Recently, a history teacher, a retired teacher and a developmental psychologist filed a lawsuit against the New Jersey State Police seeking access to the ransom notes sent to Charles and Anne Lindbergh after their baby was abducted in 1932. The plaintiffs want access to this evidence so they can submit the stamps and adhesives for forensic testing to possibly identify others involved in the crime and prove a conspiracy.
https://www.aol.com/advanced-forensic-methods-used-id-160812686.html
I have long urged the testing of the “Allen” letter, envelope and stamp in the OCCK case, most recently to the Oakland County Prosector’s Office who has to act as a go-between because the Michigan State Police refuse to interact with me or my family. Testing the adhesive on the stamp and envelope for DNA is much more specific than testing the two-page letter or the envelope that was probably handled by many people along the way.
As described in Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing, The Search for a Child Killer (McIntyre, Tommy, (1988), Chapter 28), “Allen” sent the following letter to psychiatrist Dr. Bruce Danto at his Detroit office. Postmarked Detroit, April 4 1977, this message was typed under the address, across the bottom of the envelope: “MOST VERY IMPORTANT MOST URGENT MOST URGENT PLEASE.”
McIntyre does not specify if the letter was handwritten or typed, but it appears from the context that the letter was typewritten:
Dr. Danto
I am dsperite and nearly gone crazy and havnt got no place left to turn. I am going to comit suicide if you cant help me. Please dont give up the killer to the police. You must help me as there is no one else I cant turn to. This is for real I know who the killer is, I live with him I am his slave. He whips me and beats me all the time. And he will kill me if he finds out that I have written this letter. I have been with him in his car when we go out looking for boys but I swear I have never never never been with him when he picks up the ones he killed But I amin it in it so deep I am just as juilty to the law as he is I stayed with them here here right here in our apartment during the day while he is working. That makes me just as guilty. And no one can hear them as they gagged all the time. You know he brings them in stuffed inclothes hamper no one here knows the differences. You keep saying Oakland county not true. He has delivery rout in Oakland and Birmingham places but we live in detroit. You want to know people in this building? Primps and hookers and fags, you name it. Like on Gremlin he had it sure Grimlin until last boy but no one stops him in Detroit. He junk it out in Ohio to never be found ever. I tell you what makes him do it it Vietnam, we there together, Frank and me, oh Frank not his real name I call him that here. Nam screw up your mindtoo. Tell you something else he killed lots of little kids then with medals for it. Burned them to death bombed them with napalm it’s real becautiful there doc. He wants the rich people like people in Birmingham to suffer like all of us suffered to get nothing back for what we did for out country. Hes not a monster like you think he really loves children especially that little girl for 3 weeks not doing it because he hates childrens but doing it because he hates everybody else out there and this be his way to get even and get back at everybody.
But I cannot do it any more he says he wonts but I just know he is going to kill some more. I swear I had no idea no idea he going to kill that first little boy the one with blond colored hair. I shouldn8t ever never helped but trapped too late helped him stay uncaught, I am just as guilty as he is. I cant go on like this I fell I like to die.
I will turn him in if you will swearnto help me. I dont want any of reward I am so afraid if I turn him in I be killed or do forever to jail for what so something I didn8t want to or didn’t start. If you be real doctor you must help me. If you promise and what really promise that you not punish me like you call it immuty I meeting with you this Sunday night, I swear, I swear I tell you all of it everything I have to tell someone have to tell someone. Please please please not print this in paper he Frank kill me. I am his slave and he owns me like whatever he wants almost killed me once. I be only one alive know it him. Nobody else know. I so scared all the time policeman come to door never happen. He say we never be caught but I am scared to die. I be guilty too. I not ge be call you araid police trace all your calls back to here. But if you will onluy please please help me help me and promise me not to go to jail in writing I tell you all of it everything everything and it all be over. I never never want it to be like this with little children dead. If you will help me please please. There be no toher hope. You tell me it be all right with code in sunday papers, this sunday, news freepress. You do like other letter you write on front page of papers this sunday, it be to say, Weather beuau say Trees Bloom in 3 weeks, I know you get my letter and understdna. It mean I can trust you. I set up meeting with you, no more little childrens die. Please help me please. I feel so bad like garbage not deserve to live any more. Maybe I kill self first must get out of this some way. Please help me.
I singnd AllenWolf, pages 173-74.
The MSP has paid many, many detectives to either churn or simply sit on the OCCK cases for almost five decades. Here’s a constructive project for your state lab, especially if they refuse to rerun the kids’ clothing for DNA. Arguing the letter was a hoax as a way to avoid testing the stamp and envelope adhesive is just more gaslighting. And it’s on your dime, not mine. The technology is there. Step up.
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That letter reads like the author was purposely making the typos and spelling errors.
I agree, Brad.
As stated in the 9/28/1977 Detroit Free Press, this letter was tip number 9693.
The news report also stated;
“Danto received it at his office the next day and turned it over to task force officials. Since then, the task force has put in more time and effort trying to find Allen than on any other of the 12,544 tips it received, according to State Police Sgt. Joseph Krease”.
I’m sure this tip was also tagged as low priority, and everybody got their overtime.
The events of this letter also occurred less than 7 days before the meeting amongst Michigan prosecutors regarding child sexual abuse & exploitation of children was supposed to take place. This meeting was set up by Genesee County Prosecutor’s office, but the meeting never occurred. To me, the letter is just a ploy to help distract people away from this meeting. Possibly a ploy that the meeting may not be necessary. I believe if the envelope was tested for DNA, I would expect that Danto sealed it himself.
However, one astute reader elsewhere did find a clue in the letter. The words “shouldn’t” and “didn’t” appear as shoudn8t, and didn8t. An 8 instead of an apostrophe. Two number eights as in 88 Stevens.
I would guess the ‘8’ was lazy typing as an apostrophe (I believe) was shift-8 on a lot of older typewriters.
You are correct. The layout of the keys has changed over time, but shift-8 was an apostrophe at one time for typewriters.
Bob
While they’re at it, maybe they can test the four envelopes from Shelden sent after Gerald Richards arrest. The MSP was in possession of them, it’s in their files from that time.
Also from Wolf, Chapter 28, page 178, the tape recorded phone call from a man assumed to be Allen to Dr. Danto on Sunday, April 10, 1977 at 2 pm:
I want (unintelligible) immunity. I want it by tomorrow night I mean tomorrow 9:00 (unintelligible). You be at Seven Mile and Woodward you know where Pony Cart Bar [it was The Gas Station Bar–the author must have felt the need to change this name for the book], you listen to me this only time I’m calling you (unintelligible) but this is what I’m telling you (pause). You be Pony Cart [Gas Station] Bar tomorrow night at 9:00 with letter from governor of Michigan giving me total immunity in return I give you polaroid pictures proving he kill them (pause). That’s all I’m going to say (pause). You be there (pause). Jesus (unintelligible). Seven Mile near Woodward (pause). Be there (unintelligible). Pony Cart [Gas Station] Bar (pause). You be there, no police (pause). I know everybody in there (long pause). You no bring police you be there by yourself (pause). You be there 9:00 tomorrow (pause). No it’s a bar you stu (unintelligible). You be there 9:00 tomorrow (pause). You no bring police I prove he kill them. That’s all I say.
And of course they brought the Police, and they botched it. At least that was what was thought in part of a Royal Oak Tribune article on 12/31/1977:
Botched?
Some investigators who have served on the Task Force staff say it has accomplished little, and others even criticize the way parts of the investigation were handled.
One officer said police “botched” an attempt by Dr. Bruce Danto, M.D., to contact a man calling himself Allen who claimed in a letter and telephone call that he knew the killer and had photos of the children to prove it.
The same article adds additional blame:
State Police
Another officer criticized entrusting command of the Task Force to the State Police.
“State Police believe you are working for them, rather than with them. They also take away your initiative.
“Many of the guys were willing to work extra on their own, but State Police wouldn’t let them.
“Another person and I started a surveillance on our own. but State Police put a stop to it. Tips were about the only thing we were allowed to work on, and most of the tips were B.S.
“I think it is a fair statement to say that many of the good investigators were driven away from the Task Force.”
And before Robertson was told what to say, here were his thoughts from the same article:
Robertson’s Belief
Lt. Robert Robertson of the Michigan State Police, who heads the 22-member team of investigators trying to catch the killer, said:
“I believe he (the killer) is still here. Obviously he doesn’t plan on getting caught,” says Robertson.
“We have no reason to think that he has left. There is no evidence to suggest he has left.
“We’re dealing with a complex individual. There may be people who will agree after we catch him, that there were telltale signs which people just didn’t pick up. This person is sending out signals.”