FBI agents search the home of John Graham, suspected in the explosion of a United Airlines plane shortly after it took off from Denver on Nov. 1, killing all 44 people aboard.
Graham’s mother, Daisie King, was one of the flight’s passengers. Her carry-on bag contained a newspaper clipping about Graham, who had been involved in forgery and theft. FBI agents interviewed Graham and his wife, who said her husband had placed a gift-wrapped package in his mother’s luggage just before taking her to the airport. Graham denied it, but a search of his home turned up a small roll of copper wire and a life insurance policy on King, naming Graham as the beneficiary.
Graham confessed to planting a bomb in his mother’s luggage, telling agents he had taken a job in an electronics store to learn how to construct the bomb, which included 25 pounds of dynamite.
He later retracted his confession, but a jury found him guilty of murder in a televised trial. He was executed in the gas chamber in January 1957.
