Forest for the Trees

Perhaps no subject is of greater importance than the end-game. By this, I mean what the out-come was supposed to be. You can’t just go on torturing someone. Well, you can. But it’s hard to do when the doors are unlocked all the time. It’s also very difficult, nigh impossible, to continue doing this when you know the parents will be knocking on the door. They’ll want to see her. It will be a Herculean task to explain her condition; especially if she is dead. Knowing the actual, honest to reality, end-game is very difficult. It might in fact be impossible, like having a good excuse for the parents for the dreadful condition for their daughter. One can see the different visions of the end-game in the testimony of the different people who were there; especially the guilty. The problem is, the end-game varies, and ultimately the conclusion might have to be that the end-game wasn’t what many people think it is. It might be very different. 

The comments I make here are rather controversial..for me at any rate, and probably for anyone who might, unfortunately, find themselves reading the words of someone who so doesn’t understand this case...me. I should say that I am most interested in what can be gleaned from what the characters in the great melodrama have to say. Finding the truth, if there is any, and there is, whether it can be teased out will require, as Monsieur Poirot would say, using the “little gray cells.” It’s too bad that he wasn’t in Indiana in 1965, as I’m sure that he would tease out the truth in short order. It’s too bad that he’s not here right now. If so, he would tell me to keep my words to myself, seeing how I actually have very few little gray cells to employ. So the comments made here are in no way being held out as the truth, or a solution, or anything with any authority whatsoever. I merely think out loud. Commenting on interesting things observed, or said by those involved. Interesting things pointed out, especially by dilatants and armchair sleuths who know too little, or just enough, to muddle things up even more, are usually wrong. Wrong in the sense of what really transpired. So, if anyone reads this, please feel free to disregard any or all of it.

One thing about lying, or better yet, being good at it, is not including details that can be qualified. In other words, the more vague you make your lies, the less likely you can be proved to be lying. For example, you don’t tell someone that you put her in Juvenile detention. That can be confirmed or proven false- fairly easily. You also want to make sure that if you tell the truth, it isn’t one that can come back on you. For example, you don’t want to say that you kicked a 16 year old girl, who isn’t your child anyway, out of the house. If she turns up in less than an ideal state, you’ve made yourself legally responsible for what became of her. You say something like: “She ran off! She ran away! I haven’t seen her since she did.” The devil is in the details; and it would seem that the devil was all over the place in Indianapolis in 1965. What is more, details are fascinating. And no more than in one version of the end-game. I cite the following testimony:

Q. Did you ever hear Mrs. Baniszewski say she was going to take Sylvia anyplace?
A. Yes, she said she was going to blindfold her and dump her, take her to Jimmy's Forest, two miles out.
Q. Jimmy's Forest?
A. Yes.
Q. When did this conversation take place?
A. About the night before she died.
Q. Who was present?
A. Me, Sylvia and Johnny and Gertrude and Shirley. I think that is all.
Q. What was said then, Jenny?
A. Well, I had nightclothes on and Gertrude told me to go upstairs and get dressed, she said me and Johnny were going to go dump Sylvia.
Q. What else was said, if anything?
A. I came back downstairs and went over by the door and she got by the porch and Gertrude dragged her back. She took her by the arm and dragged her onto the floor.
Q. How far did she drag her?
A. Across the floor and she just told her she was not going anywhere.
Q. Tell what happened, if anything?
A. Well, Sylvia sat at the table and Gertrude tried to get her to eat two pieces of toast and she said she could not swallow.
Q. Who was present at this situation?
A. Me and Sylvia and Gertrude. Paula was in bed. Johnny was downstairs in the kitchen. Sylvia could not swallow. Gertrude took a curtain rod and kept hitting her across the face with it.
Q. Jenny, I will hand you what is marked for identification purposes as State's Exhibit No. 12 and ask you what that is?
A. That is the curtain rod she beat Sylvia with.
Q. The curtain rod about which you have just testified?

This is some of the most amazing testimony of the whole trial. The end-game at last! And it starts with the most plausible of all end-games, only to quickly morph into something completely ridiculous. There we stand, on the cusp of a murder. And the plan? Go hide the body. This is what you do with murder victims. You take the body somewhere remote, although the word ‘remote’ is subjective, and you bury it. This offers numerous advantages. First- it might be that no one finds the body. Then you’re in the clear. Or, they might find it, perhaps much later, and then have to identify the person. This they might be able do; or they might not, and then you’re still in the clear. If they do identify the person, then they have to trace them back to you. And if they do…you say: “She ran away!” So you’re making it as difficult as possible for the police, and giving yourself the best shot at staying out of prison..and the electric chair. And that’s why that’s the way that most murderers handle it. It’s tried and true. And there is another fascinating component to the story; i.e., the victim is still alive. So the murder itself will not occur in the house, and therefore you don’t leave evidence of the crime. One particular element that you can’t take control of is blood-spatter (and I apologize for being gruesome, although that’s the official term used by forensics people). Small drops end up in the strangest places, like a tiny spot on the ceiling, or a smidge on a doorframe. A good forensics guy will find blood-spatter if it’s there. Wait..perhaps I should say that even a forensics guy in Indianapolis in 1965 could find it. Try as you like, you cannot clean all of it up. And don’t forget it’s head trauma that will prove to be the cause of death. That usually involves a lot of blood. Still, if the floor has a drain in the middle of it and you have a hose..but I digress. Even so, this end-game makes so much sense.

But not for long. The lady of the house must be crazy! For no reason whatsoever, she suddenly decides against the plan that makes the most sense, the one that offers the best hope of getting away with the crime, at least for a while, in favor of a course of action that can only lead to an obvious charge of homicide. They’re on the way out the door, then she grabs the girl and drags her back into the house. “You’re not going anywhere!” Then what? She sits at the table, and the lady of the house tries to make her eat toast. This is strange to say the least. We were going to take the girl to the mysterious Jimmy’s Forest. She would be killed there, and the body dumped. Suddenly she’s on her way out the door. Gertrude pulls her back in. Why? It’s almost if she was cooperating! Indeed! That is exactly the image, the image of the fictional Sylvia, we find in the testimony. Silent, suffering, cooperative. Seemingly resigned to her fate as if it were some great act of sacrifice. Some say that Sylvia is trying to escape. That makes no sense. If she is trying to escape, Gertrude catches her. They’re on the way out the door, so onward! But no. Pull her back in the house, try to stuff toast in her mouth, and give her a good whack with a curtain rod. But the situation gets even stranger. Jenny states that this bizarre event, with everybody ready to go and Gertrude and Sylvia at the front door, only to have Gertrude change her mind and administer a good dose of toast and curtain rod, occurred on the night be fore Sylvia died. What makes this stranger, is that she states that another event took place that night:

Q. Where did Sylvia sleep the night before she died, Jenny?
A. In the basement.
Q. What happened just prior to the time Sylvia went down in the basement?
A. The night before she died?
Q. Yes.
A. I went to bed around 12:00 o'clock or 12:30 and it was still going on.
Q. What was going on?
A. I could hear her arguing with Sylvia, yelling at her.
Q. Who?
A. Gertrude.
Q. What did she say?
A. "I am going to get you out of my house. You are going to get the hell out of my house".
Q. What else?
A. I don't know. I went to sleep.

Extraordinary! Apparently, we can reconstruct the night before Sylvia died and see the following. Jenny and Sylvia are preparing for bed. Gertrude announces that that would be the night she would bring her evil plans to fruition. Go get your things! Then Sylvia is out the door, but Gertrude catches her, and drags her back in. “You’re not going anywhere!” But that’s exactly what we were getting ready to do! Dry toast then curtain rod. Then what? Jenny goes off to bed, and Sylvia and Gertrude argue. So the blow from the curtain rod wasn’t too bad. Sylvia can’t swallow toast. Perhaps she should have been given milk…no, we can’t do that since, as Shirley testifies, Sylvia kept throwing it on the floor. Can’t swallow, but can argue with Gertrude. What is the topic of this argument? I know! Gertrude tells Sylvia that she’s going to “get the hell out of my house.” But isn’t that what we were about to do? Then we changed our mind. Then a while later, we’re telling Sylvia that she has to get of the house! I wish Gertrude…well, the witness, would make up her mind. At some point this argument ends. Then what? Apparently, Sylvia went down into the basement to sleep. It would seem that soon everyone was asleep. That would have been a good time to escape. But no. So it wouldn’t seem that she was trying to escape a few hours before. The whole scene is nonsense. In passing, I allude to a critical theme that will be treated in a commentary elsewhere. The theme is…time. Lots of time. What to do with it? Sylvia stopped attending school by October 5th. That was the day Lester and Betty visited the girls for the last time before Sylvia’s death. I think she explained to her parents why she stopped going to school. We know that Sylvia dropped out of school because of rumors. I think that there is a good chance of figuring out what those rumors were. But not yet! There are 3 weeks, 21 days, between leaving school and dying. I wonder what she did all day? All the other kids go to school. That’s a fair number of school days when the others will be gone; from morning to about 3:30ish. So following October 5th, if I watched the house, I would see the kids leave for school. Then I could walk into the house. What would I see? Better yet…who would I see? I can’t be totally sure, but I think I would see Gertrude, baby Denny, and Sylvia. That’s an odd thing to see. I might ask Sylvia what she planned to do all day. And the next day. And the next day. I know! For three weeks she has plenty of time to escape. But doesn’t. It would be strange to find her doing something like…ironing! Or looking after the baby! Of course, you can have plenty of time to escape, but choose not to escape, because you don’t have anything from which to escape. But if you needed to escape, you have lots of time. And what is more! You have places to go after you escape. You could go to your big sister’s place. Even better..you could go to grandma’s house. She’s only a few blocks away. But I digress.

Of course, the curtain rod is important. But only in a rather lame way. Various people who testified during the trial made attempts to account for the head trauma. Curtain rod; broom stick; being hit in the head with a book; being hit with the paddle; being hit with a board; Gertrude jumping on Sylvia’s head, Sylvia hitting her head on the stairs while she was being brought upstairs. Actually, it may that the last suggestion, although not in the form it took during the trial, that is most important. Of course, there were numerous descriptions of Sylvia being pushed down the stairs. In fact, far too many for her not to have died of head trauma long before October 26th. How many times can you be pushed down the stairs, either those leading from the first floor to the second floor, and/or those leading into the basement, and in both cases, you have a very hard landing ahead of you, not to mention the very hard and painful journey to the bottom, without breaking your neck, your arm, your wrist, your leg, your ankle? But Sylvia didn’t have any broken bones. How many times does your head hit the floor, and the floor in the basement is concrete, and yet you have no problems until October 26th? This would be incredible good luck, only to eventually be followed by the inevitable; an inevitable that was inevitably inevitable long before it became reality. Even so, the end-game changes from murder committed elsewhere and the body hidden, to murder in the house, the body put in the upstairs bedroom, and the police are called. Wow! In no time flat- the most sensical plan, to the absolute stupidest plan. We went from “make all the efforts to get away with it,” to “let’s do everything to ensure that we don’t, and end up in prison.” How can this be believed? Still, Jenny’s end-game is even more bizarre. Note the following:

Q. When was this?
A. About three or four days before she died.
Q. Who was present?
A. Me, Sylvia, Gertrude, Paula, Johnny, Stephanie - about everybody.
Q. What was said and done then?
MR. ERBECKER: Same objection. It is rehashing it.
THE COURT: Overruled as to Gertrude Baniszewski. Sustained as to Coy Hubbard and John Stephan Baniszewski.
A. She said she was going to kill her, get rid of her.
Q. What else was said?
A. She said she was going to dump her.
Q. What did Sylvia say, if anything?
A. She did not say nothing but I know she wanted to get out.

So Sylvia actually sat in on an earlier conversation during which the plan to kill her and dump her body took place! She said nothing, but Jenny deduced that she wanted to escape. Really! Observe Jenny quoting a prophetess-like Sylvia:

A. Then she got out of the bath tub and Gertrude and Paula and all of them went downstairs. I was in the bathroom. Sylvia told me to get her clothes. I did. She said, "Jenny, I know you don't want me to die but I am going to die, I feel it".
Q. When did this happen, Jenny?
A. About three or four days before her death.

So not quite the prophetess, since she actually sat in on the staff meeting. In reality, this is a leitmotif found throughout the testimony- the suffering Sylvia, passively accepting the abuse, the torture, and her own murder. She cooperates again and again and again. She simply won’t walk out the door! Jenny is not alone, this fictional Sylvia appears repeatedly among the witnesses. I could say that Sylvia should just leave the house. But then she would not be stoically accepting the fate chosen for her, not by her, but since she chooses to stay..ultimately chosen by her. Of course, if she leaves, then she won’t end up on the filthy mattress in the upstairs back bedroom. The fictional Sylvia must end up there, the whole melodrama depended on it. So a completely ridiculous, inane, and impossible theme must rear its ugly head…Sylvia will choose to suffer and die with the sole purpose of ending up lying dead on a horrid mattress in the back bedroom. If the body in that room on the evening of October 26, 1965 was in fact Sylvia, then one would have no choice but to peddle this ludicrous image of the sacrificial lamb being passively led to the slaughter. It could be no other way; assuming the girl in the back bedroom was actually Sylvia. In truth, I know she was that girl. But the mattress in that room was not the mattress in Photo 1. So the real Sylvia did not end up on a horrid mattress. Someone else did. But that is only the beginning…

There is another aspect of this worth mentioning. Why did Gertrude change her mind? Well, the body was found in the house. But that’s hindsight, and the witnesses had plenty of that. Still, plans were made to take Sylvia to a specific location, kill her, and hide the body. We were ready to go, and even stood at the front door. I think that it would be helpful to imagine that we are standing in the scene. So there we are, Sylvia and Gertrude are at the door, and Jenny’s ready too. Now stop! I would walk up to Gertrude and tap her on the shoulder. When she turned around, I would ask her a question:

“Gertrude, how do you plan on getting Sylvia, along with the others, to Jimmy’s Forest?”

I might ask Jenny that question too. I could also ask everyone in the house that night, and everyone who had been at the planning meeting days before. It may seem like a superfluous question…don’t bother me with nit-picky details! But it’s not superfluous. Apparently, Gertrude didn’t have a car. Jimmy’s Forest is 2 miles away. So we really have only a few options. We could drag the girl, kicking and screaming of course, down the sidewalk for two miles. Perhaps we could wave to all the people we pass. We probably know some of them. “Don’t mind her!” we could tell who knows how many witnesses. We might even pass a cop or two..maybe even Officer Dixon! He might be interested in that! Of course, there will be a good number of witnesses, any of whom could call the police, or even step in and intervene! Those who accept the canonical story are quite prepared to believe that a substantial number of people knew what was happening and did nothing. Perhaps now, we can add that whole part of Indianapolis to that number. There is always room for more in the canonical story! But there’s another problem. Gertrude is dosing herself with Phenobarbital all the time. I don’t see that Gertrude will be able to make the 2 miles walk out, and then the 2 miles walk back. I know, Gertrude! That won’t work, but we have another option. How do you get to the doctor’s? That’s right, by cab. Maybe we can call a cab. But you know, the cabbie will be a good witness against us. We could try to buy him off, but money is so tight that sometimes we eat soup and crackers. I bet he’d want a lot of money, seeing how being an accomplice to first degree murder carries a bit of risk with it. Can we get someone we know with a car to help us out? Of course not. Simply put, all the testimony about taking the girl somewhere to kill her and dump the body has failed to take into account that there is no way to do it without a car.

Actually, the place name is the most interesting thing. “Jimmy’s Forest.” Now, Jenny returns to the ‘dump the body’ theme twice more:

Q. Say what Mrs. Baniszewski said, Jenny.
A. I know she said she was going to get rid of her.
Q. When did this conversation take place?
A. Oh, she would say that off and on.
Q. Did she say it more than once?
A. Yes.
Q. How many times?
A. Several times.
Q. Did she say this within the week before Sylvia's death?
MR. ERBECKER: We object, Your Honor, it is leading and suggestive.
THE COURT: Sustained.
Q. Can you tell a particular time when she said this, Jenny?
A. Oh, about two or three days before she died, something like that.
Q. Where did this conversation take place?
A. Sometimes in the kitchen, most of the time in the kitchen.
Q. Who was present?
A. Gertrude, me and Sylvia and Paula and Stephanie and John. I don't know all of them.
Q. What was said, Jenny?
A. She said she was going to get rid of her, dump her out somewhere.

Notice that this time, Jenny says that Gertrude was going to dump Sylvia “somewhere.” Not in Jimmy’s Forest? Now Jenny doesn’t seem to know where her sister’s body will be dumped. But she knew exactly when asked elsewhere. She mentions it again:

A. She said she was going to kill her, get rid of her.
Q. What else was said?
A. She said she was going to dump her.

So she twice returns to the dumping of the body, and doesn’t say Jimmy’s Forest. In fact, she even says “somewhere.” Look at how Marie got tripped up on the subject of Jimmy’s Forest:

Q. Did you ever hear of Jimmy's Forest?
A. No, sir.
Q. You never heard the words "Jimmy's Forest"?
A. I believe I have once.
Q. You don't know where it is?
A. No, sir.
Q. Did your mother ever say she was going to dump Sylvia at Jimmy's Forest that you heard?
A. Yes.
Q. When did she say that?
A. She said that the last week of September.
Q. Did she ever say it later than that?
A. No, sir.

Another wow! According to Jenny, the announcement about the dumping of the body in Jimmy’s Forest was the night before Sylvia died. According to Marie, she heard the Jimmy’s Forest announcement in the last week of September! And who does Jenny say was present? “Me, Sylvia and Johnny and Gertrude and Shirley. I think that is all.” But not Marie! And Shirley isn’t even asked about it. In fact, Marie was not present at any such conversation, and so she gets it abysmally wrong. It's rather difficult to be present at something that never happened. But Gertrude was present at the something that never happened, obviously! This was what she said:

Q. Did you ever tell anybody you were going to get rid of Sylvia Likens?
A. No.
Q. Did you try to get rid of her?
A. No.
Q. Did you know she and Johnny were supposed to go dump her in Jimmy's woods?
A. I heard it.
Q. Is that true or false?
A. That was not true.
Q. Do you know a place called Jimmy's woods?
A. No.

What is fascinating here is that the name has changed. Jenny called it “Jimmy’s Forest,” but here it is called “Jimmy’s Woods.” So we have a key example where there are two different versions of something highly important. Is it possible that this was a mistake made because they had no idea what “Jimmy’s Forest” was, or what Jenny meant by it? It may be that there was a place called “Jimmy’s Forest.” But I find it odd, but then not so odd, that no effort was made to locate this place. No effort was made to determine whether it was real. At least, not that I have found, and I can only go by that. Why not so odd? Because! Sylvia wasn’t killed there, we know she died in the house, and was found there by the police. So it’s irrelevant. The only reason I can think that “Jimmy’s Forest” was not elucidated is because whatever or wherever it was, it didn’t matter because Sylvia ended up in the upstairs back bedroom. But I suspect that it is not irrelevant. I suspect that it is a very important place. I also think that Jimmy’s Forest was not an actual place-name. It may well be a word game. Better yet…a clue within a testimony game. As if there was a dare, a challenge to figure out what the clue means. I think it would be fun to try to do just that. After all, I like word games. So here’s my answer to Jenny’s little clue:

Jimmy=  little Jim=  little James= James’ son= Jameson. Forest= area with trees= wooded area

Jenny said that this mysterious place was “two miles out.” Two miles out of town? I looked at a map, and found that if I started driving east from Gertrude’s house, turned right on N. Chester Avenue, then left onto E. Washington, followed this down until I turned left onto N. Emerson, and then turned right onto East St. Clair Street, I will have driven exactly 2 miles. And where am I? At Ellenberger Park. This is mentioned in the testimony numerous times as one of the parks that the kids frequented. I also learned that Ellenberger Park had been known by another name…Jameson Park. And that is interesting: Jimmy’s Forest = a wooded area in Ellenberger Park. That was where the body of Sylvia was supposed to be hidden, assuming that my answer to the word game is correct. Nonetheless, Sylvia’s body was found in Gertrude’s house. I wonder where the other body was found? And I must say, I’m rather curious about what’s in the wooded area of Ellenberger Park. Oh, I almost forgot..how'd I do Jenny?