The story you are about to hear is true.
The names have been changed to protect the innocent.
You're a detective sergeant.
You're assigned a homicide detail.
A 64 year old shopkeeper is found murdered, beaten to death in the back room of his store.
The body bears the marks of a savage attack.
There's no trace of the killer.
Your job?
Get him.
Dragnet.
The documented drama of an actual crime.
For the next 30 minutes in cooperation with the Los Angeles Police Department, you will
travel step by step on the side of the law through an actual case transcribed from official
police files.
From beginning to end, from crime to punishment, Dragnet is the story of your police force
in action.
Was Wednesday, February 19th.
Was cloudy in Los Angeles.
We were working the night watch out a homicide detail.
My partner's Ben Romero, the boss is Thad Brown, chief of detectives.
My name's Friday.
We were on the way out from the office and it was 10 56 p.m. when we got to 10 16 south
12th street.
The apex men's shop.
Yes sir?
Friday and Romero, central homicide.
ID card.
Oh yeah sergeant, been waiting for you.
My partner's upstairs in the back talking to the victim's wife.
You answered the call did you?
Yeah that's right.
Miles and Kever unit 16R.
Who are you?
Miles.
Kever's talking to Mrs. Wilford, victim's wife.
She found the body.
What's that up above?
How's that?
Music up there somewhere.
Sounds like a party.
Oh yeah well that's a dance place.
It takes a hole up the floor of the building.
A wonderland dance hall I think that's it.
When was the body found Miles do you know?
Well the wife wasn't very definite about it.
She told us she came in the shop here about 10 o'clock tonight.
Place was wide open, nobody behind the counter.
Said she looked around a while, finally found her husband's body in the store room back
there.
Nothing for a weak stomach, it's pretty brutal.
What else do you have to say?
Oh not too much, she's pretty closed mouthed.
Probably the shock of finding her husband like that I don't know.
You want to show us where he is Miles?
Yeah straight back this way.
Victim's name is Joseph Wilford, owner of the store ran it himself.
Wife says he's had the business here for 23 years.
Typical men's shop you can see that.
That's around the left.
In here.
Okay go ahead.
He used this for his store room I guess.
Oh that's it.
As far as we know the body hasn't been touched.
Yeah sure took a terrible beating.
An elderly man.
Wife said he was 64 last birthday.
She couldn't think of any enemies he has.
Anybody want to do this?
Where did he keep his cash?
Did she tell you that?
No cash register I guess, can't be sure until late in Prince gets here.
Yeah, did you call the crime lab yet?
I'm waiting for you fellas.
I want to call him now would you mind?
Oh sure sorry.
Say you might as well call the coroner while you're at it.
Tell him there's no big rush.
Yeah right.
Take a look around here Jill.
Looks like a tornado ripped through.
Yeah.
Chair overturned, clothes all over the floor.
Come here man.
Look at the body.
Yeah?
His arms tied behind his back.
Ordinary clothesline robe.
What's that cloth knotted around his neck?
I don't know.
Looks like it could be a woman's slip, doesn't it?
Whoever it was they weren't taking any chances he'd live through it.
The wounds on the head here, the neck see.
Yeah, looks like he was stamped on by boot, something like that.
Maybe a narrow heel, so brutal.
Doesn't look too much like a robbery motive.
Not from the beating he took anyway.
Looks like he might have had a taste for art all over the wall here.
Pin up girls, fancy calendars.
I talked to the crime lab sergeant on the way out.
Oh thanks Miles.
Notified deputy coroner.
Anything else I can do for you?
Yeah, would you mind getting the wife down here, Ms. Wilford?
We'd like to talk to her.
Sure, right away.
Thank you.
How's she feeling, any hysterics?
No, she's pretty quiet.
She went upstairs to rest.
A couple of housekeeping rooms up there.
Guess that's where she and her husband live.
Well tell her she doesn't feel too well.
We could come up there and talk to her.
Right sergeant.
What do you think?
I don't know, we'll see what the crime lab can come up with.
We can start checking around the neighborhood after we talk to the wife.
Let me take a look here.
What's that there?
It's funny.
Not much place in the haberdashery for things like this, look.
Woman's nightgown.
Black lace.
It's packed in a gift box.
Is that a card there?
Yeah, see if we can read it without touching it.
It says, to a beautiful girl, you've been away too long hoping we'll never be parted
again.
Signed Joseph Wilford.
Seems a little funny, huh?
Yeah, it does.
Maybe his wife's been on a trip, he's gonna give it to her as a present.
When's the last time you gave your wife a black lace nightgown?
11.05 p.m.
The two officers who'd answered the call, Miles and Kever, brought the victim's wife,
Mrs. Agnes Wilford, downstairs and Ben and I questioned her.
She was a small, slight woman, dark hair, dark brown eyes, a sharp nose and chin.
She looked to be in her early 50s.
She said that both she and her husband had emigrated to America from northern Germany
twenty-five years before.
We asked her how her married life with Mr. Wilford had been, but she kept dodging the
question.
We asked her how she happened to find the body.
The body's just as you found it, Mrs. Wilford.
You didn't disturb anything?
No, I just came back from a friend's and looked and I saw him and he was dead.
Somebody killed Joseph.
And you're pretty sure that your husband wasn't having any trouble with anybody?
No enemies?
No, he didn't have any enemies, not to do this.
Yes, ma'am.
You lived upstairs in the back of the store with Mr. Wilford, is that right, ma'am?
For a long time, yes, we lived upstairs in the rooms.
It was nice, save money for rent.
Well, do you have any idea at all why your husband's dead, why somebody'd want to kill
him?
There was money in the store.
They'd kill for that.
You're a policeman.
People kill for money, you know that.
Well, do you know where Mr. Wilford kept his money, ma'am?
There was a wooden drawer on the table in the back room.
He would keep the money there.
But I looked when I came in first, it was empty.
Was there any money in that drawer tonight, do you know that?
Oh, yes, three, four hundred dollars anyway.
Joseph always kept it in there.
That terrible place up above the music all the time, the noise.
You should make them be quiet.
The dance halls have been up there for a year tonight anyway.
They should be quiet.
Yes, ma'am.
About the money Mr. Wilford had in the store.
Maybe a thousand dollars, seven, eight hundred, maybe that anyway.
And then his wristwatch he had on, that's gone too.
Can you give us a description of the watch, Mrs. Wilford, what make it was, what it looked
like?
Oh, yes, I can give that to you.
It's white gold, expensive, writing on the back, Agnes, Joseph.
On birthday I gave it to him.
Have you been away from your husband recently, ma'am?
I mean on a trip or anything like that?
No, I haven't been away.
Why?
Well, we don't mean to upset you at a time like this, but would you know if your husband
had any women friends?
Mrs. Wilford?
If you have a cigarette, I'd like one.
Oh, yes, ma'am.
Here you are.
Thank you very much.
Thank you for your light, Liz.
Thank you.
Do we have to talk about it?
I'm afraid so, ma'am.
Most of them I know.
For ten years it's been like this.
Well, many of them, young women.
Joseph didn't try to hide it from me.
I knew all about it.
You continued to live with your husband all this time, ma'am?
I did.
He'd bring the girls to the shop here sometimes.
When they'd come, I'd go away for a while.
After they were gone, I'd come back.
Joseph and I would never talk about it.
You mean you never had any arguments with your husband about the women?
No.
He never lied to me about the girls.
He had them, that's all.
It was something he expected me to understand.
I see.
You say you knew several of these women your husband went out with.
Could you give us their names, please?
Yes, there's an address book upstairs in Joseph's desk.
The names are in there.
I see.
Would you mind showing us that address book now, please?
Yes, we can go upstairs.
I'll get it for you.
There's one question I'd like to ask you, Mrs. Wilfred.
If you don't mind.
Yes.
About your husband, ma'am.
I don't know.
He hurt very much at first.
And then by and by, it didn't hurt so much.
Time, I guess.
A habit.
Thank you, pardon?
A habit.
If you want to, you can get used to anything.
Yes, ma'am.
Even a man who doesn't love you anymore.
We went upstairs to the housekeeping rooms where Mrs. Wilfred gave us her husband's
personal address book.
She also gave us a description of his wristwatch, which had been removed from the body along
with the name of the jeweler who'd sold her the watch.
It was a Hamilton with a diamond studded dial.
The crime lab crew arrived downstairs and began their routine investigation.
We finished questioning the victim's wife and then we started checking the neighborhood.
Only a few of the stores in the area were still open.
We found only one possible witness, a newsboy, who told us that he'd seen an attractive
dark-haired woman enter the store earlier in the night at about 8.30 p.m.
His description of her was only sketchy.
Another hour of checking the neighborhood and we went back to the store.
Lieutenant Lee Jones and the crime lab crew finished checking over the entire layout.
They went back downtown to give a thorough examination to what physical evidence that
they'd found.
The deputy coroner arrived and removed the body.
Together with Hupka and Forbes from homicide, Ben and I spent most of the next day checking
with store owners in the immediate neighborhood of Wilfred's haberdashery.
They could tell us nothing we hadn't already found out.
We got the description and serial numbers of the victim's missing wristwatch, notified
the pawn shop detail and got out a broadcast on it.
3.45 p.m. We checked by the office.
We got a slow enough start on this thing, huh?
Everybody tells us the same story.
Yeah, seems to be pretty common knowledge.
You had a lot of girlfriends.
I guess we better start checking out the names in that address book, huh?
Yeah.
Sure beats all, doesn't it, Joe?
What's that?
Mrs. Weld, for ten years, her husband's dating other women right in front of her.
It isn't normal.
Can't see why she didn't just pack up and leave.
It's kind of hard to figure at that.
Maybe she was still in love with him.
I wonder how Forbes and Hubka made out.
I'll check the books, see if we've got a caller.
Okay.
Let's see.
No?
No word from him, huh?
No, Lee Jones called from the crime lab, wants us to check with him.
I'll call him.
Okay, fine.
2667, please.
I'll try.
I guess we better check with the morgue, too, huh?
See if they got the body posted yet.
Yeah.
Hi, Lee, Mr. Romero.
What was it?
Did you get the name?
I see.
I went by.
What do you have?
Lee talked to the coroner already.
Wilfred died about nine o'clock, cause of death was strangulation.
How about those wounds on the head and on the neck?
That didn't do it.
The cloth died around his neck.
It was a woman's slip, all right.
Did he pick up anything off it, any laundry marks?
He did better than that.
He got the name of the laundry.
After checking for all stains and markings on the woman's slip, which had been found
knotted around the murder victim's neck, Lee Jones had examined it under a special fluorescent
light.
He found a type of marking used by only one large laundry service in the city.
We checked with the managers of the laundry company and found that the slip had been cleaned
by them for a Miss Elise Dressler.
She had a North Hudson Street address.
We started checking on her.
The first lead came from the dead man's personal address book.
We found the name of Elise Dressler listed along with her address and telephone number.
There was a single word scribbled beside her name and enclosed with parenthesis.
It said Max.
That was all.
5.42 p.m.
We drove out to the address, a Spanish style apartment house on North Hudson.
We rang, but there was no answer.
The apartment manager told us Miss Dressler worked as a dancer at a nightclub on West 7th
Street.
Ben and I drove to the club, a high-priced theater restaurant which was newly opened.
We were told Elise Dressler wasn't due there until 9 p.m.
We had a couple of ham and cheese sandwiches and some coffee at a lunch counter, and we
checked back at the club a few minutes past 9.
The show was already started.
We located the Dressler girl in her room backstage.
She was a tall, fairly attractive blonde.
We started questioning her.
Can you tell us where you were last night, Miss?
Yeah, all right.
Here I work every night but Monday.
We closed then.
What time did you get here last night?
Just about 8 o'clock.
I had something to eat and then I changed to my costume and went to work.
Do you know if Mr. Wilford had any enemies?
No.
Maybe somebody he was having trouble with?
No.
Maybe that wife of his.
That's none of my business.
I wouldn't know.
You can't think of anybody at all who might want him out of the way.
No, I don't think so.
He and Max Hollins had some arguments, but that's the only time I saw Joe mad at anybody.
Who's this Max Hollins?
He's the man who arranged for me to come out from New York.
Joe and Max have been friends for a long time.
What were the arguments about, Miss Dressler?
Do you remember?
Yeah, about me.
You see, Max brought me out here and I suppose at first he thought he owned me.
He didn't think I should go out with any other men but him.
Max is stubborn sometimes.
Well, so am I.
I like Wilford, so I went out with him.
I went out with Max, too.
Well, these arguments they had about you, would you say that they were pretty mad at
each other, Max and this Mr. Wilford?
Only last week, Max was very angry with Joe, but I think he got over it.
Could we talk together later?
It's almost time for me to go on.
I've got to get outside.
Oh, sure.
Excuse me.
I'll get it.
We'll wait backstage here for you, Miss Dressler.
Is that all right?
Yeah, fine.
Oh, that's all right.
I still have a few minutes.
Well, how about the last time you were in Wilford's store, Miss Dressler?
Can you remember that?
Not exactly.
At least six months ago, I hardly ever went to see Joe there.
Did you ever have any occasion to leave any clothing with Wilford in his store, maybe
for cleaning alteration?
No, I never left him.
Maybe it's possible they could be there.
How do you mean?
Well, I have some nice slips, you know.
First I sent them out, but Joe said he knew a very nice French laundry to do them.
He'd come to my place, pick them up, and then take them to the laundry.
Maybe he could have left them in his shop one day.
Well, would anybody besides yourself have access to the clothes in your apartment, maybe
a roommate?
No, I live by myself.
I have the only key to the door except Max Hollins.
He's got one.
He lives in my apartment house, the upstairs floor.
Nobody else has a key.
Did you send in clothing to the French laundry with Mr. Wilford recently?
Yesterday, I did.
Two nice slips of mine.
But Joe Wilford didn't call for him.
I sent him over with Max.
How'd that happen?
Max said he might as well take him.
He was going down to that neighborhood by the haberdashery.
Oh.
Yeah, I wanted to see Wilford anyway.
Max said he wanted to fix up their argument.
We continued questioning the Dressler girl after she finished her first act at the theater
restaurant.
She told us that she hadn't seen Max Hollins since early the day before.
She was taken downtown where she gave us a full statement.
Further questioning got us the information that the argument between the two men, Joseph
Wilford and Max Hollins, over the affections of Elise Dressler was far from settled at
their last meeting.
The girl admitted that it was a serious argument and that it ended up in a fist fight between
the two men.
She said Max Hollins was out of town for the night, but that he'd return early the next
evening for work.
He was employed as manager of a room service department at a large downtown hotel.
11.30 p.m.
Ben and I drove back to the apartment house on North Hudson and together with the building
manager we checked Max Hollins' apartment.
We found nothing.
The manager told us Hollins' car was parked in the apartment garage, so we went down and
gave it a routine check.
Under the front seat we found a paper bag with a pair of gloves in it.
There were blood stains on both gloves.
We dropped him off at the crime lab for examination.
At six o'clock the following night, Ben and I went to the room service department of the
downtown hotel where Hollins was employed.
Sorry, Mr. Hollins is late this evening.
He should be here pretty soon.
Did he notify you he'd be in late?
Well, he called, yes, probably be here in 10 or 15 minutes.
I'm his assistant.
Can I help you?
No, that's all right.
We'll wait.
All right.
Pardon me.
I wonder if we could look at your wristwatch, please.
Well, surely it's just a few minutes past eight.
No, we just want to look at the watch if we can.
Oh, sure.
Here.
Could you take it off?
I'd like to look at the back of it if it's all right.
Sure, that's all right.
Here.
That's looking, isn't it?
Just got it yesterday.
That's so.
Same engraving.
Agnes to Joseph.
Where'd you get this watch, sir?
Why, what's the matter?
Where'd you get it?
Max Hollins.
He sold it to me.
February 21st, Friday, 6.30 p.m.
We called the office and notified them that we'd located the wristwatch taken from the
body of the murder victim, Joseph Wilfred.
A stakeout was placed on the North Hudson Street apartment house.
Ben and I stayed on at the hotel waiting the return of the murder suspect, Max Hollins.
We talked to his assistant and found out that Hollins had a room in the hotel where he could
sleep whenever he was called on to work late at night.
6.55 p.m.
We called the office back and asked for a couple of men to be sent over to check the
suspect's room.
A few minutes later, Hollins himself showed up for work.
Apparently, he'd been doing some drinking.
Ben and I questioned him at his desk to stall for time until the men from the office could
get to the hotel and make a thorough check of the suspect's room.
Hollins was kept busy on the phone taking room service orders from the hotel guests.
In between calls, we talked to him.
I left a lease in the apartment and then I took the few pieces of laundry she had and
dropped them off at Wilfred's store.
It was about 6 o'clock Wednesday night.
You mentioned it addressed the girl you wanted to see, Mr. Wilfred.
You wanted to patch up an argument you'd had with him?
Yes, I just wanted to make sure he didn't have any bad feelings about it.
It really wasn't much of an argument.
How long did you stay at Wilfred's store, Mr. Hollins?
Do you remember then?
Twenty minutes, maybe a half hour.
We talked and we had a glass of wine in the back room.
No, it was upstairs.
We drank the wine and everything was all right.
I guess it was about half past six when I left the store.
It was all right then.
Well, did anybody come in the store while you were there?
No, it was nobody.
How about Mrs. Wilfred?
Was she in the store at all during the time you were there on Wednesday?
No, he said she was gone for the day.
She'd be back later on.
We finished our talk, then I left.
It was the last time I saw Joseph.
It was a terrible thing for somebody to kill him.
Excuse me again, please.
Yes, sir.
Go ahead.
Room service, may I help you, please?
Yes, sir.
Well, could I suggest the Palace Court salad?
Very nice, yes.
Half the vada chokes filled with fresh crab meat, a thousand-dollar dressing garnished
with slices of avocado.
All right.
Two orders.
Some consomme.
All right.
French rolls, coffee, and brandy.
8.30.
Yes, sir.
I'll be right away.
Fred, this order for 8.13?
Yes, Mr. Holland?
That's Mr. and Mrs. Morrow, 8.13.
Make it quickly, please.
Yes, sir.
One of the best men I have, Fred.
We keep a very high standard in our room service.
Only the very best.
They're all Geneva men.
Yes, sir.
Something else we'd like to find out?
Twenty-one years ago, I came here to the hotel.
There was nothing.
They were serving garbage.
Bad service.
Very bad.
I built our staff one by one.
I did it.
There's our staff list there.
Finest waiters in the country.
Henry Sanchez, Fred LaSalle, Conrad Lutz, Joe Zwick.
Yes, sir.
And Elmer Creighton.
He waited on the President when he came to visit here from Washington.
The President thought so much of our service, he wrote a letter to Elmer later on.
No argument at all.
I have the best spend in the country, the best food.
Twenty-one years to make it like it is.
I did it all myself.
I understand you and Wilford were old friends, Mr. Holland.
You knew him quite a number of years, is that right?
Most of his life, yes.
I knew Joseph from the old country.
We came from the same town.
Terrible thing that's happened.
I always liked Joseph.
A good friend.
What about these arguments you had with him lately about the girl, Elise Dresler?
Any amount of anything?
No, but it showed something typical of Joseph.
Maybe it was the business he was in.
Dollars.
It's all he thought about.
The big dollar.
He knew he had more money than I did.
He thought he could do anything with it.
How do you mean?
About the girl, Elise.
I took a visit to the old country three years ago, Stausburg.
That's where I learned my trade from the best maitre d's in Europe.
I met Elise on my way back in New York.
You can check up on all my background.
I worked at the Grand Hotel in Brussels.
That's when it was the best.
I was at the Carlton in London.
Then I went to Venice, the Hotel Danielier.
After I went to the Hotel Majestic in Cannes.
Yes, sir.
What would that have to do with Miss Dresler?
Very nice girl.
We liked each other.
When I came back here, I arranged for her to come out from New York.
She took care of everything.
I thought I'd like to marry her when she came here.
How about it, Hollins?
You want to tell us now?
Yes, sir.
Did you kill Wilfred?
Excuse me, please.
Room service.
May I help you, please?
Yes, Mr. Sutter.
Dinner for twelve tomorrow night in your suite.
Your wife and I made up the menu.
Certainly, Mr. Sutter.
I'll check it over for you.
Let's see.
We serve caviar with pligny to start with.
And the soup, consomme, marteau-laine.
And with the soup, amanteato.
Yes, sir, that's Spanish.
Then crab legs, sandini.
Sir?
Sandini.
That's crab legs rolled in breadcrumbs.
Fried in butter, served in a terrapin dish with bechamel sauce.
After that, the chateaubriand with truffle sauce, souffle potatoes, small green peas
français.
And with that, we serve Ponte Connais 27.
Dessert, we shall have peach flambé, coffee, and liqueurs afterward.
Yes, sir.
Henry Sanchez and 100 Lutes.
They will serve you.
Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Sutter.
Good night, sir.
A real gentleman, Mr. Sutter.
He knows how to give a dinner party.
The old school.
Not so many of them left now.
It's not like it used to be.
People aren't the same anymore.
Oh, yes, Fred.
What is it?
Message for the officers here, Sergeant.
Oh, thank you.
Excuse us a minute.
Oh, of course.
What is it?
It's from Forbes.
I checked his room in the hotel.
They didn't find anything.
Better get him downtown, huh?
Yeah.
Hollins, we'll have to ask you to come downtown.
Oh, yes.
Get my top coat on here.
Now, there.
Out this way, Sergeant.
All right.
You park your car in the hotel.
I'll be right back.
You park your car in the hotel garage?
No, sir.
Outside on 10th Street.
You go out the side door, then.
This way.
It's starting to rain.
Do you both have your top coats?
Yeah.
Well, let's go.
We're parked right down this way.
What did Elise say?
Elise Dressler.
She said you had a fight with Wilford.
You went to see him the same day he was murdered.
Yes.
It's terrible.
It's too bad.
Might as well tell you, sir.
We've got the evidence, quite a bit of it.
All points to you.
Oh?
How is that?
Well, the pair of gloves you were wearing, we found them.
The wristwatch you took off the body, we found that, too.
Yes.
You want to tell us about it?
I didn't use good sense.
I didn't know what to do when I went to see him.
But I...
I didn't have it in my mind to kill him.
God knows I tried to talk to him.
I asked him, please, to stay away from Elise.
I asked him as a friend.
Yes, sir.
All he said to me was, Max, I give her presents and she likes me.
I have the money to give her what she wants, Max.
You haven't got the money.
That's what he said to me.
You had a fight with him, then?
No, there wasn't any fight.
I'm not sorry.
I killed him, but I'm not sorry.
You want to give us a statement about it downtown?
I suppose.
I'm not ashamed of it.
All right, let's go.
Down this way.
Any man would have done the same.
How could you hear such talk and not kill him?
How about the wrist watch you took off of him, the money from the drawer?
I wanted to hurt him more, even after he was dead, after I beat him and beat him.
I knew it would be the worst way to hurt Joseph, to take his money.
Here we are.
In the back house.
Yes.
Sergeant.
Yeah.
I've told you now, I killed him.
Don't you think I had a right to kill him?
I wouldn't know.
But he was like that.
The first time you met Joseph, you would know he was bad.
It was better for everybody, for him to die.
First time you met him, you would know that.
I'm sorry, I wouldn't know, mister.
What?
The only time I met him, he was dead.
The story you have just heard was true.
The names were changed to protect the innocent.
On June 4th, trial was held in Superior Court, Department 89, City and County of Los Angeles,
State of California.
In a moment, the results of that trial.
Max Hollins was tried and convicted of murder in the first degree.
He was executed in the lethal gas chamber at the State Penitentiary, San Quentin, California.
You have just heard Dragnet, a series of authentic cases from official files.
Additional advice comes from the Office of Chief of Police, W.H. Parker, Los Angeles Police
Officer, Dallas Police Station.