Elena Semander

popular name: Henry Bedard, Jr.

date_of_death: December 16, 1974

age: 15

cause_of_death: Homicide - blunt force trauma

claim_to_fame: Crime and their Victims

best_know_for: Henry E. Bedard Jr. was a 15‑year‑old sophomore at Swampscott High School in Massachusetts. He was active in school sports—playing youth baseball and "Big Blue" football—and also worked at his father’s service station. Henry was considered a beloved member of his community, known for spending time with family and friends. On December 16, 1974, Henry was last seen after school doing some Christmas shopping. He stopped at a CVS in Vinnin Square, buying perfume as a gift for his sister. After leaving the mall, witnesses (including Swampscott Police Lieutenant Peter Cassidy) saw him walking along Paradise Road and entering a wooded area near the town’s Department of Public Works yard, a place known locally as “Swampscott View” or “Kite Hill.” The next day his body was discovered in that wooded area, behind the DPW building, under a pile of leaves. He had been severely beaten to death. Investigators found a Louisville Slugger baseball bat near the body—31‑inch, wooden—with distinctive carvings or markings on the handle, possibly Roman numerals or letters. The bat is believed to be a key piece of evidence. Despite investigations, including interviewing dozens of people, reviewing the evidence, and even exhuming Henry’s body recently to run updated forensic tests (such as DNA) and autopsy work, no one has been charged in his murder. The case remains unsolved half a century later with no suspect and no motive.

popular name: Joe Arridy

date_of_death: January 6, 1939

age: 23

cause_of_death: Execution - gas chamber

claim_to_fame: Crime and their Victims

best_know_for: In August of 1936 Joe Arridy was arrested for vagrancy and shortly after confessed to the rape and brutal murder of Dorothy Drain, a 15-year-old girl in Pueblo, Colorado. Only problem was that Joe Arridy had an I.Q. of 46 and the understanding of a 6-year-old child. Unfortunately that did not matter to the arresting sheriff, the prosecutor or the judge who sentenced Arridy to death in the gas chamber. Despite the exhaustive work his attorney did along with a host of professionals to halt this travesty of "justice" Joe Arridy was murdered by the State of Colorado on January 6, 1939. So unaware of his surrounding or his situation, he enjoyed his last meal of ice cream and smiled and joked with the guards as they escorted him to the gas chamber.

popular name: Frank Sheeran

date_of_death: December 14, 2003

age: 83

cause_of_death: Cancer

claim_to_fame: Crime and their Victims

best_know_for: Frank Sheeran was a truck driver, corrupt labor union official and alleged mafia hitman. Sheeran is thought by some to have murdered Teamsters president Jimmy Hoffa, (among dozens of others) and was the subject of the 2019 film "The Irishman" starring Robert De Niro and Joe Pesci. The truth of the matter is that Sheeran, near death struggling with cancer, dictated his life story to writer Charles Brandt who created a book that was adapted into the movie "The Irishman." In the book Sheeran told Brandt that he had committed one of the country's most infamous unsolved crimes: the murder of Jimmy Hoffa, a powerful onetime leader of the Teamsters Union with ties to organized crime. Sheeran also took credit for killing "Crazy Joe" Gallo, a mobster who was taken out at his own birthday party in 1972. Sheeran's claims got even wilder. He portrayed himself as a peripheral character in JFK's assassination, and a minor player in the Bay of Pigs invasion. Somehow, this previously low-profile thug was the lynchpin in every major unsolved, mob-linked hit. In the end, he claimed to have killed more than 25 people yet the FBI has not been able to link Sheeran to a single killing. Upon his death, he was interred at Holy Cross Cemetery in Yeadon, PA.