Talk:Boston Strangler

Old discussion
He died on November 25, and was found on November 26 in his cell.

While "Unsolved Mysteries" suggests there was another killer, & deSalvo knew him, the book The Boston Strangler (1968?) mentions the first (or first 3) vics were all in their 60s, while later ones were in their 20s. It may not be a rule, but cert rule of thumb among profilers

Isn't it true that Roy Smith was convicted of a murder that they only now credit to the Boston Strangler? A writer and reporter from Belmot, Mass., has a book on this, in fact.

Here is an excerpt from a 1963 Time article on this woman...


 * Bessie Goldberg, 62, wife of a real estate man, lay on the living-room floor of her Dutch-colonial home in Belmont, a well-to-do Boston suburb. Around her neck was a nylon stocking that had been stripped from her left leg. She was dead. Headlined the Boston Herald: HOUSEWIFE TENTH STRANGLE VICTIM.The ten women, all from the Boston area, have been strangled in the past nine months, throwing the city into panic. The Animal Rescue League cannot keep up with the demand for watchdogs. Hardware stores report a run on chain locks. Detectives have combed the dossiers of more than 2,000 known sex offenders.... Thenewsgeek 23:32, 24 March 2006 (UTC)


 * It's sort of true, and it's worth including in the article. CNN has a story today on this subject here. | Mr. Darcy talk 00:18, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

This article is terrible
F. Lee Bailey's book THE DEFENSE NEVER RESTS was published in 1971, not 1995. Why such a long mention of a psychic and no mention of Brooke's political ambitions and how they may have effected his handling (i.e. the "solving" of the case)? Why isn't the place of DeSavlo's alleged 1964 assault mentioned? This is a really bad article. Why? Shemp Howard, Jr. (talk) 02:26, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Putting DeSalvo's vital statistics in the article is unconscionable
The Boston Strangler murders are unsolved. And I can't think of anyone other than Bailey (and what source that is) that would contend that De Savlo is the strangler, or even that there was one strangler. Putting DeSalvo's vital statistics in the article is unconscionable as it violates the policy against having a neutral point of view. Shemp Howard, Jr. (talk) 02:26, 27 June 2012 (UTC) Shemp Howard, Jr. (talk) 02:26, 27 June 2012 (UTC)


 * I (partially) agree. DeSalvo has never been proven to be the Boston Strangler.  His claim to be the actual murderer is widely accepted with skepticism.  In any event, it is highly contentious and controversial.  Many in law enforcement believe that the Boston Strangler murders were actually the work of several different murderers (not one man).  DeSalvo's name and information should not be in the info box in this article.  That is highly misleading; it would lead a reader to believe that DeSalvo is in fact the Boston Strangler, a claim hotly disputed and highly in doubt.   Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 04:22, 31 December 2013 (UTC)

Move
I have reverted the move of this page. Please discuss the move before doing it. Thanks!--Kungfu Adam (talk) 23:05, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

I think this should be merged with the article on Albert DeSalvo. The two articles are basically the same and I just fixed a redirect which sent "Albert Desalvo" to this article, so people are obviously mixing them already. Gregory j 01:03, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

Request for Comments
This is a request for comments regarding the article. Substantial evidence has shown that Albert DeSalvo was NOT the Boston Strangler, nor a serial killer at all. I don't think it is appropriate to portray him as such, as the first sentence of the article does, nor to have "Boston Strangler" redirect to "Albert DeSalvo".

Oblyvia 08:47, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Could you please provide links or sources to this evidence? Hominidx 16:45, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Yep. http://www.unsolved.com/0216-Strangler.html : Explains that DNA proved he did not kill Mary Sullivan, the Strangler's 11th victim.

http://www.crimelibrary.com/serial_killers/notorious/boston/14.html : Explains that several people who saw the strangler before a killing could not identify DeSalvo. In fact, every witness failed to even claim to recognize DeSalvo in a photograph.

http://www.crimelibrary.com/serial_killers/notorious/boston/15.html : Explains that the only survivor of the attacks identified George Nassar, DeSalvo's jail mate, as possibly being the man who attacked her, but was absolutely positive DeSalvo was not the man. She described her attacker as slender with sharp, thin features and honey-colored hair. DeSalvo was a large man with large features and black hair. Another witness said the exact same thing--that Nassar was possibly the man she saw, but DeSalvo was definitely not.

The book "The Boston Stranglers" by Susan Kelly provides a near complete transcript of Desalvo's confession, and points out the blatant errors in his descriptions. Interviews with the Boston Police Department lead to the conclusion that not only do the police not believe DeSalvo was the strangler, they also do not believe that any single person was. Too many differences in victim choice, MO and crime scene evidence force anyone with knowledge of serial killers to conclude there were at least 3 seperate killers at work. Oblyvia 05:43, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Parts of his confession are inconsistent but he was never cleared of all charges or found innocent in all murders attributed to the Boston Strangler, so language like "cracked the case" and "Showed that he was not the Boston Strangler" is inappropriate.

When a known rapist confesses to crimes and backs some of these claims up with knowledge only the killer should have, it takes more than an "expose" by some lady to exhonorate him. Witnesses not identifying the culprit, police suspecting someone else and the confessed possibly claiming other people's work as their own (which isn't all that uncommon) does not "prove" the innocence of a man that died claiming to be guilty, especially in an encyclopedia.

Unless it's been proven (not suggested or speculated) that he didn't kill any of the victims attributed to the BS, then he is the Boston Strangler. He seems to have killed at least 2 of the victims and no one else has been convicted of the other crimes. Perhaps you should reword to say he most likely didn't kill all, or possibly any (though I find this a stretch) of the supposed BS victims as he claimed, but stating emphatically that he is not the Boston Strangler and that this has been proven is misleading. 68.166.68.84 22:13, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

I agree ... though there were discrepancies in the confessions there were also a lot of accuracies not all of which had been made public. So he either got these from 'the real strangler' ( many speculate that it could have been his cell mate George Nassar) or he was the strangler for at least some of the attributed murders. Confessing to additional crimes that he may not have committed ( not unusual for killers who may want to use insanity as a defence) does not show that he didn't commit any of the crimes. In my view there are just too many co -incidences to declare Desalvo innocent of all the murders. The fact that he does not fit the pattern that behavioural profilers expect for a serial killer is also not a convincing reason to show innocence .. it is not an exact science. Doctorpete 10:13, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

In relation to whether to merge "Boston Strangler" with Albert de Salvo's biography, I disagree. Many people forget the name of the accused, but the phrase "The Boston Strangler" is ingrained in the American (and other nationalities) mind.

Herminio Flores, Ph. D. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2602:306:BCEC:5750:3CD2:853A:2436:C274 (talk) 23:21, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

Edits to victims
Seems there has been a huge amount of vandalism to the victims section, spanning several months. Someone care to get a verified list of the actual victims names?

yes there has! I have now reverted the list back to the original which the police believed to be correct at the end of their investigations.... until an official investigation shows it to be incorrect then I feel we have to stick to it. Doctorpete 11:10, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

I have now also added in the two missing alleged victims to complete the 13.Doctorpete 09:05, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

Conflict of interest
A major issue exists with the addition of material by User:Csherman1 who, by inclusion of information regarding his own involvement in case, both on this page as well as the autobiography page he created (Casey sherman), stands to profit from mention in the article from sales of books that were included in the autobiography page. In addition, no citations or references are given for any of the material he has added. A POV issue also exists because of the wording used in the additions. For example, Casey Sherman led a high profile crusade, It was considered the Holy Grail in the case, Sherman then forged an unlikely alliance, etc. The subject of Sherman's involvement is already included in the article in a more neutral, less stellar manner in the following paragraph. This isn't a forum for self-promotion. I am removing his contribution for the second time and have tagged the article for conflict of interest. If necessary, I can open a CoI inquiry. Wildhartlivie (talk) 23:55, 3 February 2008 (UTC) I have added another victim thought to be connected with the Boston Strangler found in mysterious way.

? previously unknown victim
There has been the name 'Paula Lepro' added to the victim list ...... ? who was this .. I have not seen that name mentioned anywhere in the literature till now. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Doctorpete (talk • contribs) 13:22, 1 June 2012 (UTC)

DNA link
This CNN report may be of interest. Roger Davies talk 07:08, 12 July 2013 (UTC)

Remove infobox?
Since there's already a WP:BIO article about DeSalvo, and the consensus seems to be that the two articles should not be merged, I'd like to suggest making this article less biography-like and more obviously an article about a series of crimes which may have been committed by more than one person. For starters, I'd like to suggest removing the Infobox from this article, since (1) it makes it look like a bio of DeSalvo (and I don't know of an appropriate Infobox template for a series of crimes); and (2) the DeSalvo article has its own "murderer" Infobox, and if these things are being counted, that's misleading. Any objections? --Rosekelleher (talk) 14:20, 8 February 2015 (UTC)


 * I commented it out, hope that's okay. These two articles are so intertwined it's hard to know where to put what. Seems to me the DeSalvo article should be less about the case (with some of that info transferred here) and more about his early life and so on. --Rosekelleher (talk) 21:40, 8 February 2015 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just added archive links to 1 one external link on Boston Strangler. Please take a moment to review my edit. You may add after the link to keep me from modifying it, if I keep adding bad data, but formatting bugs should be reported instead. Alternatively, you can add to keep me off the page altogether, but should be used as a last resort. I made the following changes:
 * Attempted to fix sourcing for http://www.trutv.com/library/crime/serial_killers/notorious/boston/21.html

When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true or failed to let others know (documentation at ).

Cheers.—cyberbot II  Talk to my owner :Online 04:58, 30 March 2016 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 2 external links on Boston Strangler. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.time.com/time/printout/0%2C8816%2C839437%2C00.html
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20061027133814/http://www.charliemanson.com/crime/desalvo.htm to http://www.charliemanson.com/crime/desalvo.htm

When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.

Cheers.— InternetArchiveBot  (Report bug) 22:08, 23 July 2017 (UTC)

Did police think it was all one person or not?
Under the “Events” section it first says (unsourced) that “police believe that one man was the perpetrator”, but later says police were unconvinced. Does anyone have reliable sources either way? Or that indicates police views changed over time? IllQuill (talk) 03:09, 23 April 2020 (UTC)