19 Investigates has uncovered a new push to identify victims of one of Cleveland’s most infamous serial killers.
For nearly 90 years, the “Torso Murders” have remained unsolved, and most of the killer’s victims have not been identified.
In an exclusive interview with 19 Investigates, Dr. Thomas Gilson, Cuyahoga County’s Chief Medical Examiner, confirmed his office is teaming up with
DNA Doe Project in a new effort to identify victims of the 1930s cold case murders.
Over four years in the mid-to-late 1930s, someone murdered and dismembered more than a dozen people in Cleveland and dumped their bodies across the city’s east side.
Over and over, these horrifying discoveries were made across the area known as Kingsbury Run.
Many times only a torso was recovered.
“At this time, you know, this is in the middle of the Great Depression. There are a lot of transient people moving around the country, high unemployment,” Dr. Gilson said.
According to police, Edward Andrassy and Florence Pollilo were the only victims who could be positively identified through their fingerprints.
Another woman, Rose Wallace, was tentatively ID’d from dental records.
But for nearly 90 years, the identities of the torso killer’s other victims have remained a mystery, buried in unmarked graves in a potter’s field.
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