OH OH - Ruth Baumgardner, 21, Delaware, 4 May 1937

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If anyone would like to read the trial transcripts or book transcripts let me know and I can email them to you. Each page is an individual PDF so unfortunately I cannot upload them here for all to see as there would be 30+ pages.
 
JeannieC said:
New News.

Evaline Polland AKA Bernice BradleyRead this:

Detective says it is ridiculous that Ruth Baumgardner was in the car when Conn was killed.............Something really strange about this. .........

http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=ZvYaAAAAIBAJ&sjid=Dk0EAAAAIBAJ&dq=peter sereno&pg=5691,2677902

The article begins on page 1 and ends on page 3 but you can't link to page 1........sorry
Click to expand...

What makes all of this so hard, though, is that one of the detectives wrote a book about his career, touching on the Conn/Baumgardner case in it. He states that the family asked LE to act to the press like Ruth was not found and they obliged. He then states that she was put in an institution.
 
That makes sense since one detective denied that she was in the car and everyone else said she was.

I'd love to read those transcripts.
 
I would too! I wonder what happened to Evaline/Bernice after this? I'm guessing that she ended up in prison, an institution or dead. I've tried googling her name (both her real and alias) and haven't found anything. It sounds to me like Ruth was found and her parents just wanted to make all of this go away. I'm just curious about whether or not she made it out of the institution. It is really, really sad.
 
I wonder if someone could contacts some of these local papers to run a follow up story in their paper today? It could be kind of a local history piece or a where are they now kind of story. It may get some response from people that might remember the case or maybe a family member that would not afraid to talk at this point.

I have seen these types of stories in the LA Times (my local paper).
 
I'm reading the court documents now, and Charles Ford testified that Masulla, not Sereno was the one who knew Ruth. He "had an appointment to see a girl in Delaware", so the four men drove to Delaware.
 
marie-chantal said:
I'm reading the court documents now, and Charles Ford testified that Masulla, not Sereno was the one who knew Ruth. He "had an appointment to see a girl in Delaware", so the four men drove to Delaware.
Click to expand...

Yeah I re-read the files today and the two documents mix that up. I think the guy that sent me those files mentions that in the thread, I'll go back and check. The book says Sereno, but I tend to believe the court docs as they are court docs.
 
fact-n-detail-finder said:
The following had to be written years later from his memory. Some of his facts are off, such as Ruth Baumgardner was taken about May 4th and Patrolman Conn was shot & killed 9/27/37.
Click to expand...

Bumping this up - so the court docs are more accurate with some details
 
I also believe the court docs, Claudette. What I find interesting is that the Pinkerton agent was able to find her before the police. It would seem to me that the agent would have notified the police that she'd been located. It didn't appear that the police were notified until after just before the trial (MOO). I wonder if the police went to the institution to verify that she was there. In today's age, they would have done this and they would have interviewed her extensively. It saddens me that her parents wanted everything to be dropped and covered up.
 
This article about Ruth will really make you think.............

According to this article Sereno, Masulla, and Ford were all in jail May 5th when Ruth was taken and could not have abducted her.

Her case was still unsolved and she hitched to Ashville, NC but was headed for Texas. This goes with the story of the truck driver who claimed to have given her and a guy named Frenchie a ride.

I wonder if this is true, I mean as far as Sereno etc being in jail.

http://access.newspaperarchive.com/...earch&currentResult=0&currentPage=0&fpo=False
 
JeannieC said:
This article about Ruth will really make you think.............

According to this article Sereno, Masulla, and Ford were all in jail May 5th when Ruth was taken and could not have abducted her.

Her case was still unsolved and she hitched to Ashville, NC but was headed for Texas. This goes with the story of the truck driver who claimed to have given her and a guy named Frenchie a ride.

I wonder if this is true, I mean as far as Sereno etc being in jail.

http://access.newspaperarchive.com/...earch&currentResult=0&currentPage=0&fpo=False
Click to expand...


I wasn't able to access the article, but based on what you're saying and based on the date that this article appeared (14 years later), I wonder if this means that those who testified in court lied?

Ashville and Texas? Does the truck driver state that she gave him her name? Did he ever say where he picked her up? This is very strange to me. Either the witness lied in court (Ford was his name, I think) or someone else was saying she was Ruth (remember the escaped mental patient in Boston?). Very odd.
 
Unable to read the article. :(

It just seems strange to me that it took them 14 years to figure out that the dates didn't match? It should have been the first thing they noticed.
does that mean she never knew these people and really was missing? They must have found her if they knew where she was headed.

With so many conflicting articles, I don't know what to believe. I find it hard to believe that so many people lied about Ruth being associated with the crime in one way or another. This would mean that everyone lied, including the officer that wrote the book that first brought all of this to our attention.

I wonder if it could be part of the cover up to not have Ruth associated with the murder and those types of people. But 14 years later?? Why?? Could the family had that much pull in the community to continue to cover things up?

I wish I could read the article.
 
momtolil said:
Unable to read the article. :(

It just seems strange to me that it took them 14 years to figure out that the dates didn't match? It should have been the first thing they noticed.
does that mean she never knew these people and really was missing? They must have found her if they knew where she was headed.

With so many conflicting articles, I don't know what to believe. I find it hard to believe that so many people lied about Ruth being associated with the crime in one way or another. This would mean that everyone lied, including the officer that wrote the book that first brought all of this to our attention.

I wonder if it could be part of the cover up to not have Ruth associated with the murder and those types of people. But 14 years later?? Why?? Could the family had that much pull in the community to continue to cover things up?

I wish I could read the article.
Click to expand...

I'd like to know the date of the alleged hitch-hiking incident. If it was several years later, it could have been possible that Ruth got out of the institution (or ran away from the institution) and was leaving the area for a new life. Otherwise, I tend to believe the court reports.
 
I can't get back into the article either. Now they want you to join.......

The article stated the same things stated earlier about the truck driver picking up a couple who claimed to be married. She didn't have a wedding ring on. His name was Frenchie and he called her Ruth and Baumie. They were headed to Tex and he dropped them off in Ashville, NC.

The only thing I had not seen before was the part where the writer stated that it could not have been an abduction because Sereno, Masulla, and Ford were in jail on May 5, 1937.

I have my doubts about them being in jail on May 5, 1937 because they were arrested after the abduction in 1938 and if I'm correct they had been out on parole when they attached the politician and were returned to jail.

The article also stated that she was engaged to Bud Moore and he was having the diamond setting from his grandmother's ring put into a ring for Ruth.
 
I don't know how May 5th relates to the Conn murder but Ford, according to the court docs, had met Sereno and the other guy just before the murder.
 
Ford said in the court docs that he met the others toward the end of April or the first of May. Ruth was abducted on May 5th, 1937.

I think the article is incorrect and possibly the writer hadn't done enough research.

I guess it is possible that Ford read all the papers, saw her picture, and made it all up to get out of a murder charge but it seems improbable to me. He seemed to know a lot of facts about where they went and what they did. Not to mention names.

Conn was killed on Sept 27, 1937.
 
According to People Search Ora F Hardwick of Cleveland, Medina, Oh is alive and 102 years old. Her husband Richard J Hardwick is 110 years old.

Ruth's sister was Ora F Baumgardner Hardwick. She lived in Medina Ohio at the time Ruth was abducted.

Could this be Ruth's sister? Anyone live near Cleveland, OH?
 
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