Barbara and Patricia Grimes: Murder of Chicago Sisters Still Unsolved
Barbara and Patricia Grimes
Cook County Sheriff's Department
One of Chicago's Most Infamous Cold Cases
On the evening of December 28th, 1956, 15-year-old Barbara Grimes and 12-year-old Patricia Grimes left home and went to Brighton Theater–something they’d done many times before. The sisters wanted to watch a double screening of Love Me Tender, which starred their favorite singer, Elvis Presley.
Nothing seemed out of the ordinary that night and the girls were last spotted by a friend waiting in line for popcorn during intermission. Trying to reconstruct what happened from there is a difficult–if not impossible–task, due to a tangled web of countless conflicting accounts and inconclusive evidence.
What can be said with certainty is that the girls were found dead on January 22nd, 1957. But many aspects of their final hours and murder remain a mystery. Numerous suspects have been considered over the decades–some of whom seem almost equally plausible as the culprit–but the identity of their killer is still unknown.
Who murdered Barbara and Patricia Grimes?
Barbara and Patricia Grimes
Barbara Jeanne Grimes was born on May 5th, 1941, and Patricia Kathleen Grimes was born on December 31st, 1943. They were two of seven children born to Joseph and Lorretta Grimes. The large family resided in Chicago’s McKinley Park neighborhood. Following her divorce from Joseph in 1951, Lorretta was a hardworking single mother, employed as a clerk for Parke Davis.
Barbara and Patricia were not only sisters, but close friends as well. The girls often spent their free time together and had bonded over shared interests, including their mutual love of singer and actor Elvis Presley. They had recently joined his official fan club together. In addition to their extracurricular interests, both excelled in school.
Going to the movies was a favorite pastime for the sisters and Brighton Theater was just 1.5 miles away from their home. Barbara and Patricia left the Grimes house at 7:30 p.m. on December 28th, 1956, and made their way to the theater.
They typically either walked or took the bus, but it’s unclear which method of travel they chose that night. It is worth noting that it was bitterly cold that Friday, making it perhaps more likely that they would have taken the bus or accepted a ride from someone.
Regardless, they arrived safely at Brighton Theater. Dorothy Weinert, a friend of Patricia’s, would later tell investigators that she and her sister had been seated behind the girls that night. When they left at approximately 9:30 p.m., the Grimes girls were still there and were waiting in line for more popcorn.
Missing
Barbara and Patricia had told their mother that they’d be back by midnight. But midnight would come and go with no sign of the girls. Lorretta became concerned and sent 17-year-old Theresa and 14-year-old Joey out to wait for their sisters at the nearby bus stop.
Buses came and went, but Barbara and Patricia weren’t on any of them. Joey and Theresa eventually returned home and told Lorretta that they’d never shown up.
Hours went by, but the girls were still gone. A worried Lorretta reported them missing at 2:15 a.m.
Investigators initially assumed that the Grimes sisters were runaways, theorizing that they’d perhaps traveled to Nashville to attend an Elvis concert. However, after a week had passed with no word from either girl, their disappearance was taken much more seriously.
An extensive search of Chicago was conducted, with hundreds of volunteers helping officers comb the city. Additionally, nearby bodies of water were searched and police officers went door-to-door throughout the Brighton Park area looking for Barbara and Patricia. This would be one of the largest searches carried out in Chicago's history.
A task force dedicated to locating the sisters was also formed.
Despite these efforts, law enforcement was no closer to finding the girls, and rumors circulated as to what had happened to them.
Lorretta Grimes
findagrave.com
Countless Sightings, More Confusion
Numerous unconfirmed sightings of the sisters came in, but would ultimately only create more confusion and unanswered questions.
Several individuals–most notably the bus driver himself–claimed to have witnessed Barbara and Patricia boarding a Chicago Transit Authority bus (headed into downtown Chicago) at approximately 11:05 p.m. on the night they went missing.
Roger Menard, a young man who’d been at the theater that night, stated that he’d seen two different vehicles come to a stop next to the sisters as they walked home–one a black 1949 Mercury that was occupied by two teenage boys and the other a “late model, green Buick.” However, according to his account, they didn’t enter either car and simply continued walking.
Additionally, they were supposedly seen getting into a vehicle with a man who resembled Elvis on the night they vanished.
Multiple eyewitnesses indicated that they’d gotten into a vehicle with teenage boys.
Patricia and Barbara–or girls who resembled them–were allegedly spotted in many different locations in the days and weeks following their disappearance, including hotels, theaters, stores, restaurants, in cars with men, and walking with other girls.
Judy Burrow, a friend of Barbara’s, said that she’d seen the Grimes sisters walking on nearby Archer Avenue on the afternoon of December 29th. Interestingly, others–including more classmates–claimed to have spotted Barbara and Patricia that same day, in places like Chicago’s Clark Theater.
On December 30th, they were reportedly seen at a restaurant with a man named Edward Bedwell (more on him later). This establishment was located roughly 5.5 miles away from Brighton Theater.
They allegedly checked into a hotel in the city on the 30th as well, as stated by a clerk who worked there.
Many other such encounters with the missing girls would be reported, but none could be substantiated–and a gruesome discovery later would call into question the veracity of these sightings.
“If someone is holding them, please let the girls call me,” Lorretta pleaded. “I’ll forgive them from the bottom of my heart.”
Strange Calls
The family of Sandra Tollstan–one of Patricia’s friends–received unsettling calls in the early morning hours of January 14th. In both instances Sandra’s mother answered the phone.
The first time no one spoke, but during the second call the voice of a “frightened and depressed” girl came from the other end asking, “Is that you, Sandra?” and “Is Sandra there?” The caller hung up before Sandra herself was able to come to the phone.
Had this been Patricia? Sandra’s mother believed so, saying that she recognized her voice. Several of Patricia’s other friends reportedly received similar calls.
Distressing Discovery
On January 22nd, 1957, a construction worker named Leonard Prescott noticed “these flesh-colored things” on the ground along rural German Church Road in Willow Springs (around 15 miles away from the Grimes residence) as he drove past. He initially assumed them to be mannequins, but still felt something was off and brought his wife there later in the day to investigate with him.
What they found horrified them: the nude bodies of Barbara and Patricia Grimes. It was presumed that they’d been lying there for some time and that a recent rise in temperature had melted enough snow to make them visible.
Joseph Grimes, who had also aided in the search for his missing daughters, was the one who positively identified their remains.
Investigators look for clues near German Church Road
Chicago Tribune
Conflicting Findings
An examination of their bodies would do surprisingly little to clear up what had been done to the sisters.
The autopsies were carried out by three forensic pathologists, but they struggled to agree on a conclusion.
Barbara’s head and face bore wounds and bruising consistent with blunt force trauma, and her chest showed marks that appeared as if they could have been made by an ice pick. There were also signs that she’d engaged in sexual intercourse before her death, but they couldn’t determine whether it had been consensual or not.
Patricia's face and body were badly bruised as well.
Toxicology results showed no drugs or alcohol in either girl’s system. It’s unclear what their stomach contents were, as some sources say that the contents showed what the sisters were last known to have eaten–including theater snacks–while others indicate otherwise, stating that Patricia actually had nothing in her stomach at the time of her death.
These conflicting statements called into question when Barbara and Patricia were murdered. But if they really did still have the last meal they were known to have eaten in their stomachs, then this would mean that they were killed within hours of their disappearance–as the autopsy report indicated.
Ultimately, after excluding other possibilities, it was determined that the Grimes sisters had died due to a combination of exposure and shock. They concluded that the marks on the girls’ bodies might have been the result of post-mortem predation by rats, rather than anything they might have been subjected to prior to death.
Yet if they had died of exposure, they must have been incapacitated somehow beforehand, since it appeared that their bodies had been posed and that they hadn't moved from the spot in which they'd been placed.
But the initial findings of the pathologists wouldn't be the final word on the subject.
Harry Glos, the chief investigator for the Cook County Coroner’s Office, strongly disagreed with the official narrative. To him, it was clear that Barbara and Patricia had been beaten and sexually assaulted.
He said that semen was recovered from both bodies and that Barbara had something that resembled “curdled milk” in her stomach as well, despite the fact that she wasn’t known to have consumed milk either at home or the theater on December 28th.
Glos felt that the investigators and forensic pathologists might be holding back some information–particularly relating to the rapes of Barbara and Patricia–to spare Lorretta Grimes additional pain. He also thought that both victims had likely been held captive for a while before they were killed, contradicting the assertion that they'd been murdered within hours of their disappearance.
He contended that the layer of ice found crystallized on the bodies showed that they’d both been alive and warm when left there, and that this warmth had melted some of the snow, which had then frozen again due to the frigid weather, forming the ice.
Since there had been hardly any snow on the ground prior to January 7th, he theorized that they were actually dumped there at some point on or around this date, further explaining that the bodies had remained concealed for so long due to the subsequent heavy snowfall.
Glos was fired for making public statements which refuted the official ruling, only to later be hired as a deputy by Sheriff Joseph D. Lohman, who agreed with his findings and felt that the Grimes sisters had fallen victim to a violent sexual predator. Others who viewed the case files were said to have concurred with Glos as well.
A coroner's jury ruled that Barbara and Patricia Grimes had been murdered.
Suspect: Edward Bedwell
Edward Bedwell, 21, was a suspect early in the investigation. He worked as a dishwasher in a Chicago restaurant. He also matched the description of a man allegedly seen with the girls on the night of December 28th.
The owners of this business were the ones who had come forward with the previously mentioned sighting which placed Bedwell in the company of Patricia and Barbara on the morning of December 30th. According to them, he and another young man had come into the restaurant with the girls.
Bedwell was brought in for questioning and initially professed innocence of any wrongdoing. However, after repeated interrogations, he confessed.
He explained that he and 28-year-old William Cole Willingham had picked up the girls, spent time drinking with them in various bars and bought them hot dogs. However, he and Willingham became angry when the sisters rejected their advances, beating them and then disposing of their bodies.
Lorretta Grimes felt this story was pure fabrication from the outset:
“It’s a lie. My girls wouldn’t be on West Madison Street (where they allegedly drank with Bedwell and Willingham). They didn’t even know where it was.”
Conversely, several McKinley Park residents claimed that the Grimes girls were known to hang out outside of bars, often convincing older men to buy drinks for them.
For his part, Willingham denied any involvement in the murder of Barbara and Patricia, saying that he’d never even spent time with them. He and Bedwell had been with two other women that morning, he said, but no violence had occurred.
Bedwell soon retracted his confession, claiming that he had felt pressured to confess, believing that he wouldn’t be released otherwise.
Additionally, it was proven that he had been at work from the afternoon of December 28th to the early morning hours of December 29th–the time frame during which it was believed that the sisters had been abducted. Add to that the fact that no alcohol or hot dogs were found in the system of either girl.
Edward Bedwell was eventually released on bond.
Yet, in another twist, Barbara’s friend Dolores said that Bedwell was in fact Barbara’s boyfriend and that she’d seen pictures of him before.
“She mentioned him from time to time and told of having dates with him. She said she liked him very much, and was crazy about him.”
However, even the possibility that he’d been romantically linked to Barbara didn’t necessarily mean that he’d been responsible for her murder, and he was never charged for the crime. Notably, however, he would be tried for the rape of another teenage girl that year, but was ultimately acquitted.
Interestingly, it was still the belief of Harry Glos that Bedwell was the true culprit in the Grimes sisters' case.
Additional Information
- The sisters’ clothes were never located.
- Barbara and Patricia had reportedly missed their curfew the night before their disappearance and Lorretta had almost decided to not allow them to attend a movie the following night, but eventually relented. Patricia was allegedly witnessed crying that night before she made it home, but the cause of her distress is unknown.
- According to one of her friends, Patricia had recently received a letter from a sailor she knew and in it he’d mentioned that he would be in town for the holidays. (It’s unclear if this letter was ever found or if the sailor’s identity was ever determined.)
Other Leads
Max Fleig, 17, was persuaded by police to take a polygraph examination, during which he allegedly confessed to the crime. But, as there was nothing else to tie him to the murders, he was released. He would eventually be charged with the murder of another young woman.
There would be a number of other (apparently) false confessions as well.
53-year-old Walter Kranz, a self-professed psychic, had contacted police before the girls were found to give a description of where their bodies could be located. Kranz claimed to have learned this information in a dream. Barbara and Patricia were ultimately found approximately one mile away from the park in Lyons Township that he had described.
Additionally, handwriting experts felt that Kranz’s writing was similar to the writing contained in a ransom note received by Lorretta prior to the discovery of the Grimes sisters. Kranz denied any involvement in the murders and–without any solid evidence to implicate him–was released.
Suspect: Charles LeRoy Melquist
In 2013, retired police officer Raymond Johnson began studying this case and, through the course of his own investigation, came to believe that a convicted murderer named Charles LeRoy Melquist was responsible for the slaying of the Grimes sisters.
Melquist, who was 23 when Barbara and Patricia went missing, was eventually convicted of killing 15-year-old Bonnie Leigh Scott in 1958. Bonnie’s decapitated body had been discovered months after she had vanished–less than 10 miles away from where Patricia and Barbara had been found.
Prior to this, in May 1957, Loretta had gotten a deeply unsettling phone call from an individual who asserted that he was her daughters’ killer.
He went on:
“I know something about your little girl that no one else knows, not even the police. The smallest girl’s toes were crossed at the feet.”
The stranger laughed before hanging up the phone.
Patricia’s feet did bear the deformity that the caller had mentioned–a detail that was never released to the press. So how did he know?
After Bonnie Leigh Scott’s remains were discovered, Lorretta received another call from a person she believed to be the same man. She was certain that it was the same voice from the haunting phone call months earlier.
“I’ve committed another perfect crime … This is another one those cops won’t solve and they’re not going (to affix blame onto) Bedwell or Barry Cook.”
Bonnie’s case would go on to be solved, though, and, as previously mentioned, Melquist would be charged for it. He would only serve 11 years out of his 99-year sentence, however.
Had he killed Barbara and Patricia as well? That remains unknown.
WGN9
Crime Linked to Another Case?
Due to similarities, some investigators thought that this crime might be related to the murder of three boys: 14-year-old Robert Peterson, 13-year-old John Schessler and his 11-year-old brother Anton.
The boys had gone to downtown Chicago to see a movie together on October 16th, 1955, and then vanished. Their nude bodies would later be discovered in a Cook County forest preserve. They had been sexually assaulted and strangled.
A man named Kenneth Hansen was ultimately found guilty of the murders and died in Pontiac Correctional Center in 2007, at the age of 74.
Were these two heinous crimes connected? Unfortunately, no one could say for sure because the DNA recovered from the bodies of the Grimes sisters was lost and couldn’t be used for comparison. However, it should be noted that the profile of Hansen's known victims (he had assaulted other boys as well) suggests that he exclusively targeted young boys.
But, interestingly, Hansen had been leasing the property where the remains of Patricia and Barbara turned up.
Current State of the Investigation
Theresa Grimes is the only surviving member of the family.
“We were a poor family,” she said. “My mother worked hard for us. She said she didn’t have to worry about us being kidnapped because we were poor. Little did she know what would happen.”
“They were nice, ordinary little girls,” Rosemary Chodor, a friend of Theresa’s, recalled. “Poor and happy–we all were. Their mother had to work and she assigned them housework, like mopping the floors. Our idea of fun was to pour soapy water over them and slide around in our bare feet giggling–silly, little-kid stuff, you know? … They might have accepted a ride with someone they knew to get warm. Either that, or someone forced them into a car.”
The tragic case of the murder of Barbara and Patricia Grimes remains open and unsolved.
