The Poisoner's Handbook

  190: “They all say ‘Why pick on us . . . ’ ”: “Rogers’ Tip to Speculators: Don’t Sell Democrats Short,” New York Times, June 5, 1928, p. 31.

  190: The first October weekend, four New Yorkers were killed . . . : “Four Dead, 18 Ill of Poison Liquor,” New York Times, October 3, 1928, p. 11; “11 Dead, 60 Ill in Day Is City Liquor Toll,” New York Times, October 8, 1928, p. 1; “20 Speakeasies Raided in Drive Backed by Mayor as Liquor Kills 29 in Day,” New York Times, October 9, 1928, p. 1.

  192: In October 1929, Marie Curie made another radium tour . . . : “Marie Curie Is Guest of Friends in Country,” New York Times, October 17, 1929, p. 29; “Mme. Curie to Get Medal,” New York Times, October 21, 1929, p. 16; “Mme. Curie at White House,” New York Times, October 30, 1929, p. 21; “Mme. Curie Receives $50,000 Radium Gift,” New York Times, October 31, 1929, p. 1.

  193: J. J. Riordan, head of the County Trust Company . . . : Marten, Doctor Looks at Murder, pp. 47–49.

  9. ETHYL ALCOHOL

  196: “Case 1: A moderate drinker . . . ”: Alexander O. Gettler, “A Study of the Alcoholic Content of Autopsy Material, and Its Bearing on the Cause of Death,” Bulletin of the New York Academy of Medicine 4, no. 6 (June 1928), pp. 715–27.

  197: “From almost every standpoint ethyl alcohol . . . ”: Alexander O. Gettler and Arthur Tiber, “The Alcoholic Content of the Human Brain,” Archives of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine 3 (1927), pp. 218–26.

  198: In early 1930 the Metropolitan Life Insurance . . . : “Alcohol Deaths Up 300 Percent Since 1920,” New York Times, October 23, 1930, p. 28; “Dry Conflict Acute After 10-Year Test,” New York Times, January 1, 1930, p. 3.

  199: The primary alcohols, including methyl and ethyl, . . . : Gonzales et al., Pathology and Toxicology, pp. 781–85; Peterson, Haines, and Webster, Legal Medicine, pp. 614–32; www.chemguide.co.uk/organicprops/alcohols/background.html; William Boggan, Ph.D., “Alcohol and You,” General Chemistry Case Studies, www.chemcases.com/alcohol/index.html.

  202: No one had figured out how much alcohol in the blood meant intoxication . . . : Alexander O. Gettler and A.W. Freireich, “The Nature of Alcohol Tolerance,” Forensic Medicine, February 1925, pp. 328–33.

  203: “Mama cried out and said . . . ”: Dan Baum, “Jake Leg,” New Yorker, September 15, 2003, pp. 50–57 and “The Jake Walk Blues: A Toxicologic Tragedy Mirrored in American Popular Music,” Annals of Internal Medicine 84, no. 6 (December 1976), 804–808. See also A. D. Woolf, “Ginger Jake and the Blues: A Tragic Song of Poisoning,” Veterinary and Human Toxicology 37, no. 3 (June 1995), pp. 252–54.

  203: From Brooklyn arose another . . . : “Arrested as Maker of Deadly Drink,” New York Times, May 1, 1930, p. 5.

  205: It took months for scientists to identify the plasticizer . . . : “Paralyzing Drink Has Carbolic Acid,” New York Times, March 29, 1930, p. 6; “ ‘Ginger Jake’ Is a Puzzle,” New York Times, July 13, 1930, p. 13.

  206: the chemist had purchased perfumes . . . : “Kansas Ginger Jury Indicts Firms Here,” New York Times, July 30, 1930, p. 5.

  207: By 1930, Gettler had assembled an encyclopedic list . . . : Gettler and Tiber, “Alcoholic Content”; Alexander O. Gettler, Joseph B. Niederl, and A. A. Benedetti-Pichler, “The Isolation of Pure, Anhydrous Ethyl Alcohol from Non-Alcoholic Human and Animal Tissues,” Journal of the American Chemical Society 54, no. 4 (April 6, 1932), pp. 1476–85; Alexander O. Gettler and A. Walter Freireich, “Determination of Alcoholic Intoxication During Life by Spinal Fluid Analysis,” Journal of Biological Chemistry 92 (193 1), pp. 199–209.

  211: another twenty were dead in Newark . . . : “20th Newark Death Gives Alcohol Clue,” New York Times, October 15, 1930, p. 17.

  211: “a certain type of person with uncontrollable . . . ”: Doran made his comments in the context of another attempt by “wet” politicians to force the government to stop adding extra poisons to industrial alcohol. Like earlier attempts, that effort failed: “Wets Are Defeated in First House Test on Balking Dry Law,” New York Times, December 6, 1930, p. 1; “Poison Alcohol Takes Larger Toll,” New York Times, December 19, 1930, p. 1.

  211: seemingly able to guzzle alcohol without obvious effect . . . : A. O. Gettler and H. Freireich, “The Nature of Alcohol Tolerance,” Forensic Medicine, February 1935, pp. 328–34.

  215: In his annual report, issued that spring . . . : “6,525 Fatalities in City Last Year,” New York Times, May 19, 1931, p. 14.

  215: “At the present time I am spending nearly . . . ”: Norris to Charles F. Kerrigan, assistant mayor, February 10, 1932, medical examiner’s files, New York City Municipal Archive.

  216: “told me that this disease is an obscure one . . . ”: Harrison Martland, “The Occurrence of Malignancy in Radioactive Persons,” American Journal of Cancer Research 15, no. 4, (1931), pp. 2435–516.

  217: Here was an “important” radium death . . . : Roger M. Macklis, “The Great Radium Scandal,” Scientific American, August 1993, p. 99; R. M. Macklis, “Radithor and the Era of Mild Radiation Therapy,” Journal of the American Medical Association 264, no. 5 (August 1, 1990), http://jama.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstract/264/5/614.

  218: Eben M. Byers was chairman of . . . : “Eben M. Byers Dies of Radium Poisoning,” New York Times, April 1, 1932, p. 1; “Death Stirs Action on Radium Cures,” New York Times, April 2, 1932, p. 12; “Doctors Seek Ban on Radium Water,” New York Times, May 12, 1932, p. 3; Alexander O. Gettler and Charles Norris, “Poisoning from Drinking Radium Water,” Journal of the American Medical Association, February 11, 1933, pp. 400–403.

  220: The new crisis resulted from an administration change . . . : Norris to McKee, September 19, 1932, medical examiner’s files, New York City Municipal Archive; “McKee Says Bankers Force Budget Cuts; Dr. Norris Resigns,” New York Times, September 21, 1932, p. 1; “Norris Quits Post as Chief Examiner,” New York Times, September 21, 1932, p. 3; “Doctors Urge McKee to Ask Norris to Stay,” New York Times, September 24, 1932, p. 2; “Dr. Norris Returns as City Medical Examiner; Withdraws Resignation at the Mayor’s Behest,” New York Times, September 28, 1932, p. 1; “Post Mortem,” Time, October 3, 1932, www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,744511,00.html.

  222: The news was, for a change, unusually good . . . : “Only Two Deaths Laid to Poison Liquor,” New York Times, December 27, 1932, p. 2.

  10. CARBON MONOXIDE

  224: a dusty little store that never seemed to open . . . : This description is based on a photo published in the New York Daily News in 1933 and reprinted in Simon Read, On the House: The Bizarre Killing of Michael Malloy (New York: Berkley Books, 2005). Read’s book provided background for the Malloy story, along with “The Indestructible Man,” in Richard Glyn Jones, ed., Poison! (New York: Berkley Books, 1987), pp. 58–71; Marshall Houts, Where Death Delights (New York: Coward-McCann, 1967), pp. 125–38.

  225: On February 20, Congress voted to repeal . . . : See David J. Hanson, “Repeal of Prohibition in the U.S.,” www2.potsdam.edu/hansondj/controversies/1131637220.html; and Marvin Hintz, Farewell, John Barleycorn: Prohibition in the United States (Minneapolis: Lerner Publications, 1996).

  230 “Case 2: Male, age 38, found dead . . . ”: A. O. Gettler and H. C. Freimuth, “Carbon Monoxide in Blood,” American Journal of Clinical Pathology 13, no. 79 (1943), pp. 10–17.

  231: In April 1933legal beer . . . : “Brewers Here Swamped,” New York Times, April 8, 1933, p. 1; “Thirsty Throngs Jam City Streets,” New York Times, April 8, 1933, p. 2.

  233: Too many were willing to share their part . . . : “Insurance Murder Charged to Five,” New York Times, May 13, 1933, p. 1; “Murder Plot Seen in Another Death,” New York Times, May 14, 1933, p. 27; “Murder Inquiry Is Widened by Foley,” New York Times, May 16, 1933, p. 18; “Indicted as Slayers in Insurance Plot,” New York Times, May 17, 1933, p. 8.

  233: the formation of a new department: forensic medicine . . . : “NYU Will Train Medical Officers,” New York Times, June 11, 1933, p. N4;“Science and Cr
ime,” New York Times, June 18, 1933, p. E4: “Program Outline and Requirements,” unpublished document, 1933, medical examiner’s files, New York City Municipal Archive.

  234: “The clerks seem to think an undertaker . . . ”: Edward F. Donovan, funeral director, to Charles Norris, March 7, 1933, medical examiner’s files, New York City Municipal Archive.

  235: “A great deal of the trouble . . . ”: Norris to George Goodstein, May 13, 1933, medical examiner’s files, New York City Municipal Archive.

  235: Prohibition might still be . . . : “July Thirst Sets 3.2 Beer Record,” New York Times, September 1, 1933, p. 36.

  236: Smokers could choose from among almost three hundred . . . : Emil Bogen, “The Composition of Cigarets and Cigaret Smoke,” Journal of the American Medical Association (October 12, 1929), pp. 1110–14.

  237: “headaches experienced by heavy smokers . . . ”: A. O. Gettler and M. R. Mattice, “ ‘Normal’ Carbon Monoxide Content of the Blood,” Journal of the American Medical Association 100, no. 92 (January 14, 1933), pp. 92–97.

  237: Nicotine is a naturally occurring . . . : Thorwald, Century of the Detective, pp. 296–307; Peterson, Haines, and Webster, Legal Toxicology, pp. 554–65; Gonzales et al., Pathology and Toxicology, pp. 844–45, 1140–42; “Case Definition: Nicotine Poisoning,” U.S. Centers for Disease Control, www.bt.cdc.gov/agent/nicotine/casedef.asp.

  238: an analysis done in 1929 pointed out that tobacco plants . . . : Bogen, “Composition of Cigarets.”

  239: They’d also found cyanide, hydrogen sulfide, . . . : Ibid.; W. E. Dixon, “The Tobacco Habit,” Lancet, October 22, 1927, pp. 881–85; “Is Tobacco Smoke Carbon Monoxide Eliminating the ‘Red-Blooded ’ Man?,” New York Times, November 7, 1926, p. X16.

  240: The durability of carbon monoxide in a dead body . . . : A.O. Gettler and H. C. Freimuth, “Carbon Monoxide in Blood,” American Journal of Clinical Pathology 13, no. 99 (1943), pp. 79–83; “The Carbon Monoxide Content of Blood Under Various Conditions,” American Journal of Clinical Pathology 10 (1940), pp. 603–16.

  240: And Mike Malloy’s blood? . . . : “Four on Trial in Bronx Insurance Slaying,” New York Times, October 5, 1933, p. 16; “Jury Weighs Fate of Four in Killing,” New York Times, October 19, 1933, p. 42; “Four Men to Die for Bronx Killing,” New York Times, October 20, 1933, p. 38.

  241: In Manhattan, as the clock ticked away . . . : “Chefs Jubilant at Dry Law Doom,” New York Times, November 11, 1933, p. 1.

  242: Utah, the last state needed to complete . . . : “City Toasts New Era,” New York Times, December 6, 1933, p. 1.

  243: On June 3, 1934, Tony Marino, Frank Pasqua, . . . : “Three Die at Sing Sing for Bronx Murder,” New York Times, June 8, 1934, p. 44; “Murphy Goes to the Chair,” New York Times, July 6, 1934, p. 10; Robert Campbell, “Three Die in Chair for Barfly Murder,” New York Daily Mirror, June 8, 1934, p. 1.

  11. THALLIUM

  245: There were times, and they came frequently enough . . . : Arthur Kallet and F. J. Schlink, 100,000,000 Guinea Pigs: Dangers in Everyday Foods, Drugs and Cosmetics (New York: Grosset and Dunlap, 1935); Ruth De Forest Lamb, American Chamber of Horrors: The Truth About Food and Drugs (New York: Grosset and Dunlap, 1936).

  246: The depilatory creams had created a small but significant epidemic . . . : “Dangers from Use of Thallium Acetate,” Journal of the American Medical Association 94, no. 2 ( January 18, 1931), p. 197; “Thallium Poisoning,” Journal of the American Medical Association 95, no. 3 (January 30, 1932), pp. 406–407; “A Case of Thallium Poisoning Following the Prolonged Use of a Depilatory Cream,” Journal of the American Medical Association 96, no. 22 (March 30, 1933), pp. 1866–68; “Reports of Thallium Acetate Poisoning Following Use of Koremlu [a depilatory cream made in New York City],” Journal of the American Medical Association, 1868–69; William Mahoney, “Retrobulbar Neuritis Due to Thallium Poisoning from Depilatory Cream,” Journal of the American Medical Association 98, no. 8 (February 20, 1932), pp. 618–20.

  247: He was such a nice man . . . : “Five in Family Killed by a Rare Poison; Father Is Accused,” New York Times, May 11, 1935, p. 1; “Five Poisonings Denied by Father in Court; No Motive Is Found,” New York Times, May 12, 1935, p. 1.

  249: The name thallium comes from the Greek . . . : Emsley, Elements of Murder, “Thallium: The Essentials,” www.webelements.com/thallium/; Jefferson Lab, “It’s Elemental,” http://education.jlab.org/itselemental/ele081.html; “Thallium: Statistics and Information,” http://minerals.usgs.gov/minerals/pubs/commodity/thallium/.

  251: “its relatively rare occurrence . . . ”: Louis Weiss, A Study of Thallium Poisoning, Ph.D. diss., New York University, 1942.

  252: As the U.S. Public Health Service noted in a review . . . : Francis Heyroth, Thallium: A Review and Summary of Medical Literature, Supplement No. 197 to the Public Health Reports (Washington, D.C.: United States Government Printing Office, 1947).

  252: As state wildlife officials discovered . . . : Jean M. Linsdale, “Facts Concerning the Use of Thallium in California to Poison Rodents: Its Destructiveness to Game Birds, Song Birds and Other Valuable Wildlife,” Condor 33, no. 3 (May–June 1931), pp. 92–106.

  253: “In subacute cases, where the patient lives . . .”: Alexander O. Gettler and Louis Weiss, “Thallium Poisoning I: The Detection of Thallium in Biologic Material,” American Journal of Clinical Pathology 13 (1943), pp. 322–26; Gonzales et al., Pathology and Toxicology, pp. 756–57.

  254: Surely, the Brooklyn detectives thought, . . . : “New Clues Found in Poisoning of Five,” New York Times, May 13, 1935, p. 1; “Thallium Is Found in Gross Cocoa Can,” New York Times, May 13, 1935, p. 1.

  254: “So far we have uncovered nothing . . . ”: “Prosecutor Hints at Freeing Gross,” New York Times, May 15, 1935, p. 44.

  256: In cases of thallium poisoning, autopsy results . . . : Alexander O. Gettler and Louis Weiss, “Thallium Poisoning III: Clinical Toxicology of Thallium,” American Journal of Clinical Pathology 13 (1943), pp. 422–29.

  258: The chemical tests for thallium were an intricate . . . : Gettler and Weiss, “Thallium Poisoning I.”

  259: Further, repeated analyses of the cocoa found . . . : “Gross Cocoa Found Free of Thallium,” New York Times, May 18, 1935, p. 3.

  260: On May 20, a Brooklyn magistrate . . . : “Gross Is Released in Poison Deaths,” New York Times, May 21, 1935, p. 40.

  260: “Let your voice be heard loudly . . . ”: Kallet and Schlink, 100,000,000 Guinea Pigs, p. 302.

  261: Elixir Sulfanilamide . . . : U.S. Food and Drug Administration, “Taste of Raspberries, Taste of Death: The 1937 Elixir Sulfanilamide Incident,” www.fda.gov/oc/history/elixir.html; Paul Wax, “Elixirs, Diluents, and the Passage of the 1938 Food, Drug and Cosmetics Act,” Annals of Internal Medicine 122, no. 6 (March 15, 1995), pp. 456–61.

  262: “I am avoiding going out . . . ”: Norris to Philip Hoerter, Detectives’ Endowment Association, April 15, 1935, medical examiner’s files, New York City Municipal Archive.

  262: “You ask me how I am . . . ”: Norris to Charles Miller, Yale Alumni University Fund Association, April 17, 1935, medical examiner’s files, New York City Municipal Archive.

  262: The commission calculated that 40 percent . . . : “Graft of $170,000 in ‘Fees’ Charged to Aides of Norris,” New York Times, May 27, 1935, p. 1.

  263: Within a month a formal investigation . . . : “Blanshard Clears Aides of Dr. Norris,” New York Times, June 28, 1935, p. 23.

  264: On the morning of September 11 . . . : “Dr. Norris, 67, Dies of Sudden Illness,” New York Times, September 12, 1935, p. 1; “Dr. Norris Buried with High Honors,” New York Times, September 15, 1935, p. 38; “Dr. Norris Set Up Trust for Wife,” New York Times, September 21, 1935, p. 13.

  265: The staff took up a collection . . . : “Receipts and Expenditures—Portrait (Painting) of Dr. Charles Norris,” September 1936, medical examiner’s files, New York City Municipal Archives.

  265: “because of the grea
t friendship . . . ”: Thomas Gonzales to Mendel Jacobi, July 23, 1936, medical examiner’s files, New York City Municipal Archive.

  265: “In sending my small contribution . . . ”: Mendel Jacobi to Thomas Gonzales, July 21, 1936, medical examiner’s files, New York City Municipal Archive.

  266: The case began in mid-September . . . : On the Creighton-Appelgate murder case, see, Leonard Gribble, “The Long Island Borgia,” in Richard Glyn Jones, ed., Poison! (New York: Berkley Books, 1987), pp. 100–12; Dorothy Kilgallen, Murder One (New York: Random House, 1967); The People of the State of New York, Respondent v. Frances Q. Creighton and Everett C. Appelgate, Appellants, Court of Appeals of New York, 271 N.Y. 263; 2 N.E. 2nd 650; 1936; and the following newspaper accounts: “Find Poison Enough to Kill 3 in Wife’s Body; Quiz Husband,” New York Daily News, October 7, 1935, p. 1; “Wife Dead by Poison, Quiz Mate,” New York Post, October 7, 1935, p. 1; “Woman Confesses Arsenic Slaying,” New York Times, October 9, 1935, p. 1; “Admits She Poisoned Friend and Own Kin,” New York Daily News, October 9, 1935, p. 1; “State Maps Case to Send Mrs. Creighton to Chair,” New York Evening Journal, October 10, 1935, p. 1; “Ruth Creighton Refuses to Save Lover at Altar,” New York Daily News, October 10, 1935, p. 2; “Suspected Borgia, Kin Asserts,” New York Daily Mirror, October 11, 1935, p. 1; “Indict Appelgate, Mrs. Creighton,” New York Post, October 11, 1935, p. 1; “Husband Indicted in Arsenic Murder,” New York Times, October 12, 1935, p. 2; “Mrs. Creighton Calm in Face of Life Trial,” New York Evening Journal, October 12, 1935; “Dr. Gettler on Stand at Appelgate Trial,” New York Times, January 18, 1936, p. 6; “Mrs. Creighton Dies for Poison Murder: Appelgate Follows Her to the Death Chamber for the Slaying of His Wife,” New York Times, July 17, 1936, p. 1.