Black Dahlia Crime Scene Photos: New Investigation-Hard Evidence and Forensics Revisited 2019

October 1, 2019
Los Angeles, California

Below scenes from Director Michelangelo Antonioni’s classic 1966 film, BLOW-UP showing “Thomas” (Actor David Hemmings) examining his “blown up photographs” which reveal evidence of a crime.

In the updated Black Dahlia Avenger (HarperCollins 2006) paperback edition I added several new chapters. One of these was entitled, “New Investigation: Hard Evidence and Forensics.

I quote from pages 544-45 of that chapter:

BLOWUP

As my Dahlia investigation comes to a close, I again find death imitating art.

Italian director Michelangelo Antonioni’s thriller Blowup, a seminal film of the 1960s, forced us to think and question lifestyles, mores, art, and the subjectivity of perception, all focused through the lens of a photographer’s camera. In the film, a whodunit or wasitdun existentialist mystery, David Hemmings plays a mod-fashion photographer who, while strolling through a London park, happens upon and takes photographs of a couple embracing.

In developing the photographs, he discovers that his camera has caught a possible murder in progress. Is there a hand showing a man holding a gun in the shrubbery? A dead body? He begins to enlarge small sections of his prints (hence the title), and as they grow, they enhance the mystery as distinct pieces of the puzzle.

Some forty years after seeing this fascinating film, I now find myself cast in the same role of protagonist-photographer. The only difference: we are in the year 2005, and I have traded Hemming’s 35mm Leica for a Hewlett-Packard computer and Adobe Photoshop!

What my investigation has revealed forces me to make public crime photographs that are graphically horrifying. In previous printings of my book I have been able to restrict this aspect of the investigation to verbal descriptions, which though shocking reduced significantly the violence. Hearing is a much kinder sense than sight. For the sake of truth, and the further need to prove my case, I must, I am afraid, cross the line and delve into that darker corner. I would ask that you, my readers, consider yourself a seated juror in a murder trial. Before showing you this evidence, I will do what most prosecutors do in court: apologize for having to show you scenes so violent that they will doubtless shock your senses; but this additionally compelling evidence must be added to our case.

BLOWUP FORENSICS 2019– A THIRTEEN-YEAR REEVALUATION

PART I- THE WATCH

In the 2006 examination and analysis, I suggested that an object seen inside the upper torso at the crime scene may well have been a military watch placed there by my father as a deliberate inclusion and posing of his “surreal masterpiece,”

This was based on several known factors which included:

1. A search of the vacant lot by LAPD recruits in the days following the removal of the victim’s body from the lot resulted in the “finding of a man’s military watch which was recovered and booked in evidence.”

2. A photo of George Hodel taken some two months prior to the murder showing him wearing a man’s military watch.

3. The fact that surrealists in their paintings were known to place a watch or other representation of “time” in their drawings/paintings.

4. A blowup of the upper torso showed what appeared to be a circular object with a dark face inside the body cavity at the crime scene compared to a second photo taken at the coroner’s office showing that object missing. (Did the watch fall out upon moving it from the scene only to be discovered by police recruits searching the location two days later?

Photos included in the original 2006 Chapter:

Man Ray photo of GHH taken in October 1946 showing him wearing his military watch.

Newspaper article describing “a man’s military watch” found two days by LAPD police recruits searching near where the body had been placed.

(Top) Crime scene arrow showing a circular object in upper torso appears to have a black face and resembling a man’s watch. (Bottom) Arrow taken at coroner’s office showing object missing from inside the upper torso.
(SKH Note- At the time of my original writing I assumed it would be a simple task to compare the watch booked in LAPD evidence to the watch seen worn by my father in the Man Ray photograph taken just months prior. Post publication, in a television interview, LAPD was forced to admit, “The watch is missing from our Property Division. We don’t know where it is?” Consequently, no comparison could be made to the George Hodel watch.)

2019 Forensic Reexamination

At my request, my friend and now frequent partner in my ongoing investigation, Robert Sadler, photographer, true-crime author, and ex-Dallas Police Officer, enhanced the original photographs as I wanted to see if we could obtain a more definitive answer that might allow us to rule “in or out” the suspected object. Was it or was it not- a man’s military watch?

Click photo to enlarge

In examining Robert’s photographic study and enhancements both he and I agree that the object can now most probably be ELIMINATED as being a man’s military watch.

Based on the above comparisons, specifically, 1c (negative imagery) and 1d (high contrast imagery) we both agree that it is more likely a piece of human tissue or bone that appeared to be connected and hanging from the upper torso and  likely fell off during the autopsy procedure.

PART II OF FORENSIC EXAMINATION TO BE CONTINUED IN MY NEXT BLOG

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