Obsession, Mistaken Identity, and Collateral Damage

On the afternoon of March 28, 1937, Easter Sunday, Joseph Gedeon and his daughter, Ethel, arrived at the home of Gedeon’s wife, Mary, for a planned Easter dinner. The Gedeon’s had been separated for some time but had agreed to have dinner together as a family, which included their other daughter, Veronica, a moderately successful pulp magazine model. When they entered the apartment, it appeared as though no one was home; however, upon checking the bedroom where his daughter slept, Joseph Gedeon found the nude body of his daughter lying lifeless on the bed and immediately called the police.

During an initial search of the apartment, investigators found the body of Mary Gedeon stuffed under her bed; like her daughter, she had been strangled to death. In a third bedroom, police also found the body of Mary’s boarder, Frank Byrnes, who’d been stabbed several times in the head and neck with a long, thin implement. There was no sign of a forced entry, no sign of a struggle, and nothing appeared to be missing from the apartment. Given that Veronica had been found nude, and Mary was clothed but her underwear had been torn away, investigators assumed the murders were a sex crime.

Still caught in the grip of the Great Depression, New Yorkers welcomed anything that could distract from the unpleasant realities of daily life and the salacious murder of a pulp magazine model—a sex crime, no less—was exactly what they were looking for. The story dominated the press, as reporters and tabloid journalists dug into Veronica’s personal life and dating history and published lurid photos from her past. But when the killer was finally caught and the motive revealed, the story was far stranger and tragic than anyone had imagined.

Thank you to the wonderful David White of the Bring Me the Axe Podcast for research!

References

Brooklyn Daily Eagle. 1937. "Cops question ex-lodger in triple murder." Brooklyn Daily Eagle, March 29: 1.

—. 1937. "Doubts student is killer." Brooklyn Daily Eagle, April 6: 1.

—. 1938. "Irwin's guilty plea." Brooklyn Daily Eagle, November 15: 10.

Buffalo Evening News. 1938. "Irwin, ruled insane, sent to Dannemora." Buffalo Evening News, December 10: 1.

2015. A Crime to Remember. Directed by Jeremiah Crowell. Performed by Jeremiah Crowell.

New York Daily News. 1937. "3 murdered in model's flat." New York Daily News, March 29: 1.

—. 1937. "Gray hair in model's hand chief clue in triple murder." New York Daily News, March 30: 1.

—. 1937. "Willful Ronnie 'made fools of men,' dad says." New York Daily News, March 30: 3.

New York Times. 1938. "139-year sentence imposed on Irwin." New York Times, November 29: 48.

—. 1937. "Fingerprint clues found at scene of triple murder." New York Times, March 31: 1.

—. 1937. "Gedeon gets bail." New York Times, April 3: 1.

—. 1937. "Gedeon questioned again in murders; solution held near." New York Times, April 1: 1.

—. 1937. "Irwin flown here; boasts of killings." New York Times, June 28: 1.

—. 1937. "Irwin, wild-eyed, meets reporters." New York Times, September 1: 20.

—. 1937. "Women jam court to glimpse Irwin." New York Times, Jukly 1: 56.

People v. Robert Irwin. 1938. 166 Misc. 751 (Court of General Sessions of the County of New York, March 24).

Schechter, Harold. 2014. The Mad Sculptor: The Maniac, the Model, and the Murder That Shook the Nation. Boston, MA: New Harvest.

United Press. 1937. "Sculptor hunted as triple killer in Gedeon cases." Buffalo Evening News, April 5: 1.

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