IL IL - Valerie Percy, 21, Kenilworth, 18 September 1966

[Luckymanuh]

I think the blooding palm and partial thumb or finger prints should be compared. I have always said that. Also, if I am right there was one on the cut piece of glass too.
With DNA you would need to get it from family members of suspected person or persons because they did not collect DNA back in those days

 

[Bargle]

I can't find the old thread right now, but some DNA testing was done a while back. Apparently nothing came of it. For a brief time, on the old Crime & Justice board, we had a poster who was a member of the Kenilworth PD. That person couldn't tell us much, only that something new might break in the case. Nothing ever happened.
I may have mentioned this before, but touch DNA testing might not yield anything useful. I don't know how the Kenilworth and Chicago PD were handling evidence, but it wasn't uncommon for it to be done barehanded. There was an old TV news clip, linked at another board, of the kitchen shears being recovered and it was done barehanded. They were careful not to disturb fingerprints, but they did use bare hands. We also don't know how the evidence has been stored. The material containing DNA may be too degraded to be useful.

 

[Winward1]

I just can't remember whether they ever really determined whether the glove was linked in any way, positively, to the crime, or discounted completely like the bayonet in the lake, etc. I can't remember whether any stories said just where it was found either.

Here's the story that mentions the latest DNA testing:

http://abclocal.go.com/wls/story?section=news&id=4563621

Here's some of the footage shot at the house that day:

http://www.efootage.com/stock-footage/71553/Valerie_Percy_Crime_Scene_-_HD/

 

[Winward1]

Luckymanuh and me were discussing how much has been published about the Bubes attack. I thought I had read information about the intruder stealing her underwear. Today I found that in a story in the Tribune about Valerie's attacker. Not much else is in it except the mother and Bubes getting a look at the guy as or before he dropped the stuff and fled. They apparently didn't see fit to print any more details. Isn't it said he told her to be quiet and she yelled?

 

[Bargle]

Luckymanuh and me were discussing how much has been published about the Bubes attack. I thought I had read information about the intruder stealing her underwear. Today I found that in a story in the Tribune about Valerie's attacker. Not much else is in it except the mother and Bubes getting a look at the guy as or before he dropped the stuff and fled. They apparently didn't see fit to print any more details. Isn't it said he told her to be quiet and she yelled?

OK, I'm quoting a couple of Lucky's old posts at the orig. C&J board, quoting a newspaper article.

The underwear was taken out of her dresser drawer and was being held in one hand while beating her in the head. Her mother heard her screams ran into the bedroom and that is when the assiliant was frighten away dropping the underwear as he left.

"Altho dazed, Miss Bubes saw a man standin over her bed with the hammer in one hand and a quantity of her underclothing in the other. The clothing had been taken from her dresser drawer." It goes on to say that "as the intruder fled he scattered the underclothing he had stolen."

 

[Winward1]

Lucky, if possible, it would be great to know what papers those quotes are from, thanks!

 

[Winward1]

Of course, the question about DNA is interesting. But the more basic question is, did investigators think the glove actually was used by the attacker or not? What did investigators think the odds were? If it was moist, was the moisture human fluids?

If I recall correctly, news reports didn't really go that far into it. Yes a glove was found. Yes there was moisture of some sort on it. I don't recall much more being said about it.

 

[Bargle]

I found 2 articles on the glove in those I saved a while back.

From an AP wire story:

"The leather-palmed woolen man's glove, of medium size, was found the day of the killing in a shallow gully some 30 feet from the spacious Percy mansion..."

Rather than transcribe the other article, I'll link to a picture of the article.

 

[Winward1]

That certainly is affirmative. They linked the glove to the crime but not to anyone else.

I suspect there was a lot of discussion as to whether someone wearing such gloves could wield a weapon in an attack such as this.

Of course, he could have taken one or more of them off once he got in, and either way dropped one while escaping. The "gully" mentioned in the story is actually Devonshire, which is actually considered a ravine (you may see that in pics I posted.) From Sheridan road to the driveway it just seems like a narrow lane, but the other, roughly half of it, that runs down from to the beach cuts through the bluff on either side.

I read somewhere there was also a fence they thought might have been damaged by the intruder. I don't know if one ran along there then. One also probably ran between Percy's house and Dr. Hoff's as well. I don't think it said where the fence was. If the fence was anywhere near the glove that should have been reported.

It would appear that the moisture was not blood. I would think there was morning due and or perhaps condensation from being near the lake. It can be humid or quite dry here at that time of year. One wonders if that happened today if they could get DNA from such a glove even if it wasn't bloodied.

 

[Winward1]

And, certainly it's interesting to note the headline says blood stained but nothing in the story says it was confirmed blood was on there. The fact that it was initially discounted as being used by the killer indicates anything but blood was on it.

 

[Bargle]

And, certainly it's interesting to note the headline says blood stained but nothing in the story says it was confirmed blood was on there. The fact that it was initially discounted as being used by the killer indicates anything but blood was on it.

Yeah, that's my feeling as well. If it had been blood, it would have been obvious. Most likely it was just damp from the dew.

 

[Winward1]

Really is funny that stories like that, or at least headlines, got past editors. I wonder if there was haste involved, since the story was so huge, if all of these papers thought they'd get scooped.

I wonder how good the analysis of the fibers on the screen was. It would be highly suspicious for a wool glove to be laying around the area then as it's usually still pretty warm in this area in mid Sept. There'd be less reason for anyone to be wearing a wool glove for warmth at that time. Still, if the fibers were wool and the glove was wool, that's still a pretty generic material.

On another note, this is more of an accuracy thing than a continuity but the NY Times first story said the beach was private. But it was actually public at that time, and still is.

 

[Winward1]

Anyone see Frontline last night? They had a story on the Norfolk Four, a story about forced confessions related to a homicide.

During the show, someone commented on the rarity of sexual related homicides, and said in one recent year there were only something like 64 of them in the entire country, a tiny fraction of all homicides.

The case was also about a female who was assaulted and killed in her home (bedroom, I believe.) That said, I couldn't help but think of this case.

 

[Winward1]

Pete Peterson here. He took over Bell and Howell after Valerie's father left for government. His family lived just up the road in Winnetka at the time she was killed and the Percys went to his house after she was laid to rest.


http://tinyurl.com/4ntgavn

 

[Luckymanuh]

Sorry Winward been absent for awhile. Those quotes were from one of three papers I got my research from. Trib, Suntimes or the local Evanston paper. I do not remember the name of it. Sorry.

 

[Winward1]

No, problem.

 

[JBean]

bumping because the case is freezing cold.

 

[Winward1]

Thanks for doing this. There's something I've got to do on this that I've been putting off. I'll try to do it this weekend.

 

[Dreamnine]

My blog piece about Valerie Percy - also the Briccas murdered 9 days later in Cincinnati:

http://amaranth-parallelreality.blogspot.com/

 

[Winward1]

Thanks, Dreamnine. For some reason the photo and sketch you posted aren't coming up on my browser.

".... I think you will agree he obviously bears a strong similarity to the suspect sketch in the Percy murder -..."

Far's I know, there was never a Percy murder sketch per se. Mrs. Percy apparently didn't get a good enough look at Valerie's killer. The widely circulated sketch related to the case was made from the attack in Evanston you mention in your blog. Mrs. Percy was said to have seen some similarities between it and the person she saw in Valerie's room that morning.

I have not read your entire post but will in a minute. The Trumbull name popped out to me because the Percys had neighbors who were also their friends by the same name and who lived roughly a dozen or so houses south of the Percy residence on Sheridan Road. The Trumbulls attended the same church as the Percys. Mr. Trumbull was a well to do businessman like Mr. Percy. I do not know if he was/is any relation to the person in the Pacific Northwest mentioned in your story but it is interesting nonetheless.

Some of the footage online of investigators searching the front yard of a house near the Percy residence the day of and/or in the days just after the killing, specifically the shot of Explorer Scouts conducting a search of a lawn and garden, was quite near the Trumbull residence. That house and the Trumbull's former house are still there.

Mr. and Mrs. Percy were able to come and go the day of and in the days just after the murder, without the knowledge of the press which was camped out in front of the Percy residence, by walking stealthily up and down the beach and to and from the Trumbull's house, from which they departed and arrived by a waiting car I am told was provided by Mr. Trumbull. The press only caught onto this days later, when the Percy's left IL for a number of weeks.