzer never officially got caught making up stories. Instead, the countless
headlines that splashed upon Page 1 of Cleveland Press were editorials
wrote by the editor of the paper. Still considered a disgrace? In my mind, you
bet. What saved him from falling under the 'made up stories' was that one
little word-editorial. He could claim if ever questioned that it was his own
opinion.
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| Headlines, like the one above, saying SOMEBODY IS GETTING AWAY WITH MURDER flooded The Cleveland Press when Louis Seltzer determined that nothing was being done |
But this was not the first case that Seltzer's beloved Cleveland Press
went out on a limb regarding headlines in their papers. In John Bellamy's book The
Maniac in the Bushes, clippings from the Press during the Torso
"Kingsbury Run" Murders feature such headlines such as GHOSTLY HAND SEEN IN LAKE , BONES ON SHORE DISAPPEAR which cause numerous phone
calls and tips into the police about false sightings and/or useless discovers
in the case. Better yet, other headlines that splashed across Press's
papers included POLICE SEEKING THRILL SLAYERS, a story they "got from
unnamed police officers" and yet another "editorial" titled
MADMAN OR COOL KILLER? POLICE PROBERS GROPING FOR LEADS IN COUNTY'S FIVE HEADLESS MURDERS." In 1937, BABY FARM IS TORSO DEATH CLEW, a fact that was never proven because the baby farm
referred to in the story didn't exist.
Is Seltzer a disgraced journalist? Yes. He singlehandedly destroyed a man
in the newspaper of Cleveland. Did he make up stories? Most likely, but then
covered his trail with calling them editorials. Why did he lead the Cleveland
Press into this? Seltzer called it justice. Doris O'Donnell, a reporter for
Cleveland News said that "When Louise Seltzer spoke, politicians
shook. [He was a] little guy [but] the king of journalism." Even Seltzer
himself admitted in his autobiography, "There were risks both ways. One
represented a risk to the community. The other was a risk to The Press. We
chose the risk to ourselves. As Editor of The Press I would do the same thing
over again under the same circumstances."
You be the judge about this one.
Epilogue
The Sam Sheppard murder case remains unsolved to this day. Marilyn and Sam's only son, Chip, continues to try and clear his father's name and find the real murder of his mother's death.
But, take this into consideration. If Seltzer wasn't a 'disgraced journalist' who singlehandedly led his paper into a witch hunt of the century with this case with all the headlines run and other comments made in the paper, would the Supreme Court of this great nation really have to vote 8 to 1 that Dr. Samuel Sheppard, a fine physician until the untimely death of his young, pregnant wife, that Sheppard didn't get a fair trail because of the media circus that had covered the case almost from the very moment it started? I doubt it. But hey, that's just my opinion...or as Seltzer would write it-An Editorial
