NBC interview, April, 2002 | Chicago column by Michael Miner | Background from Centre on Wrongful Convictions, Northwestern University law school |

A book by Delores Kennedy, written after many years of research brought attention to the case of the "Lipstick Killer". This tag was completely invented by a Chicago newspaper reporter. A cry for help was scrawled in lipstick on a brick wall, photographed and attributed to him. So gruesome were the murders and hysterical the public reaction that Heirens, at 17, bargained his knowledge he was innocence for his life. Bill Kurtis' Investigative Report has done an hour show on this case which everyone should see. It leaves no doubt about the power of the press to do harm. See Shannon Murrin where 50 years later the media conspired with a bad cop and a lazy prosecutor to smear an innocent man.

'Lipstick Killer' fights for freedom

Duncan Campbell in Los Angeles Friday April 5, 2002 The Guardian

A man who has spent 56 years in jail in what his lawyers describe as "one of the grossest miscarriages of justice in the history of the US" could finally be freed. A new investigation into the case of the man known as the Lipstick Killer indicates that the evidence against him was fabricated by detectives.

William Heirens was a 17-year-old University of Chicago student when he confessed to three murders, one of them that of a six-year-old child. He was injected with a "truth serum" and given a spinal tap after which he confessed in a plea bargain that would spare him a death sentence. His confession was published in the Chicago Tribune before he had actually made it.

His case has been taken up by the Northwestern University Centre on Wrongful Convictions which has a high success rate in having suspect verdicts overturned.

Josephine Ross, a housewife, was stabbed to death in her apartment in 1945. Later that year, Frances Brown was shot dead and the words "For heaven's sake, catch me before I kill more - I cannot control myself" were found written in lipstick on her wall. Then the child, Suzanne Degnan, was kidnapped, strangled and dismembered. A ransom note demanding money for her was found. There was enormous pressure on the police to solve the case.

The new investigation indicates that neither the ransom note nor the lipstick confession were written by Heirens. A fingerprint found in Brown's apartment is alleged to have been placed there by police.

Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2002

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