Elizabeth Short MurderHere’s what I found out.Dead body of Elizabeth Short was discovered on January 15, 1947 in a vacant lot in Leimert Park, Crenshaw district of Los Angeles by mother and daughter who were on their way home after doing some shopping. They first thought there was an abandoned mannequin in the grass but as they got closer the horrific truth was revealed. That was no mannequin, but a body of a young girl naked, cut in half, her face slashed from mouth to ear and her hands posed above her head.
There was no evidence at the crime scene. No footprints, no weapons, nothing to provide the police with any clues. Crime scene details were provided to the media and the story of Black Dahlia took off. By now, nobody even knows whether she had this nickname while she was alive or whether it was started by one of the media and everyone else went with it.
Black Dahlia Autopsy ResultsThe investigation of the Black Dahlia murder returned inconclusive results. While mutilated body of Elizabeth Short was drained off blood, there was hardly any at the crime scene leading investigators to conclusion that she was murdered elsewhere and dumped in that ditch after she was dead. The mortician concluded that her body was cut in half with either an electric saw or a large butcher knife. Her death was caused by “hemorrhage and shock due to concussions of the brain and lacerations of the face.”
Autopsy report further details that face of Elizabeth Short had deep 3″ long laceration that extended laterally from right corner of her mouth and a 2.5″ long laceration that extended laterally from left corner of her mouth making her look as if she was smiling. Her body was bruised in several places, including head and neck but no evidence of trauma indicative of strangulation was found on trachea, the thyroid glands or hyoid bone.
Elizabeth Short has a small tattoo of a rose on her thigh. This tattoo was cut off by the murderer(s) and shoved up her vagina along with a lot of grass. Autopsy results also suggested that Elizabeth Short was sexually abused and sodomized both before death as well as post mortem. Her stomach was filled with all sorts of matter, including feces however no sperm was found anywhere on or near her body. Bruising suggests that Elizabeth Short was tortured prior to death as dead bodies don’t bruise.
(via my-in-search-of)