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The child has been kidnapped.

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Tonight, a high-profile kidnapping grips the world

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when the infant son of an aviation legend

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is snatched from his crib at home.

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We're speaking to you now from the Christ headquarters

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at your in the Lindbergh case.

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After a nationwide manhunt,

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the supposed culprit is brought to justice.

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But did authorities get the right man?

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Based on the circumstances, there are a lot of people

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who have been in an inside job.

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Now we'll uncover the top theories surrounding

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what's been called the crime of the century.

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How could this have succeeded without someone

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having inside knowledge?

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There are at least two or more accomplices

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that never guide any attention.

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If I was Dr. Condon so heavily involved,

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did he have something to do with this?

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Can new evidence finally reveal the truth behind this

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American manhunt?

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The alleged confession said that I,

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not Bruno Richard Heltman,

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am the kidnapper of the Lindbergh baby.

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Who really is responsible

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for the kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby?

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Hopewell, New Jersey, 1932.

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For the past year, world-famous aviator Charles Lindbergh

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has called this area home.

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So Lindbergh has been a major celebrity

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ever since he completed his first transatlantic solo flight

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in 1927.

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In the drizzly early morning of May 20, 1927,

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the spirit of St. Louis takes off from Roosevelt Theater

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in Long Island.

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And after 33 and a half hours of flying alone,

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Lindbergh lands at Lavogé Field outside of Paris.

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Does Lindbergh do something that no one else

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has ever done before? Absolutely.

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He flies across the Atlantic Ocean by himself solo

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on a flight pattern that takes him 2,000 miles farther

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than the last transatlantic flight,

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a flight, by the way, which had two aviators.

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Not one.

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Lindbergh's flight proved that aviation had a future

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for passenger transportation.

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This also earns Lindbergh tons of accolades,

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tons of awards, everything from the Medal of Honor,

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the Flying Cross, the Congressional Gold Medal.

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But there's no way Lindbergh would have reached this level

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of fame and adulation without one thing, radio.

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You have to understand, at the time, no smartphones,

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no internet, no television.

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This is before almost any form of modern communication.

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Radio is revolutionizing the way the world connects.

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So when Lindbergh is making this record-breaking flight,

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this is the first time that an audience can actually follow

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along with an historic event in real time.

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This is a moment of instantaneous information,

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not the delayed information,

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we get a newsreel or a newspaper account or a book.

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This is happening in real time.

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And that's very impactful for people.

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After this flight, he comes back home,

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there's a tip-a-tip berate, hundreds of thousands of people.

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He gets millions of telegrams congratulating him.

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Lindbergh is instantly internationally famous.

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But before long, the intensity of this public adulation

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becomes overwhelming.

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Lindbergh is batched constantly by the press.

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Everybody wants a piece of him.

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Charles Lindbergh and his wife decide

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we've had enough of being in this crazy public eye,

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so they bought some land in Hopewell, New Jersey.

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They purchase a remote 600-acre lot

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where they plan to build an estate

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that will be their primary home,

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along with their 20-month-old son, Charles Jr.

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Construction on their new home begins in March of 1931,

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but the Lindberghs are just so anxious

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and so ready to leave New York

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that they decide to head out to the house

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before it's even completed.

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And they start staying there a few days a week.

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In addition to Charles and-and Charles Jr.,

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they've got the nursemaid, Betty Gao,

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their butler, Ollie Watley, and his wife, Elsie,

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living in the house with them.

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They're a pretty tight-knit group.

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Lindbergh increasingly resents the intrusions

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on his private life.

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The purpose of the construction of the estate

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outside of Hopewell was to give the Lindberghs

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some breathing room from the 24-7 press attention

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that the family is under.

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But before the Lindberghs find their respite,

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on March 1, 1932, the unthinkable happens.

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So shortly before 10 o'clock, the nurse, Betty Gao,

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heads into the nursery to check on Charles Jr.

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She is horrified to find out that the crib is empty.

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She runs to tell Lindbergh,

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he follows her back to Charles Jr.'s room,

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and he finds out that she's right.

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The baby is gone.

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The house staff immediately begins searching the property.

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They are combing the house high and low,

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and while they're searching, Charles Lindbergh comes across

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something that confirms his deepest, darkest fears.

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Near the window of his son's room, he finds an envelope.

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There's a problem with this particular window.

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It's warped, which means that it doesn't close properly.

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The latch doesn't actually catch,

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so this is the only way that you could get into the house

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without a key.

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This was the second floor window.

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This wasn't one you could just walk up to the house

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and climb through.

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In the envelope is a poorly written, misspelled note

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demanding $50,000 for the return of the baby.

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It's a ransom note.

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The note reads,

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After two to four days, we will inform you where to deliver the money.

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We warn you for making anything public or notifying the police.

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The child is in good care.

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At the bottom of the note,

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the kidnappers leave a cryptic signature.

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They had an image at the bottom that was two interlocking circles,

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a couple of squiggly lines, and then three punch holes.

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It's a very strange pattern.

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So the author of the letter actually says,

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This particular symbol will let you know

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that this is authentic correspondence from me and no one else.

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As if this is some sort of secret code

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to verify that the letters are genuine

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and that, rather chillingly,

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more letters may follow.

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It was as if the kidnappers were saying,

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This is just the beginning.

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As they comb the property,

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Lindberg and his butler, Ali, find a few additional clues.

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There are also some scraps of wood from a broken ladder underneath the window,

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and they also find a set of muddy footprints.

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By 10.30 p.m., a small army of police officers arrive

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and begin investigating.

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The police realize they have very little to go on.

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They've got no fingerprints. They've got no eyewitnesses.

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And you're in the middle of nowhere.

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At a massive estate.

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So when it comes to this investigation,

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where would you want to start?

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On the inside. Of course.

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It's only natural to start with those that are closest to the crime.

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And based on the circumstances, there are signs

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that may have indicated that this could have been an inside job.

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First off, the precision of this kidnapping

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and how it went down is a bit suspect.

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It's as if the person or person is a person

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who has been in the crime for a long time.

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And how?

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Based on the scene outside, the footprints,

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the wood from the broken ladder,

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it appears that whoever took Charles Jr. went to one window only,

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the window that led directly into the nursery.

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We also know that Charles and Anne were awake at the time of the kidnapping,

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so there's no way that there's going to be somebody outside of the property

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moving a ladder from window to window,

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trying to jimmy open every window before they find the correct one.

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They would have been hurt.

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There's a dog. The dog doesn't bark.

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There's a baby. Baby's cry, but this baby did not cry.

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So there's a general sense that there must be someone

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who's familiar with the household has to be involved.

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The nursery's condition is also suspicious.

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The baby's blankets after Charles Jr. is taken,

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they're not just left in the crib.

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They're actually folded very neatly and placed on a shelf nearby.

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Why would a stranger that's kidnapping Charles Linn

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Berg's baby even bother to do that?

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That seems more like a routine of somebody that's in the house

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that does this frequently.

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Authorities figured that the kidnapper had to have had inside knowledge of the schedule.

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The Linn Berg's are creatures of habit.

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They do not go to the house in the country all the time.

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Normally they're on the weekend and they leave on Monday,

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but Charles Jr. got taken on March 1, which was a Tuesday.

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They stayed one extra day in the house,

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because the baby had a cold and so they thought that the country air,

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the fresh air, would be good for the baby.

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And the question becomes how would a random person no doubt?

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So if you're looking at this as an inside job,

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your first three suspects should be obvious.

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The Linn Berg's staff members, you've got Betty Gao,

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you've got the butler Ollie, and his wife, Elsie Wotley.

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The Wotley's have been with the Linn Berg's all weekend long,

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so they pretty much have alibi.

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Ollie was actually in bed and Elsie was downstairs

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in the kitchen making lemonade.

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But nurse maid Betty Gao has only arrived that afternoon.

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Doesn't she have time to plan a kidnapping?

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Please question her immediately.

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According to Betty's statement on March 1,

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Anne calls Betty and asks her to come to the weekend estate,

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and Betty agrees, even though she had plans at the time

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with her boyfriend, Henry Red Johnson.

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Betty says that she called her boyfriend to cancel her plans

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because she had to go into work.

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Police questioned Johnson, and he backs up his girlfriend's story.

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However, in Johnson's car, they do find a bottle of milk.

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This bottle of milk was really suspicious to police.

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They wondered, you know, is that there to feed a baby?

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There are some theorists that suggest that when Betty Gao

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called her boyfriend to cancel the plans,

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that's not actually what she was doing.

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She was actually calling him to signal to him

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that yes, he should kidnap the baby.

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Apart from a bottle of milk, police have no evidence

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that implicates Johnson or Betty Gao.

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Limburg intervenes to prevent the police

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from really interrogating and bearing down

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on the servants in his own household,

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who he trusted without qualification.

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And that meant that Betty Gao wasn't looked at any further.

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That line of inquiry goes cold, but then they find another.

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When famed aviator Charles Limburg's infant son

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is kidnapped on March 1, 1932,

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it creates an unprecedented media uproar.

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It's a cliche nowadays to call something a crime of the century,

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but this really was.

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This was one of the biggest cases,

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not just in America, but in the world.

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We have here a flash, which reads as follows.

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News of the kidnapping leaks almost immediately,

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and journalists just flock to the Limburg estate.

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It's a madhouse.

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Of course, everybody wants to help.

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One of the people who wants to provide criminal expertise

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to this case is the notorious gangster Al Capone,

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who currently residing in the Cook County jail.

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He offers his criminal and gangster contact

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to help the police find the Limburg baby

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if they will just temporarily release him from prison.

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The police do not take Al Capone up on his offer.

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That was indicative of just how widespread the story had gotten.

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It was reaching everybody.

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Al Capone, sitting in a cell in Chicago,

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finds out about this news only 12 hours after it happens.

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Mind you, there is no internet during this time.

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But let's also remember, the ransom note specifically said,

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do not make this a public deal.

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Do not get the police involved.

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Is all the media attention jeopardizing the life of the child?

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The Limburgs soon learn the answer to that question.

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So on March 6th, another ransom note arrives.

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And it follows the pattern of the first ransom note.

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You've got the same handwriting,

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you've got the same signature with the squiggly lines,

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and you've got the three holes.

258
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But the tone of this letter is much more threatening.

259
00:12:59,000 --> 00:13:01,000
And it starts off by saying,

260
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dear sir, we've warned you not to make anything public.

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Now you have to take consequences.

262
00:13:08,000 --> 00:13:10,000
And the consequences are severe.

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00:13:10,000 --> 00:13:13,000
The kidnappers basically say that they're going to keep the baby

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until things quiet down.

265
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As long as this case continues to get as much attention

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as it's getting from the police and the media and the newspapers,

267
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Limburg is not getting his son back anytime soon.

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00:13:27,000 --> 00:13:31,000
Because of that transgression, the kidnappers now have decided

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that instead of a $50,000 ransom, they want a $70,000 ransom.

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$70,000 back then is like a million dollars today.

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So they don't actually wait until things die down.

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In fact, the story continues to get bigger and bigger as it goes on.

273
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But regardless, within a couple of days,

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the kidnappers carry on with their plan.

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In a series of notes that were sent on both March 8th and March 10th,

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the kidnappers are asking for a volunteer to serve as the go-between

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for the handoff of the money.

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Ultimately, they agree to let a former school principal from the Bronx

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be that volunteer.

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His name is Dr. John Condon.

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00:14:09,000 --> 00:14:12,000
So probably seeking some fame for himself,

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Condon placed an ad in his local paper offering up a $1,000 reward

283
00:14:16,000 --> 00:14:19,000
if the kidnappers were to give up the baby to a priest.

284
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Apparently, the kidnappers saw this ad,

285
00:14:21,000 --> 00:14:24,000
asked him to be the middleman, and he agreed to do it.

286
00:14:24,000 --> 00:14:27,000
And at this point, the police have so few leads that they decide,

287
00:14:27,000 --> 00:14:29,000
go with it. Why not?

288
00:14:29,000 --> 00:14:31,000
Let's see how this plays out.

289
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With the support of the Lindbergs and police,

290
00:14:34,000 --> 00:14:37,000
Condon begins corresponding with the kidnappers.

291
00:14:37,000 --> 00:14:41,000
So over the course of two weeks, there's a chain of back and forth.

292
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It's like cat and mouse game.

293
00:14:42,000 --> 00:14:44,000
Condon would put ads in the local paper,

294
00:14:44,000 --> 00:14:47,000
and the kidnappers would respond with their letters.

295
00:14:47,000 --> 00:14:51,000
And this back and forth keeps the Lindbergs hopeful that their son is still alive

296
00:14:51,000 --> 00:14:55,000
and a solution will be reached where they'll be able to get him back.

297
00:14:55,000 --> 00:14:59,000
They eventually arrange a meeting between Condon and the kidnappers

298
00:14:59,000 --> 00:15:01,000
at a cemetery in the Bronx.

299
00:15:01,000 --> 00:15:07,000
According to Condon, at this meeting, he finally learns the kidnappers' identity.

300
00:15:11,000 --> 00:15:14,000
Condon says he meets a man who calls himself John,

301
00:15:14,000 --> 00:15:18,000
whom the media and the police will soon dub, Cemetery John.

302
00:15:18,000 --> 00:15:24,000
Cemetery John tells Condon he's part of a group of Scandinavian sailors.

303
00:15:24,000 --> 00:15:28,000
The baby is being taken care of by these sailors on a boat.

304
00:15:28,000 --> 00:15:33,000
He says the baby is safe and that we need to make an exchange for the ransom money.

305
00:15:33,000 --> 00:15:40,000
This Cemetery John is about 30 to 35 years old, athletic build, 5'9".

306
00:15:40,000 --> 00:15:44,000
Based on Condon's description, police prepare a sketch of Cemetery John.

307
00:15:44,000 --> 00:15:50,000
He has a light complexion, light hair, pointed chin, and he has a Scandinavian accent.

308
00:15:50,000 --> 00:15:56,000
Meanwhile, during the meeting, Condon wisely asks the kidnappers for proof that they have the baby.

309
00:16:01,000 --> 00:16:04,000
Cemetery John promises to send some evidence.

310
00:16:04,000 --> 00:16:13,000
What turns up at Condon's house is a gray sleeping suit that Charles Jr. was sleeping in the night he was taken.

311
00:16:14,000 --> 00:16:18,000
From here, you've got a number of things that are happening in quick succession.

312
00:16:18,000 --> 00:16:23,000
There are several more exchanges between Condon and the kidnappers trying to haggle over what the actual ransom should be.

313
00:16:23,000 --> 00:16:29,000
Condon and the kidnappers ultimately agree on the original $50,000 ransom amount.

314
00:16:29,000 --> 00:16:33,000
Police decide to use gold certificates to pay the ransom.

315
00:16:33,000 --> 00:16:39,000
This is actually a clever move by the authorities because those gold certificates have the same value as dollars.

316
00:16:39,000 --> 00:16:45,000
But for the past 70 years, the United States had tied its currency to what was at the time the gold standard.

317
00:16:45,000 --> 00:16:49,000
They were a legal tender of money, but they were a bit more unique.

318
00:16:49,000 --> 00:16:53,000
So the idea that the police had was if they pay up the ransom in these certificates,

319
00:16:53,000 --> 00:16:58,000
because there's so few of them in circulation now, if they're spent, they're easier to track down.

320
00:16:58,000 --> 00:17:01,000
But that whole plan will have to come later.

321
00:17:01,000 --> 00:17:04,000
Right now, the Lindbergs only care about getting their baby back,

322
00:17:04,000 --> 00:17:08,000
and they firmly believe that tonight is the night that it happens.

323
00:17:09,000 --> 00:17:15,000
On April 2nd, 1932, John Condon goes to do the money exchange to the kidnapper.

324
00:17:15,000 --> 00:17:21,000
At the exchange, the kidnapper gives John Condon a letter and then disappears with the money.

325
00:17:21,000 --> 00:17:25,000
The letter says that the boy's on a boat called the Nelly.

326
00:17:25,000 --> 00:17:30,000
The Nelly's a small boat, about 28 foot, has two women on it who apparently know nothing.

327
00:17:30,000 --> 00:17:33,000
They're just simply been hired to watch a baby.

328
00:17:33,000 --> 00:17:40,000
And you can find this boat between Horsenet Beach and Gay Head near Elizabeth Island.

329
00:17:41,000 --> 00:17:46,000
And when Condon shares this information, police race off to this marina at Martha's Vineyard to find this boat.

330
00:17:46,000 --> 00:17:50,000
Because you have to understand, these cops are trying to get there as quickly as possible because think about it.

331
00:17:50,000 --> 00:17:57,000
If you're the first police officer to find Charles Lindberg's kidnapped baby, it's like you're guaranteed to be a hero.

332
00:17:57,000 --> 00:18:02,000
Police get to this marina and they search every slit, every boat.

333
00:18:02,000 --> 00:18:06,000
Nelly is never found and the baby Lindberg is never found.

334
00:18:08,000 --> 00:18:16,000
The thing about this Scandinavian gang theory and all this is they're assumed that we're going to get the baby back and that's not what happened.

335
00:18:16,000 --> 00:18:20,000
But this really sets a new tone I think in relation to this whole experience.

336
00:18:20,000 --> 00:18:26,000
Because people now are really more concerned at some level about the fate of Charles Jr.

337
00:18:26,000 --> 00:18:32,000
With their ransom paid, there is no further communication from the alleged kidnappers.

338
00:18:32,000 --> 00:18:37,000
The kidnapper has the money, but the Lindbergs do not have the baby.

339
00:18:37,000 --> 00:18:41,000
It was like losing Charles Jr. for a second time.

340
00:18:42,000 --> 00:18:46,000
Then on May 12th, the news everyone's feared.

341
00:18:46,000 --> 00:18:49,000
This is about six weeks after the ransom dropped.

342
00:18:49,000 --> 00:19:00,000
A truck driver named Orville Wilson and his assistant William Allen pulled the truck over to the side of the road in Mount Rose, New Jersey, which is a little less than five miles away from the Lindberg estate.

343
00:19:00,000 --> 00:19:04,000
William Allen was a black man who worked as a trucker.

344
00:19:04,000 --> 00:19:11,000
One of the disgusting parts of American history is that he wasn't allowed to use the bathroom wherever he wanted.

345
00:19:11,000 --> 00:19:16,000
So he pulled over to use the restroom in the woods.

346
00:19:16,000 --> 00:19:24,000
He walked in a ways so as not to be spotted by anybody passing by and he noticed something on the ground.

347
00:19:24,000 --> 00:19:32,000
At first he assumes is a dead animal, but as he gets closer he realizes it's a small child.

348
00:19:34,000 --> 00:19:40,000
It's obvious that the head has been crushed and animals are starting to scatter that remains.

349
00:19:40,000 --> 00:19:44,000
All that is really left is a tattered white t-shirt.

350
00:19:44,000 --> 00:19:52,000
The men notify police who bring in the Lindbergs nursemaid, Betty Gao, to identify the body.

351
00:19:52,000 --> 00:19:57,000
She confirms that the body is of Charles Lindberg Jr.

352
00:19:57,000 --> 00:20:05,000
A funeral director conducts a rudimentary autopsy and declares that this child died from a blow to the head.

353
00:20:05,000 --> 00:20:09,000
This funeral director establishes that the baby died probably two months ago.

354
00:20:09,000 --> 00:20:18,000
That timeline means that much of the time that these notes were being exchanged around returning the baby, he was most likely already dead.

355
00:20:18,000 --> 00:20:27,000
Grieving parents Charles and Anne have their son cremated and the investigation turns from kidnapping to murder.

356
00:20:27,000 --> 00:20:34,000
So naturally this marks a huge shift for police because if this child died the very night that he was kidnapped,

357
00:20:34,000 --> 00:20:37,000
well this puts them back at square one.

358
00:20:37,000 --> 00:20:43,000
And in this case square one means that maybe their initial instinct was right all along.

359
00:20:43,000 --> 00:20:46,000
Maybe this wasn't inside job.

360
00:20:49,000 --> 00:20:59,000
In May of 1932 the case of missing infant Charles Lindberg Jr. turns from kidnapping to murder.

361
00:20:59,000 --> 00:21:02,000
The police are confident in demanding that Cemetery John is involved.

362
00:21:02,000 --> 00:21:08,000
He and a group of accomplices send ransom to the man and eventually collect $50,000.

363
00:21:08,000 --> 00:21:15,000
Once they pay the ransom Cemetery John is gone and they find the body of Charles Jr.

364
00:21:15,000 --> 00:21:19,000
and find out that he apparently died the very night he was taken.

365
00:21:19,000 --> 00:21:25,000
With no new leads police focus their attention on the Lindbergs extended family.

366
00:21:25,000 --> 00:21:32,000
The lingering question is why baby Lindberg was targeted at all and why on a Tuesday when the Lindbergs were not usually there.

367
00:21:32,000 --> 00:21:35,000
And how did the kidnapper know which window to enter?

368
00:21:35,000 --> 00:21:44,000
As the investigators work through a long list of Lindberg family and friends and associates eventually they find someone whose story doesn't quite add up.

369
00:21:44,000 --> 00:21:47,000
And they jump at the chance to label her a sussept.

370
00:21:50,000 --> 00:21:55,000
New Jersey State Police question a domestic worker named Violet Sharp.

371
00:21:55,000 --> 00:22:02,000
Sharp is a 20-something immigrant from England who works for Anne's mother at her house serving her meals.

372
00:22:02,000 --> 00:22:05,000
Which means that she's working for the baby's grandmother.

373
00:22:05,000 --> 00:22:09,000
So the minute they begin questioning her Violet becomes very nervous.

374
00:22:09,000 --> 00:22:13,000
She doesn't want to answer questions. Sometimes she's a little belligerent.

375
00:22:14,000 --> 00:22:20,000
It's obvious to the officers that she is being evasive but why?

376
00:22:20,000 --> 00:22:22,000
And her story keeps changing.

377
00:22:22,000 --> 00:22:29,000
At first she says that she's on a blind date on the night of the kidnapping but she can't remember the name of her date or the other couple that she's with.

378
00:22:29,000 --> 00:22:32,000
She claims she went to a movie but she can't remember which one.

379
00:22:32,000 --> 00:22:35,000
And later she claims she went to a row house and not a movie at all.

380
00:22:36,000 --> 00:22:39,000
So the police decide that they need to take a closer look at Ms. Sharp.

381
00:22:39,000 --> 00:22:47,000
So they ask her for all of her bank statements and all of her financial records to see if there have been any large deposits that have been made.

382
00:22:47,000 --> 00:22:53,000
They also ask her to come in and to give an official account of her whereabouts during the day of the kidnapping.

383
00:22:53,000 --> 00:22:57,000
They're pushing so hard because they're convinced that Violet Sharp must know something.

384
00:22:57,000 --> 00:23:03,000
So the police schedule several interviews with Violet Sharp.

385
00:23:03,000 --> 00:23:06,000
And the last one she just doesn't turn up to.

386
00:23:06,000 --> 00:23:11,000
And there's such a thing. Is she on the run? Is something spooker? Where is she at?

387
00:23:11,000 --> 00:23:20,000
Sadly on June 10th one month after baby Lindbergh's body is discovered Ms. Sharp's body is also discovered.

388
00:23:20,000 --> 00:23:24,000
She had ended up committing suicide by eating silver polish.

389
00:23:24,000 --> 00:23:32,000
And ultimately after her death investigators are actually able to prove her alibi for the night of March 1st.

390
00:23:32,000 --> 00:23:37,000
Turns out she was on a date after all.

391
00:23:37,000 --> 00:23:44,000
Eventually every member of the Lindbergh inner circle is questioned and discarded as a suspect.

392
00:23:44,000 --> 00:23:49,000
Everyone that is except for one Charles Lindbergh himself.

393
00:23:51,000 --> 00:24:00,000
Today when we have any kind of crime involving a child or a family the family members are the first suspects especially in kidnappings.

394
00:24:00,000 --> 00:24:04,000
The first person you would look at would be the parents.

395
00:24:04,000 --> 00:24:16,000
In 1932 no one is going to question Lindbergh or imagine that the hero of the age could have anything to do with an exploit so sociopathic as the kidnapping of his own son.

396
00:24:16,000 --> 00:24:23,000
One of the things that happens over time is that people thinking about the crime start to notice odd things about Lindbergh's behavior.

397
00:24:23,000 --> 00:24:28,000
Theories start to emerge that perhaps Lindbergh is involved in some way.

398
00:24:28,000 --> 00:24:32,000
Lindbergh had tremendous influence over the investigators that were involved in this case.

399
00:24:32,000 --> 00:24:44,000
In fact according to one story when the police arrived at his home Lindbergh is standing outside with a rifle and he tells them if anyone disobeys me they're going to get shot.

400
00:24:44,000 --> 00:24:53,000
And the only statement that Lindbergh actually gives is a one page account where he can't really attest to his own whereabouts the day before the event.

401
00:24:53,000 --> 00:25:00,000
Lindbergh has very strong connections to the New Jersey State police and it's documented that he wanted them to be in charge.

402
00:25:00,000 --> 00:25:04,000
Some say that Lindbergh wants control of the investigation.

403
00:25:04,000 --> 00:25:13,000
Here's another curious detail. When the police want to copy down all the serial numbers on those gold certificates Lindbergh strongly objects.

404
00:25:13,000 --> 00:25:19,000
Why would Lindbergh want to limit the scope of the search for his son's killer?

405
00:25:19,000 --> 00:25:30,000
People have suggested that it was actually Lindbergh himself who was responsible for the murder of his own son in a prank gone wrong and the kidnapping was just a ruse after the fact.

406
00:25:30,000 --> 00:25:40,000
Charles Lindbergh is a practical joker. He likes to pull pranks on people but it's not funny stuff. It's dangerous stuff.

407
00:25:40,000 --> 00:25:46,000
There is a time where he actually put kerosene in an acquaintance's drink and let him drink it and he thought that was pretty funny.

408
00:25:47,000 --> 00:26:04,000
Lindbergh kidnapped his baby once before. Just a week earlier Lindbergh hid the baby in a closet and he allowed Betty and Anne to both get hysterical believing that the baby had been kidnapped and Lindbergh thought that was funny.

409
00:26:04,000 --> 00:26:09,000
Anne Lindbergh wrote a letter to her mother-in-law the next day explaining what had happened.

410
00:26:09,000 --> 00:26:17,000
She said that when she saw the empty crib her first thought was the child had taken the baby again as a joke.

411
00:26:17,000 --> 00:26:23,000
Theorists suggest that this time the prank takes an even darker turn.

412
00:26:23,000 --> 00:26:28,000
So the night of the kidnapping according to the weather report it was cold and windy.

413
00:26:28,000 --> 00:26:40,000
What if Lindbergh actually was pranking his family again and what if during the course of that practical joke he actually fell down that ladder or worse dropped the baby.

414
00:26:40,000 --> 00:26:47,000
This will be borne out by the autopsy results. The baby died from a skull fracture.

415
00:26:48,000 --> 00:26:56,000
And Lindbergh immediately ordered that the child remains be cremated. There were never any toxicological tests done. There was no further examination.

416
00:26:56,000 --> 00:27:02,000
He concocted a cover-up of a kidnap story in order to save his own reputation.

417
00:27:03,000 --> 00:27:06,000
But some think it wasn't an accident.

418
00:27:06,000 --> 00:27:12,000
Some people have suggested that Lindbergh took his own child's life on purpose.

419
00:27:13,000 --> 00:27:25,000
As police search for baby Lindbergh's murderer in the summer of 1932 a radical theory suggests Charles Lindbergh is the culprit.

420
00:27:28,000 --> 00:27:36,000
In the 1930s the pseudoscience of eugenics has taken hold and Lindbergh is an avid believer.

421
00:27:36,000 --> 00:27:47,000
In eugenics scientists what they do is they will deem certain genetic traits superior and any sort of deformities that show up in somebody are considered a weakness.

422
00:27:47,000 --> 00:27:54,000
It's a concept that the Nazi party would actually use to justify in their genocide against the Jewish people.

423
00:27:55,000 --> 00:28:05,000
Lindbergh was definitely drawn to aspects of Nazism. He gave speeches, he published papers, he espoused all of these racist ideas in front of Congress.

424
00:28:05,000 --> 00:28:10,000
Could these controversial political beliefs have led to the death of baby Lindbergh?

425
00:28:11,000 --> 00:28:21,000
Charles Junior was born with some mild deformities. Things like Ricketts, his legs bowed. He didn't have a whole lot of strength in his lower body.

426
00:28:21,000 --> 00:28:25,000
He seemed to be a little slow on development in that area.

427
00:28:25,000 --> 00:28:34,000
It didn't seem as though Charles Junior fit the mold of what Charles Lindbergh was saying was the perfect person.

428
00:28:35,000 --> 00:28:45,000
So people do ask if Charles Lindbergh was worried that he had an inferior baby, would he be capable of carrying out the horrible act of murdering him?

429
00:28:46,000 --> 00:28:52,000
The idea of Charles Lindbergh doing something so heinous was absolutely inconceivable.

430
00:28:52,000 --> 00:28:59,000
Nobody could assign something so evil to such a celebrated man.

431
00:28:59,000 --> 00:29:07,000
And that includes investigators. They stopped looking into the Lindbergh family and the case goes cold.

432
00:29:10,000 --> 00:29:18,000
In the two years after the Lindbergh baby's death, police questioned nearly a thousand persons of interest with no luck.

433
00:29:18,000 --> 00:29:25,000
Then, in the summer of 1934, detectives finally catch the brick they've been looking for.

434
00:29:25,000 --> 00:29:30,000
It's all due to a seed they planted at the very beginning.

435
00:29:32,000 --> 00:29:41,000
They put together that $50,000 in ransom money with gold certificates and they wrote down the serial numbers so they would be easy to locate.

436
00:29:42,000 --> 00:29:49,000
So the more that those are spent, the better the odds that somebody's going to notice.

437
00:29:49,000 --> 00:29:53,000
Months later, they start to surface in New York City.

438
00:29:54,000 --> 00:30:03,000
It takes a while to really figure out exactly where all the bills are being spent, but when they do, they realize that it's along a specific path.

439
00:30:04,000 --> 00:30:10,000
They're being spent along the Lexington Avenue subway. This subway connects the Bronx to the east side of Manhattan.

440
00:30:10,000 --> 00:30:22,000
One turns up at the East River Savings Bank, another at the Lowe's Sheridan Square Theater, another comes from the grocery store in the Yorkville neighborhood, and another at the exquisite shoe store.

441
00:30:22,000 --> 00:30:31,000
Ultimately, $5,100 worth of ransom bills are recovered, but it's one in particular that cracks the case wide open.

442
00:30:31,000 --> 00:30:43,000
September 18th, 1934, one of those gold notes pops up at a bank in Manhattan, but this gold certificate has something different.

443
00:30:43,000 --> 00:30:52,000
It has a number written in the margin. For you, 1341NY. It's a license plate number.

444
00:30:53,000 --> 00:30:56,000
The bill is traced to a local gas station.

445
00:30:56,000 --> 00:31:02,000
Station attendant Walter Lyle said that that gold certificate caught his attention and it felt suspicious to him.

446
00:31:02,000 --> 00:31:09,000
He thought that that customer might have been a counterfeiter, so to help him remember, he wrote down the license plate right there on the spot on that bill.

447
00:31:10,000 --> 00:31:12,000
Police run the plate and get a name.

448
00:31:16,000 --> 00:31:22,000
For two years, police only had a sketch of their prime suspect in the Lindberg kidnapping.

449
00:31:23,000 --> 00:31:26,000
Now, they finally have a name.

450
00:31:28,000 --> 00:31:37,000
The police tracked down the car, which belongs to one Bruno Richard Hauptmann. The police now believe they know the true identity of Cemetery John.

451
00:31:41,000 --> 00:31:51,000
Hauptmann is a German-born immigrant illegally living in the United States, and he was actually charged with multiple burglaries in Germany, but he escaped by stowing away on an ocean liner.

452
00:31:51,000 --> 00:31:58,000
He currently lives on East 222nd Street in the Bronx with his wife Anna and their young child, and he works odd jobs as a carpenter.

453
00:31:59,000 --> 00:32:06,000
As soon as investigators connect the bill to Hauptmann, they immediately put him under constant surveillance, hoping that he'll slip up and incriminate himself.

454
00:32:06,000 --> 00:32:09,000
At some point, Hauptmann realizes that he's being watched.

455
00:32:09,000 --> 00:32:17,000
Now, maybe he knows he's guilty, or maybe he's worried about his status in the United States. Either way, he decides to jump in his car and make a break for it.

456
00:32:18,000 --> 00:32:30,000
And it's a straight-ahead gangster film chase, driving through the streets, police cars after him, running through traffic. It's something right out of the movie.

457
00:32:30,000 --> 00:32:33,000
He's finally pinned in on Park Avenue in the Bronx.

458
00:32:34,000 --> 00:32:38,000
Hauptmann is arrested, and authorities begin a search of his car and his house.

459
00:32:39,000 --> 00:32:46,000
They're searching through all his belongings, not finding much of interest, until they look inside this old garage at the edge of the property.

460
00:32:47,000 --> 00:32:52,000
There, in a stack of old gas cans, police finally find their smoking gun.

461
00:32:53,000 --> 00:32:58,000
They open some jars and what do they find? $14,600 in gold certificates.

462
00:32:59,000 --> 00:33:07,000
And once they find the cans of ransom money in Hauptmann's garage, it's a race to the finish to build a case against him, and the evidence is pretty damning.

463
00:33:08,000 --> 00:33:17,000
Detectives check the serial numbers on every bill found at Hauptmann's place, and indeed, these are the certificates that were given as part of the ransom.

464
00:33:17,000 --> 00:33:21,000
In Hauptmann's attic, there is more evidence.

465
00:33:22,000 --> 00:33:28,000
Remember, the night Charles Jr. goes missing, they find those broken pieces of wood underneath the nursery window that come from a ladder.

466
00:33:28,000 --> 00:33:31,000
Well, in Hauptmann's attic, they find a ladder.

467
00:33:32,000 --> 00:33:37,000
Not just any ladder, a handmade telescopic ladder designed to collapse in on itself.

468
00:33:38,000 --> 00:33:44,000
This allows one person to carry it easily, while being long enough to reach the height of Lindberg's second-story window.

469
00:33:46,000 --> 00:33:49,000
Was it the ladder used to kidnap the Lindberg baby?

470
00:33:50,000 --> 00:33:57,000
Hauptmann is a carpenter, and so he has his own tools. He has the ability to build a ladder.

471
00:33:58,000 --> 00:34:03,000
And during the attic search, investigators find a section of floorboards that have been cut.

472
00:34:04,000 --> 00:34:11,000
A team of experts study the wood from the floorboards and forensically compare it to the wood from the ladder.

473
00:34:12,000 --> 00:34:21,000
And this gets them thinking. The wood grain in one rail of the ladder, dubbed rail 16, seems to match up perfectly with that cut section from Hauptmann's attic floor.

474
00:34:21,000 --> 00:34:25,000
And the nail holes also match the nails used to construct the attic.

475
00:34:25,000 --> 00:34:31,000
So experts are convinced that the ladder is made from slats in the floor of Hauptmann's attic.

476
00:34:32,000 --> 00:34:34,000
But police need more for a conviction.

477
00:34:37,000 --> 00:34:42,000
Of course, owning a ladder isn't a crime, but then investigators find one more clue.

478
00:34:43,000 --> 00:34:49,000
They found a phone number written on the wall in the closet in the kitchen. Whose phone number was it?

479
00:34:50,000 --> 00:34:55,000
Dr. John Condon, the same man who was the intermediary for the ransom hand-off.

480
00:34:56,000 --> 00:35:04,000
Finally, investigators commission handwriting analysis between Hauptmann's handwriting and the writing that appeared on the ransom notes, and they find multiple similarities.

481
00:35:05,000 --> 00:35:13,000
Both sets of writing contained backward ends, curls on the Ys. Additionally, he spelled some of the same words wrong.

482
00:35:14,000 --> 00:35:21,000
On September 24th, Hauptmann is indicted for extorting the $50,000 ransom from Charles Lindberg.

483
00:35:22,000 --> 00:35:28,000
Shortly after, on October 8th, he's also indicted for the murder of Charles Lindberg Jr.

484
00:35:32,000 --> 00:35:41,000
Hauptmann is represented by Eddard J. Riley, an attorney actually hired by the New York Daily Mirror for exclusive rights to Hauptmann's story.

485
00:35:44,000 --> 00:35:52,000
The trial brought hundreds of reporters into town. People couldn't find hotel rooms for miles. It was huge.

486
00:35:53,000 --> 00:35:58,000
He quit his job the day he collected the $50,000. The very day!

487
00:35:59,000 --> 00:36:08,000
After a conviction and two failed appeals, Hauptmann is executed by the electric chair on April 3rd, 1936.

488
00:36:09,000 --> 00:36:16,000
And that's it, everyone. Mystery solved. We now know the truth of what happened. Or do we?

489
00:36:20,000 --> 00:36:29,000
Even after the conviction of Richard Hauptmann for the murder of Baby Lindberg, not everyone's convinced he's solely responsible.

490
00:36:29,000 --> 00:36:38,000
Obviously, the police want to close this case as neatly and as efficiently as possible. And looking at the evidence they have, Hauptmann appears extremely guilty.

491
00:36:39,000 --> 00:36:41,000
It seems very likely that he was involved in these crimes.

492
00:36:42,000 --> 00:36:46,000
But even the highest authorities wonder, did he act alone?

493
00:36:50,000 --> 00:36:56,000
While Hauptmann is awaiting execution, the governor of New Jersey himself, Harold Hoffman, visits him in his cell.

494
00:36:56,000 --> 00:36:59,000
He also brings along a translator who speaks fluent German.

495
00:37:00,000 --> 00:37:06,000
While there were no notes released from this talk, it seems like it was a pretty influential talk.

496
00:37:07,000 --> 00:37:13,000
After talking with Hauptmann, the governor implores court officials and the police to keep on investigating.

497
00:37:14,000 --> 00:37:16,000
He ended up granting him a reprieve.

498
00:37:17,000 --> 00:37:21,000
Governor Hoffman felt that there was more to the story than what the state had put forward at the trial.

499
00:37:21,000 --> 00:37:26,000
And he wanted to make sure that everyone who was involved was identified and brought to justice.

500
00:37:27,000 --> 00:37:31,000
As we know, of course, that request from the governor isn't followed upon.

501
00:37:32,000 --> 00:37:35,000
And Hauptmann takes the fall as the one and only perpetrator of that crime.

502
00:37:36,000 --> 00:37:41,000
Hoffman doesn't give any more reprieves and the execution takes place four years after the kidnapping.

503
00:37:42,000 --> 00:37:49,000
For the next six decades, Hauptmann's guilt is generally accepted, along with the idea that he acted alone.

504
00:37:49,000 --> 00:37:55,000
Then in 2003, a state police archivist makes a startling discovery.

505
00:37:56,000 --> 00:38:00,000
Sitting right there in the archive is a board with a signed confession written on it.

506
00:38:01,000 --> 00:38:08,000
It's written in German, but it translates to, I was one of the kidnappers of Lindbergh's baby, not Bruno Richard Hoffman.

507
00:38:09,000 --> 00:38:13,000
It goes on to state that some of the ransom money was buried in a town of Summit.

508
00:38:14,000 --> 00:38:23,000
What's more intriguing still is that there's a series of screw holes, like a table leg or a brace, was removed with a large circle around it.

509
00:38:24,000 --> 00:38:32,000
And when a comparison is made to the ransom note, these holes line up perfectly with the holes that were found in those ransom notes.

510
00:38:33,000 --> 00:38:36,000
The board was apparently reported to the state police in 1948.

511
00:38:37,000 --> 00:38:41,000
A man found it attached to the bottom of the table he had recently purchased.

512
00:38:42,000 --> 00:38:47,000
Authorities did not take this seriously because there had been dozens of confessions.

513
00:38:48,000 --> 00:38:54,000
Dozens of people had said that they were involved, some cases that they were actually the baby.

514
00:38:55,000 --> 00:39:00,000
Handwriting comparisons are made between Hoffman's writing and the writing on the wood, and they don't match.

515
00:39:01,000 --> 00:39:03,000
If Hauptmann didn't write it, who did?

516
00:39:04,000 --> 00:39:09,000
In 2012, author Robert Zorn offers a potential lead on who might have written this note.

517
00:39:10,000 --> 00:39:18,000
In his book Cemetery John, he reports that his father Eugene may have witnessed Hauptmann conspiring with two other men in 1932.

518
00:39:19,000 --> 00:39:22,000
Growing up in the South Bronx, Eugene lived next to a John Knoll.

519
00:39:23,000 --> 00:39:34,000
And one day at an amusement park, Eugene claims to have seen John Knoll along with his younger brother Walter and Hauptmann in the amusement park speaking in hushed tones in German, plotting something.

520
00:39:34,000 --> 00:39:42,000
He recognized the words Bruno, which was Hauptmann's first name, and the word Englewood, which was the suburb where Lindbergh's family lived in New Jersey.

521
00:39:43,000 --> 00:39:46,000
Zorn puts a few more details together for this story as well.

522
00:39:47,000 --> 00:39:55,000
John Knoll was a stamp collector, and the Lindbergh ransom notes used a variety of odd stamps.

523
00:39:56,000 --> 00:40:03,000
And the Knolls residence on the South Bronx was along the same Lexington Avenue subway route of which the gold certificates were spent.

524
00:40:04,000 --> 00:40:08,000
If you look at the sketch, Knoll and Cemetery John show a striking resemblance.

525
00:40:09,000 --> 00:40:12,000
Could John Knoll be the real Cemetery John?

526
00:40:13,000 --> 00:40:20,000
While this information is revealing and interesting, at this point it's impossible to prove that John Knoll was Cemetery John.

527
00:40:21,000 --> 00:40:29,000
It's possible they sent the Roman to the electric chair, or there were at least two or more accomplices that never guided any attention.

528
00:40:29,000 --> 00:40:36,000
For a mystery that's supposedly already solved, there are still a lot of questions that people have that linger about this case.

529
00:40:37,000 --> 00:40:44,000
How could this have succeeded without someone having inside knowledge? What about the inconsistencies at the crime scene?

530
00:40:45,000 --> 00:40:50,000
Why was Dr. Condon so heavily involved? Did he have something to do with this?

531
00:40:51,000 --> 00:40:54,000
What about the death of Violet Sharp? What about John and Walter Knoll?

532
00:40:54,000 --> 00:40:58,000
And of course the biggest question of all, could Lindbergh have possibly orchestrated the whole thing?

533
00:40:59,000 --> 00:41:05,000
For now, we're left with the official story. At least, until a new clue appears.

534
00:41:08,000 --> 00:41:15,000
As of today, less than 20,000 of the original $50,000 ransom paid to Cemetery John has been recovered.

535
00:41:16,000 --> 00:41:21,000
If the rest ever turns up, will it tie back to Hauptmann, or will it point to a new suspect?

536
00:41:21,000 --> 00:41:28,000
I'm Lawrence Fishburne. Thank you for watching History's Greatest Mysteries.