Murder Atop The Florist's Shop

In 1933, Harold Wolcott's tumultuous and often abusive relationship with Helen Bendowski ends with his shooting her on the roof of his flower shop after a drunken night of revelry at the Hotel Maryland. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:26

And we are back with another Little Old Murder from Pasadena. I am the historian Elise, and I'm here with my co-host.

SPEAKER_00 0:33

Victor Cass, a retired police sergeant with over 30 years experience all with the Pasadena, California Police Department.

SPEAKER_01 0:41

Today we bring you a story from 1933. One that I I heard of, I think like a year ago, and then got obsessed with it, but couldn't find enough uh newspaper articles on it until recently.

SPEAKER_00 0:59

Yes, and then uh Lise uh struck gold and came up with like 40 articles about this bizarre murder case, which takes place in a part of town. Some of these sites you can still visit today.

SPEAKER_01 1:13

Mm-hmm. But also it's kind of like um an area that's no longer there because it's been replaced by a big modern office building.

SPEAKER_00 1:25

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 1:26

But uh, we're talking about on Colorado Boulevard, there was a Hotel Maryland, a giant hotel, and they had large grounds with like bungalows and cottages and stuff on it. And next to it, because it's Colorado Boulevard, there are several shops. One of them is a florist, Whitford's florist, and next to it is a restaurant, I believe called the Colorado Cafe. Colorado Cafe. Something like that. So on August 13th, or I should say August 12th of 1933, there was a big party at the Hotel Maryland um to celebrate. There are a lot of vets there. I think it was an American Legion.

SPEAKER_00 2:13

Yes, this was an American Legion Convention. Uh these are things the American Legion, uh, which by the way, I think was founded in 1919, uh, just after the First World War. These were mostly World War I veterans, and they would have been uh partying uh the evening of the 12th into the morning of the 13th. And their headquarters for this convention was at the Maryland Hotel, actually. Um sure having a large gala uh in the ballroom or something, and uh everyone in town in this area of town would have known about this party. It would be very loud. Um many of the attendees to this event were firing off firecrackers, fireworks.

SPEAKER_01 2:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 2:55

Um, and it was a very noisy night. Very noisy night in this neighborhood. Today this neighborhood's known as Civic Center, and it's where the Pasadena City Hall is. And on Union Street, you can still see an old portion of the Maryland Hotel today.

SPEAKER_01 3:12

Yeah. Um and right near that old library, too, or the post office.

SPEAKER_00 3:17

The post office, right. The post office on um Garfield there.

SPEAKER_01 3:21

Um right across from Paseo, Colorado.

SPEAKER_00 3:24

That's correct. And the Paseo, Colorado is on the south side of Colorado Boulevard. But like as Elise mentioned, at this time there were some old storefronts that no longer exist. And uh the flora shop's kind of interesting. Uh they said it had a penthouse, but I think some of the even news articles kind of poked fun at that, calling it the so-called penthouse.

SPEAKER_01 3:47

Yeah, it was kind of like a small little area, it's not the penthouse that you would think of, like at the top of a hotel.

SPEAKER_00 3:54

Right.

SPEAKER_01 3:54

Um, so Whitford's Florist Shop was owned by the Whitford family. Um Elder Whitford died, and I think it was then left to his daughter. His daughter was married to Harold Walcott. Yes. And they had a very abusive, tumultuous marriage. Um, he it was often reported that he would like beat on her, and she left him at one point and wrote him out of the will and put, which is interesting, Chief Kelly as the executor of her will.

SPEAKER_00 4:41

So as often happens with in domestic violence cases, often both the suspects naturally and the victims get to know police officers and the police department for whatever reason, um, no doubt because they had had interactions with the police. Um, yeah, this florist owner, the female, did leave Chief Kelly as the uh beneficiary of the will.

SPEAKER_01 5:05

Yeah. Well, maybe they were family friends or something, you know.

SPEAKER_00 5:08

Possibly, yeah. Um but nevertheless, in as Elise points out, this is rather odd. Uh but things took an odd turn for her.

SPEAKER_01 5:19

Yeah, so she she kind of changed her mind because they got back together, and Harold Walcott was being like a perfect little angel.

SPEAKER_00 5:28

Well, she'd gotten sick.

SPEAKER_01 5:29

She was sick. Yeah. And while she was sick, he was a perfect man.

SPEAKER_00 5:33

She stepped up and really took care of her and she felt bad or something.

SPEAKER_01 5:36

And put him back in the will.

SPEAKER_00 5:38

And back in the will to get everything.

SPEAKER_01 5:40

And took Chief Kelly out.

SPEAKER_00 5:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:43

So when she died, I think like the year before this all happens, everything, including Whitford's Florida shop, was left to Harold Walcott. Right. Including the apartment that was right above, it was like a weird multi-level apartment.

SPEAKER_00 6:01

Well, it's a two is a two-story building, and so the floor shop is on the first level. Upstairs is the apartment, and there's a little stairwell that leads to the roof.

SPEAKER_01 6:10

Yeah, but there's also like a strange kitchen up above the roof, too.

SPEAKER_00 6:15

Yeah. So this is the area where you know Wolcott would make his little bachelor pad and you know, call the roof in his upstairs apartment kind of area the penthouse.

SPEAKER_01 6:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:25

Quote unquote.

SPEAKER_01 6:26

And they would go up to that uh kitchen to make drinks, cocktails. This is prohibition era. Oh 1933.

SPEAKER_00 6:36

Yeah, the prohibitions is up getting ready to end soon. It ended in 33, uh, actually. Um, but yeah. Um this is right at the tail end. Um and uh Wolcott, you know, people that are abusive and that have really uh bad relationships with with their partners are usually gonna be that way with whoever they're with.

SPEAKER_04 7:02

Right.

SPEAKER_00 7:03

And um, even though Walcott was married to this florist and and then she died, uh, there was another woman involved with Walcott for a long time.

SPEAKER_01 7:15

Yeah, since like 1921, he had been seeing this other woman, Helen Bendowski. She worked at a beauty parlor in 1933 at this time. But yeah, he had been seeing her, obviously, while he was still married.

SPEAKER_00 7:31

Married, yes.

SPEAKER_01 7:32

Um, things got more serious between Harold and Helen, uh, especially after his wife died. But he also had like a a secret marriage. Like everyone was asking her, why aren't asking him, why aren't you marrying Helen?

SPEAKER_00 7:48

And he would give um Well, that was the florist, was the quote unquote secret marriage. And so this was right before the florist died that he was married to, uh, he was confronted by Helen's family. Um, and hey, why aren't you gonna marry our daughter?

SPEAKER_01 8:05

That's right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 8:07

And so Harold's line or his uh argument was I'm not getting married to anybody because then you gotta pay for 'em.

SPEAKER_01 8:16

Yeah. He didn't want to support a wife.

SPEAKER_00 8:19

Yeah, he didn't want to be uh physically or emotionally responsible for any more wives or women in his life, and he was just gonna continue dating and partying and doing what Harold did best, which is uh drink hard, party hard, and physically abuse women hard.

SPEAKER_01 8:36

Yeah, pretty much. That's the kind of guy he was.

SPEAKER_00 8:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:41

Um, and so the night of this big party at the Hotel Maryland, Helen and Harold Walcott are attending this party. I think he was a World War I veteran.

SPEAKER_00 8:56

Possibly. Um, and who knows if they are if he's in the American Legion or they crashed this party. I'm sure there's people from outside that are coming in and out of this hotel.

SPEAKER_01 9:05

And they're living like right around the corner.

SPEAKER_00 9:07

Yeah, so it's not gonna be a stretch to see why they wouldn't want to go check out the festivities.

SPEAKER_01 9:12

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 9:12

So they're drinking, having fun at the Hotel Maryland, um, or is it fun? Apparently they start arguing.

SPEAKER_01 9:20

They do start arguing, and and they have a friend there who happens to be a Pasadena police officer with a kind of strange name. Maynard Miyedima? Miadima?

SPEAKER_00 9:37

Maynard Medima. Yeah, so he's a Pasadena PD officer. Uh he knows Harold. I guess they're friends, they're buddies, and uh Medima was working on the 12th, and he gets off shift at like 1:30 a. 1.30 a.m. that Sunday morning of the 13th. Um and he went to the Maryland Hotel as well. Uh, who knows if Harold asked him to join them or whether he wanted to see what the festivities were all about himself. Um but uh you know, he goes there, and when Officer Medima gets there, there's a mutual friend who who kind of tells him that, hey, your buddy uh Harold Walcott was here and he was fighting with his girl.

unknown 10:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:22

And uh they kind of, I guess, wanted Officer Medima to kind of like play like peacemaker and kind of intercede with this quarreling couple. But a little kind of little side note here is that she at one point steps away from Harold.

SPEAKER_01 10:37

Yeah, well, his peacemaking efforts work temporarily, but she wants to go. Helen Bandowski wants to go back to the apartment to get some cigarettes. Right. As she is coming back from getting these cigarettes, she says she is attacked in this alleyway that's behind the floral shop that kind of leads to the Hotel Maryland.

SPEAKER_00 11:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:04

And she returns to the party with scratches and marks on her neck.

SPEAKER_00 11:09

Right. Now, Harold being drunk and of course a jealous type, um, probably instantly believes that she was one, doing something she shouldn't have been doing, going down a dark alley, and he also believes that maybe she got involved with some guy that she met on the street.

SPEAKER_01 11:28

Like Yeah, like, oh, were you really attacked, or did you meet someone there, or you must have known who the guy was.

SPEAKER_00 11:35

Right. Um, but there was a witness who did see her kind of get in some kind of scuffle with a man in the alley.

SPEAKER_01 11:42

Yes. So the man who owned the cafe is sitting in the restaurant when he hears her screaming. Right. And he gets up and he runs out into the alleyway and um sees Helen there, and she says that she had been attacked. The guy just ran, took off down the alley when he came to her uh rescue. He didn't see anyone, but he sees that she has like scratches on her throat and all of that.

SPEAKER_00 12:14

Right. So they're already they're already in a bad mood with each other. Um, the fight's gonna continue. They're intoxicated, jealous rages, she's jealous of him, he's angry and jealous of her, and really a lot of their animosity toward one another comes out when they're drinking.

SPEAKER_01 12:34

Yeah. So there have been there were a lot of stories of Walcott being found like drunk, passed out in front of the flores shop, and she's complaining that he's trying to like assault her or kill her.

SPEAKER_00 12:51

At one time he was found outside the shop and uh by a security guard and told the security guard, don't go in my shop, she'll shoot you. Because oftentimes Helen would arm herself with Walcott's gun when she thought that he was going to be violent or beat her up. Um so we already know there's a gun in the mix. Um sometimes she takes the gun, sometimes he has the gun.

SPEAKER_01 13:20

Um but they they do have a history of these fights. A lot of these quarrels. There was one occasion where there was an officer who literally saw him like reach out and try to strike Helen right in front of him, and he stopped him.

SPEAKER_00 13:35

And not just that, the year prior, uh they were both arrested for domestic violence on each other.

SPEAKER_04 13:40

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 13:40

And on the way the police the jail, um, they he cursed her out and they were cursing each other. He even kicked her while they're being booked.

SPEAKER_04 13:47

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 13:47

Um, so this is a very volatile relationship. The police would have known about these two. Um, they both would have had reputations. You know, she is definitely somebody who knows this guy really well. She's known him for a long time. She was super jealous of him. Um, you know, it was alleged that at one time she even snuck into his apartment and hid in a closet, just waiting for him to bring home some other girl, and had once even used an axe to knock down a cabin door in the Arroyo Seiko, believing he had a girl in that cabin. So she was also uh prone to some kind of like violent jealous activity herself.

SPEAKER_01 14:27

So um it But I I do wonder how much of that was told by Harold Walcott, though.

SPEAKER_00 14:36

I mean, all we know of is that the pasting of police had records of them both beating up on each other and getting away. Yeah, they do.

SPEAKER_01 14:43

So they were both definitely violent with each other, and they were often drinking and often fighting with each other.

SPEAKER_00 14:50

Right. So this is one of those almost doomed love affairs where they loved each other so much they hated each other half the time.

SPEAKER_01 14:59

And um I don't think he loved her at all. I think he just hated her.

SPEAKER_00 15:03

Well, yes, but apparently there was some kind of weird his there was something about his mojo that clicked with her mojo because they've been hanging around each other for like twelve or thirteen.

SPEAKER_01 15:11

They had something really toxic going on. Right. I'll say that.

SPEAKER_00 15:14

Um but on the night of the thirteenth.

SPEAKER_01 15:17

Yeah, so after she comes back, she is pissed because Harold is not believing that she was attacked and you know, accusing her of doing these things. And at this point, this little group kind of breaks up. Uh Medima goes to the restaurant to have a bite to eat. I think Helen just takes off somewhere and Harold is walking or going around trying to find her, find where she went.

SPEAKER_00 15:51

Right. They end up back at Harold's apartment.

SPEAKER_01 15:54

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 15:55

Medima also goes to Harold's apartment.

SPEAKER_01 15:59

Yes. While he was in the cafe, there was a woman, I think she was working there at the cafe that day, Zelda Smith.

SPEAKER_00 16:07

Yes, Zelda Smith, 24 years old. Uh, she obviously has some kind of relationship with Officer Medima. Maybe they're friends, maybe they're lovers, who knows what's going on between the two. But he takes her with him to Harold's apartment.

SPEAKER_01 16:22

Yeah, and the idea was to go to the party at the Hotel Maryland. She had just gotten off her shift, but you know, she had been hearing the party all night and she wanted to go and dance and have fun.

SPEAKER_02 16:34

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 16:35

Um, but they go to Harold's first.

SPEAKER_02 16:38

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 16:39

Because Harold called the cafe asking to speak to Medima, saying that Helen was missing. He couldn't find her, thinks that Helen stole his car and took off.

SPEAKER_00 16:52

Right. Now, keep in mind, by this time, we're nearing the 4 o'clock, 4 a.m., 5 a.m. hour. This party's going on all night at the Maryland. These American legionnaires are really like yucking it up and have having a ruckus over there. And so, you know, the fact that these people are all kind of still up and still wanting to drink and have fun and dance, um, kind of describes what kind of night this is or morning that this is shaping up to be. So Medima and his date, Zelda Smith, they go to Harold's apartment.

SPEAKER_01 17:26

Mm-hmm. And this part gets a little confusing because these people will change their story of what happened multiple times.

SPEAKER_00 17:35

Right.

SPEAKER_01 17:35

So at first, Medima says that he and Harold entered the apartment like basically, yeah, together at the same time. And they hear shots ring out. Right. And so Harold is the first to the roof, and then he turns around and tells Medima she shot herself.

SPEAKER_00 17:58

Right. This is really weird for Medima, who's a Pasnia police officer. You know, a lot of ways, you know. Look, that was my department too. I work there. We know how to conduct ourselves off-duty or on duty. Medima does some weird stuff. You know, uh, he has his gun with him.

SPEAKER_02 18:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:16

But for whatever reason, he has this personal policy where if there's drinking going on, he's gonna take his gun, empty it of its bullets, hide it, or put it somewhere. I don't know why he doesn't just have it on a holster under his clothes. Yeah, like why don't you just off-duty cards?

SPEAKER_04 18:30

Make sure it stays on your purse in your hands.

SPEAKER_00 18:32

Yeah, exactly. Um, and who knows how close these two officer Medima and Harold are, but the fact that Medima would even consider like lying for him or changing his story around or trying to like support this guy, knowing that the police are gonna get called.

SPEAKER_01 18:52

Well, he might have just been caught up in this, not knowing how the night was going to unfold for Helen and Harold. But yeah, he does end up going to the apartment, and um, you know, the at first Medima is saying that Harold is claiming that Helen is on the roof, and quote, she's up here, she's angry at me, and she's liable to kill us all. She's waving the gun all around.

SPEAKER_00 19:21

Right, which is a little different than the first story of them going there and just hearing the shot.

SPEAKER_01 19:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 19:26

Um, so what come to find out? They were all there for a little while, Zelda Smith, Medima, he's making drinks.

SPEAKER_02 19:35

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 19:36

They're he they know that he's fighting with Helen. Yeah. They know Helen's and him are fighting, going back and forth between the apartment and the roof. And at one point, as Medima later admits, Harold's out of view.

SPEAKER_01 19:48

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 19:49

When the shots ring out.

SPEAKER_01 19:50

Yes, and and where we don't even really know where Helen is. We don't see much of her. Zelda's kind of sitting on the couch, waiting for drinks. They're mixing some drinks in the kitchen while this is going on. And then the shots go off, and so when Zelda gets to tell her her story, she says she heard one shot, and then Medima comes rushing to her saying, We better get out of here. So she freaks and she runs downstairs, but she runs downstairs to an exit that is locked. So she runs back up, and when she runs back up, she overhears Medima and uh Harold kind of talking to each other. She hears Medima asking Harold, where did she get that gun?

SPEAKER_00 20:44

Right.

SPEAKER_01 20:45

And then she overhears Harold asking Medima to stick by him.

SPEAKER_00 20:52

Right. Don't leave, stick by me. Another weird thing that Officer Medima does is he starts using his handkerchief to like wipe off surfaces like the door handle and a glass, like as he doesn't want to leave any of his fingerprints around or someone else's fingerprints.

SPEAKER_01 21:07

But I mean Yeah, he's she sees a hanky in his hand and he's using this hanky to open the door for her and let her out.

SPEAKER_00 21:13

Yeah, so who knows if he's hoping brushing her out.

SPEAKER_01 21:16

And he's telling her, we find out later, he gave her a coin and said basically, just get out of here and like forget everything that you saw and heard.

SPEAKER_00 21:24

Yeah. Um again, bizarre behavior by the cop. Um, it's not gonna sit well with Chief Kelly. No. And uh after the gunfire, Medima goes up to the roof with Harold.

SPEAKER_01 21:38

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 21:39

And lo and behold, poor Helen's lying on the ground.

SPEAKER_01 21:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:44

With a bullet hole through her chest.

SPEAKER_01 21:45

Yeah, there was a skylight up on the roof, and they he said that he saw her lying dead by that uh skylight. And so when the police arrive, that's where they find her. Right. And they find the Gun by her foot, like a foot away from her foot.

SPEAKER_00 22:04

Keep in mind she's wearing a fur coat. Um, she still has all her clothes. It would have been a little cold or chilly that night.

SPEAKER_01 22:09

Uh-huh. Um, and her shoes on too.

SPEAKER_00 22:13

So Harold's story to the police is this was a suicide.

SPEAKER_01 22:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:17

Okay. Now I was telling Elise here that that story is gonna be debunked within like 10 minutes of the police getting there uh uh in a situation like this, and they're gonna instantly uh look at Harold as the suspect.

SPEAKER_04 22:28

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 22:29

Yeah. Um, and you know, just the fact that, you know, there's no powder burns on her fur coat uh also tends to dispel the notion that she pointed the gun at herself and fired it.

SPEAKER_01 22:39

Yeah, and even when it comes to the trial, they had her sister-in-law dress up in all of her clothes because they were the same size, and she was trying to show uh like point the gun where it would have been pointed had she killed herself, trying to show like how impossible it would have been for her to kill herself.

SPEAKER_00 22:59

Yes. Um so yeah, the police instantly know this is a murder investigation, they got the detectives there.

SPEAKER_01 23:07

Um The other odd thing, by the way, is there's you know, he says that she killed herself. She has one gun shot through her chest, but there are three shells on the floor. Right. And not just that, but they are spread out like all over the roof. They're not just like concentrated to one location. So it's like was she like being chased as she shot her?

SPEAKER_00 23:33

That's kind of what I thought, too. That maybe the first two rounds missed and he got her with a third round. Um again, heated fighting, yelling, gunplay, and she's dead.

SPEAKER_01 23:45

Yeah. And then they do a paraffin test, too, right? The detectives Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 23:50

There was no powder, there was no any nothing on her her fingers or hands, or you know, that would have said that um she was the one who pulled the trigger. Yeah, oddly enough, speaking about the gun, it was wiped clean.

SPEAKER_04 24:02

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 24:02

So detectives saw immediately they found a rag that had some smudges on it. The gun's wiped clean.

SPEAKER_01 24:08

They found that hidden in the bathroom, kind of like folded up and put like back in between a set of towels, like they're trying to hide it.

SPEAKER_00 24:16

Yeah. So the case goes to court, the defense is obviously interested in portraying this as a suicide. Well, even though they hadn't bought it up yet, that's where they were going with this.

SPEAKER_03 24:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:30

Like he my client didn't do it. This is all her doing. And as Elise pointed out, you know, they bring in witnesses to testify to this point or that one. They even had a demonstration uh where they fired a gun into a coat to show what kind of burns it would leave. Um, you know, again pointing to the fact that this couldn't have been a suicide.

SPEAKER_01 24:50

Yeah. Um and I think Kelly even said like nine times out of ten it would have shown like powder marks or burn marks if she had killed herself.

SPEAKER_00 25:01

Right. The bullet was a through and through wound, it did go through her and hit a wall uh behind her and landed on the ground.

SPEAKER_01 25:08

And the weird thing about this is that there are other people who hear the gunshots. Um there's a police officer in the restaurant who hears two shots fired, but he's not sure that they're gunshots. He thinks that maybe it could be like a car backfiring or partiers at the hotel.

SPEAKER_00 25:33

Yes, because they have been hearing, as we mentioned earlier, fireworks going off all night. So this could it's that can definitely confuse people. Yeah. Is that gunshots or was it part of the fireworks?

SPEAKER_01 25:43

Yeah. But it's um kind of a funny moment in this because you know he continues to eat his meal and then he hears ambulances and he's like, Oh shit, I better get up and do something about this. Realizing that it was gunshots, you know.

SPEAKER_00 25:57

Yeah. You know, and of course, during the trial, Helen's relatives come in and they speak to her disposition. Look, she was happy, she was excited. Um, kind of also pointing to the fact that she wasn't some depressed suicidal person.

SPEAKER_01 26:12

Because that's what uh the defense was trying to say. Walcott's lawyers were trying to like throw out like every instance that she was depressed or like could it could be interpreted as suicidal. They're trying to make it seem like, yeah, she definitely killed herself, and she had been wanting to kill herself for a long time. But her family, as you're saying, says no, that's just not true.

SPEAKER_00 26:37

Right. And this this this trial, by the way, was kind of quite a sensation at the time. I mean, the media was following this trial closely, courtrooms were always packed with spectators, even um, and the jury was mostly women.

SPEAKER_01 26:52

Yeah, I think it was uh like ten women.

SPEAKER_00 26:55

Yeah, that's kind of an unusual jury mix for a case like this in 1933.

SPEAKER_01 27:02

It was, and it was like the I think one of the first decades that women actually could serve on a jury in California. So it is interesting.

SPEAKER_00 27:11

You know, and like a lot of these kind of murder trials, they would take the jury and take them to the locations where the body was found, so they would kind of take them on little field trips.

SPEAKER_01 27:20

Um yeah, they took them up to the roof of the floor. Yeah, the roof, the penthouse and the apartment.

SPEAKER_00 27:26

And you can find photos about that online as at least as Elise did.

SPEAKER_01 27:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 27:31

You did a very good deep dive on this one.

SPEAKER_01 27:33

Yeah, I found a lot of photos. This, as you said, was very heavily publicized.

SPEAKER_00 27:37

Yeah. Now, Elise and I were talking about this because I know that Elise kind of she was a little up in arms about this. A little? Harold was convicted.

SPEAKER_01 27:48

Of manslaughter.

SPEAKER_00 27:50

Right. And Elise asked me about that, and I said, Look, it's not that crazy to see how they got a manslaughter conviction. Long history of a tumultuous relationship, they're arguing the night of gunfire. They're gonna portray, it's gonna be seen as heat of the moment. So it's gonna be a hard sell to get a jury believe that this was first degree murder with malice aforethought, that it was planned beforehand. Everything points to we were drunk, I was pissed, I shot her. And that's the reason for the manslaughter conviction, but at least wasn't very happy.

SPEAKER_01 28:26

I hear that. I just disagree because he was going around literally telling people that he's looking for Helen and he's gonna get to the bottom of things. He's pissed off, he has this history of beating the crap out of her.

SPEAKER_00 28:43

Yes, but it is just a history of beating the crap out of her, not a history of attempted murder on her life.

SPEAKER_01 28:47

But he's looking for her, he's talking like, oh, maybe uh Medima double-crossed me and and he's the one that she encountered in the alley. Or she went, she knew who the attacker was.

SPEAKER_00 28:59

None of those things point to he was gonna murder her.

SPEAKER_01 29:02

Oh, he was looking for her to kill her.

SPEAKER_00 29:04

He was looking for her to be pissed at her and yell and fight with her, is probably what the jury heard and what they believed. Um the other thing that was interesting is he only got ten years. Uh but I mean this foundation.

SPEAKER_01 29:17

Okay, so that's what your that's the sentencing for manslaughter, right?

SPEAKER_00 29:20

No more than at this time, clearly the guidelines said that this guy's gonna get 10 years for manslaughter.

SPEAKER_01 29:26

But they said that usually the term is like six years about six years.

SPEAKER_00 29:31

But what did you find out?

SPEAKER_01 29:33

I found an article from 1937 that said that he was about to be released on parole.

SPEAKER_00 29:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 29:41

And his date to be released was in 1938.

SPEAKER_00 29:44

Uh so he didn't even do the ten years.

SPEAKER_01 29:46

He did five years for murdering Helen. Five years.

SPEAKER_00 29:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 29:52

Tell me, how does that how how do you take someone's life and only go to prison for five years?

SPEAKER_00 29:59

Don't get people started on that. Stuff like that happens today, even gangsters shooting people and uh not even doing five or ten years for murder.

SPEAKER_01 30:06

Something needs to be done. Anyway, this is me up in arms.

SPEAKER_00 30:11

Yeah. I thought at least might get a little heated on this topic on this podcast episode. Um, what about Medima? What happened to Medima at the Pasadena PD?

SPEAKER_01 30:20

Okay, so Chief Kelly was really pissed at his behavior. He was pissed, first off, that Helen came back to him at Hotel Maryland with scratches on her throat, and he didn't immediately go report it and do something about it. Right. And then it comes out that he's like he later goes to court and tells the truth about everything. But at the beginning, he was trying to help.

SPEAKER_00 30:47

He withheld, he withheld uh incriminating eyewitness testimony.

SPEAKER_01 30:51

Yeah, he's trying to get Zelda out to not saying anything. He's wiping helping wipe the body.

SPEAKER_00 30:57

Chief Kelly was pissed about that, and um obviously Officer Medima gets investigated by the Palestinian PD.

SPEAKER_01 31:04

But he was immediately taken off of the forest. Right, suspended. He was arrested for some time. They let him out, I think, right before the inquest was to start because they wanted his testimony. Um I don't think he testified then, but then later he he told all he went on the stand and and spilled the beans and told the truth.

SPEAKER_00 31:24

You know, but uh yeah, he got fired.

SPEAKER_01 31:26

Yeah. And so the next we hear of him, he's washing dishes at a cafe.

SPEAKER_00 31:31

Yeah. Kind of an ignominious in for an otherwise uh promising police career.

unknown 31:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 31:38

Um for all young officers out there listening, tell the truth, don't hide stuff, don't try to support your buddy and lose your job and your pension and everything.

SPEAKER_01 31:47

So here's one of the crazy things for me is you know, like Zelda said she heard one gunshot, and then the other people said that they heard two shots. So, like, how is that possible? And you keep reading these articles and you find that some of the detectives think that Helen might have already been dead at the apartment when Zelda and Medima showed up there. That Harold Walcott had already shot her and then was trying to cover everything up by like acting like he was looking for her and couldn't find her and calling uh Medima to the apartment. Yeah, but they're saying she Zel Helen had her shoes on. Had she really been running up there on the roof, they would have heard her.

SPEAKER_00 32:39

Well, yes and no. Uh keep in mind there's loud partying, there's fireworks. In fact, the policeman even testified that was eating in the cafe that when he heard the shots, he noted the time. You know, so they kind of placed the time around, which matches up with the coroner's, you know, ability to estimate when she was killed. Um, you know, the body was still warm by the time the police were there. So most likely it it is the way it kind of was told that he probably chased her, fired a couple of shots at her, and hit her with the third one. You know. Um that's my theory as to what happened. Why the why the shell casings were found spaced apart and why she still had her shoes on because she'd probably just had just been there.

SPEAKER_01 33:18

Zelda was right there though. She heard only one gunshot.

SPEAKER_00 33:22

It was probably the shot that you know. Again, there's fireworks. Because again, that police officer that was eating testified that he thought there was fireworks. So we may never know the truth as to that part about it was. Um, all we know is that the third shot or one of those shots killed her.

SPEAKER_01 33:40

Yeah. And I don't know if that theory was told in court, but they were talking about it in the newspapers. And um, well, their theory was that yeah, he had shot Helen earlier up on the roof, and then later fired off another two rounds to be like, oh, she shot herself, and that was pretending that was when she shot herself. Yeah. But yeah, I agree. Your your version does make a little more sense than than that.

SPEAKER_00 34:07

I remember uh this episode, Elise alluded to the fact that this episode first caught her attention or the story a year ago. And I remember back then her trying to find and pinpoint the exact location where this florist shop would have been, using photos of Yeah, because you could see City Hall in the background of it. Um but yeah, for today, if you wanted to kind of walk around a Civic Center neighborhood, you know, you could walk past the last vestiges of the hotel Maryland. You could walk down by City Hall on Union Street and kind of see the block where this storefront would have been on the north side of the boulevard. Yeah. You know, maybe that's maybe there's a uh TikTok, or do you know and about this coming up?

SPEAKER_01 34:50

Yeah, there could be.

SPEAKER_00 34:53

Anyway, we are what one episode away from the end of season two?

SPEAKER_01 34:56

Yes. So our last episode of the season will be next week, and that is up to you. So bring us a good finale. All right. And we will see you next week for another Little Old Murder from Pasadena.