True Crime Stories

When I got up this morning and knew this was the day in which I would blog I kept feeling a pull to do this case.  I tried resisting a bit because this case has always bothered me.  It is not just that it involves the death of a child, which is always difficult to do but in all of the interviews and shows I have seen on this case it was Jessica's father, Mark, and her grandparents, Ruth and Archie that seemed to pull at my heart more than a lot of cases.  It is not that I do not have sympathy for people who have lost children, quite the contrary but these particular people just had a hold of sorts over me.  Once I finally decided there was no sense in trying to talk myself out of doing this case I started my research thinking it would be a fairly easy and quick case.  Boy, was I ever wrong. First, this case required more research than a lot of cases simply because there was so much on the crime itself that I had to dig deeper for other answers of things and it s...

Just like many of these old cases, after researching I am left with many questions and inconsistencies that have been reported over the years. This case is no different.   The short, quick facts of this case is that a 12 year old girl, Marian Parker, the daughter of a prominent Los Angeles banker, Perry Parker, was kidnapped from her school on December 15, 1927.  Her kidnapper was 19 year old William Edward Hickman.  Four days later after her father delivered the demanded ransom, Hickman delivered him his daughter, who was now dead and dismembered.  After a manhunt that lasted just a few more days Hickman was arrested, tried and convicted.  He was hung at the gallows at San Quentin prison on October, 19, 1928. On December 15, 1927 William Edward Hickman went to Marian's school telling the principal that her father had either become ill or was in an accident (reports vary) and he was to fetch her.  Hickman did not know that Marian had a tw...