On this day, Jan. 26, 1936, police found the third dismembered victim of the so-called “Mad Butcher,” sending Cleveland into a panic.
The body of Florence Polillo, 42, was discovered in a basket and burlap sacks behind a downtown business. Like the others, she was beheaded and cut with precision.
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The official count is 12 victims between 1935 and ’38, although the lead detective believed the Mad Butcher could have been responsible for more than 40 deaths around Cleveland, Pittsburgh and Youngstown, Ohio.
The victims were usually drifters who lived in Depression-era shanty towns. The Butcher always beheaded his victims. Sometimes the torso was cut in half; in many cases, the cause of death was decapitation itself.
One suspect, a butcher named Frank Dolezal, confessed to killing Polillo. However, he changed his story and killed himself in his cell. Few authorities believed Dolezal was the actual killer.
The true identity of the Mad Butcher remains a mystery.
— Scott McCabe
