The 12-year-old daughter of a prominent Los Angeles banker is kidnapped and later beheaded.
Marion Parker was abducted from her school, and her father, Perry Parker, soon received ransom letters, each signed with names “Fate,” “Death,” and “The Fox.” Parker agreed to pay $1,500,and went to hand the money to a young man in a parked car. Marion was in the passenger seat. But as soon as the money exchanged hands, the suspect drove off and dumped Marion out of the car. She was dead. Her legs had been chopped off and her eyes had been wired open. Her internal organs had been cut out.
Suspicion settled upon Ed Hickman, a former Parker employee who had been arrested earlier for stolen and forged checks.
Hickman confessed, “Marion and I were good friends, and we really had a good time when we were together and I really liked her. I’m sorry that she was killed.” He was convicted and hanged at San Quentin State Prison in 1928.
