The Black Dahlia

This celebrated unsolved murder, is one of a small number of cases that have attracted amateur sleuths that come forward with plausible and quite often, outrageous claims.  The most celebrated are, of course, Jack The Ripper, The Zodiac, and The Black Dahlia.  


    This case was very sensational, in that the victim, would-be actress Elizabeth Short was dissected and her body put on display in a residential neighbourhood.  The killer was never apprehended, and over the years, some fanciful theories have surfaced.  One woman claims her father was the killer, and a cop named Steve Hodell claimed that not only was his father the killer, but he was also The Zodiac!  One theory that I do not subscribe to, was that the killer was notorious gangster Bugsy Siegel.  It is claimed that it was done as a message to Los Angeles kingpin, Jack Dragna.  My objection to this theory, is that if Siegel wanted to send a message of any kind to Dragna, the obvious thing to do was kill one of his top men and then dump the body on his front lawn.  An unknown woman, no matter how gruesome the murder, is not going to send a message to a top gangster.