WARNING: EXPLICIT MATERIAL

Dr. Sam Sheppard

Birth Name:

Samuel Holmes Sheppard

Birth Date:

December 29, 1923

Birth Place:

Cleveland, Ohio

Death Date:

April 6, 1970

Place of Death:

Columbus, Ohio

Age:

Cause of Death:

Wernicke's encephalopathy and liver failure

Cemetery Name:

Knollwood Cemetery

Claim to Fame:

Crime and their Victims

Associates:

Marilyn Sheppard

Dr. Sam Sheppard was an attractive and well-liked doctor who tended to hundreds of patients throughout his career at Bay View Hospital in Ohio. In the early morning hours of July 4, 1954 the nightmare began for the Sheppard family when Sam's wife, Marilyn, was discovered brutally murdered. Mrs. Sheppard was found lying on her bed in their master bedroom in a provocative manner. She had been “chopped 25 times in the head and chest.” There was never any hard evidence found that directly tied Dr. Sam Sheppard to the death of his wife, Marilyn. Nonetheless he was found guilty of second degree murder at his first trial. After over a decade in prison the murder conviction was overturned on June 6, 1966 due to a lack of evidence. Dr. Sam Sheppard was a free man from that time until he passed away in 1970. His experience inspired the hit TV show and movie The Fugitive.

And the rest of the story …

There are only three suspects ever debated as the killer of Marilyn Sheppard – Richard Eberling (an occasional handyman and window washer at the Sheppard home), James Call (a washed-out air force officer who became a burglar, killer and fugitive from the law) and Dr. Sam Sheppard.

During further court proceedings in September 1997, Sam Sheppard’s body was exhumed. After testing, the body was cremated and the ashes inurned in the same mausoleum crypt at Knollwood Cemetery as Marilyn. Two years later Marilyn Sheppard’s body was exhumed for further court proceedings. At that time, Chip Sheppard learned that his mother had been pregnant at the time of her murder, a fact concealed from the Sheppard defense team. (The county coroner had retained the fetus illegally for a year after her death, and the unborn child — held in a glass jar full of formaldehyde — was placed in the Sheppard crypt in 1955.) Both the remains of the unborn child and Marilyn Sheppard were reinterred in the same crypt.

Cemetery Information:

Final Resting Place:

Knollwood Cemetery

1678 SOM Center Road

Mayfield Heights, Ohio, 44124

USA

North America

Map:

Cemetery Map of Knollwood Cemetery in Mayfield Heights in Ohio.

Grave Location:

Mausoleum, North Wing, Crypt 744E

Grave Location Description

From the main entrance, take the second right hall and walk down the hallway and turn left then left again and look along the top of the crypts for 744 where you will find Dr. Sam Sheppard resting along with his wife and unborn child.