The Murder of Anna Nosko

0:00 Warning. Kind of Murdery contains adult themes, explicit language, and descriptions of violence. It is not suitable for anyone, and we recommend you stop listening now. I'm Zevan Odelberg, and this is kind of murdery. Please join me as we uncover what truths we can and solve what mysteries we may. The murder of Anna and Nosco starts now. Anna Nosco collected the family mail on her way home from school every day. Then, on March eighth, nineteen twenty three, the eleven year old girl was late returning to her family's farm.

0:58 When Anna was late getting home, missus Nosco, Anna's mother, revealed to her husband that she had had a terrifying dream about her daughter. Just the night before. Missus Nosco had dreamt that Anna, just four days short of twelve years old, had been coming up the railroad tracks to her home when an evil looking man had stepped out to attack her. He had struck Anna with a crushing fist, then taken out a blackjack or a sap from his pocket and struck her a deadly blow on the head. At this point in her dream, missus Nosco told her husband that she'd rose in affright wide awake, Anna had still not returned home.

1:39 In the town of Battleground, Clark County, Washington, Paul Nosco told his story to his friends and neighbors that his daughter Anna had not returned home, that her mother had had a terrible dream just the night before. Men began to gather. Their faces were grim, and they carried weapons. Some had shotgun and slung under their arms. Others carried rifles. A few had armed themselves with stout clubs. It was an eerie scene as men prepared for a man hunt. The snow still fell, The wind howled here and there through the white waste.

2:14 Lantern lights flickered. The countryside was desperately searching for the beloved little girl who'd so strangely dropped from sight. I know she's dead, Anna's mother wailed. When she went to school this morning, she skipped down the walk, then she paused, and she came back. She ran to me, and she kissed me again and said, mother, dear, I may never see you again. How did a little girl, a mere child? Since the disaster was soon to befall her. As missus Nosco shared her story of Anna's premonition, Bert Anna's younger brother, sensing that something was vitally wrong, said to his mother, I saw a man dash out of the bushes along the railroad track this afternoon.

2:58 He picked up an umbrella, I think it was Anna's, and then he ran for cover again. When asked what else he had seen, the boy replied that there was nothing else except that nearby the railroad track where he'd seen the man with the umbrella, there was a dog, Eddie Whitfield's dog. Now, the testimony of a small boy under stress and excitement may not be reliable, and Eddie Whitfield's dog being on the railroad track did not actually signify a thing. It was natural for Eddie Whitfield's dog to be around that spot, after all.

3:30 The john took homestead, where Eddie Whitfield lived, was adjacent to the track and the nearest house to the Noscos. Through the gloom, every inch of the railroad track was covered with a fine tooth comb. Still, the search was unrewarded. Then one man ahead of the others cried out wildly and pointed Stuck to the barbed wire fence on the side of the railroad was a piece of cloth. It looked like it might have been torn from Anna's coat as she was dragged through the fence. The searchers followed through tensions, mounted conversation.

4:03 Dwindled men cradled their rifles and shot guns and swore quietly. The temper of the crowd was beginning to turn ugly. If murder had been committed, swift and arbitrary mob justice might be dealt. An umbrella lay in the path. There was no doubt it was Anna's. The posse steps quickened and they went on, undoubtedly the sort of general who leads from the front. Sheriff Bill Thompson set the pace for the posse, and as they searched, hoping to run down an arrest the perpetrator of one of the foulest crimes that ever stained the record of southwestern Washington, the sheriff was thinking back, pulling out all the odd bits of information that he'd gathered through the years.

4:49 Who, he wondered, fits this beastly crime? Who could have done it? A man of abnormal instincts? Of course? Was there anyone in the community. He racked his b who showed evidence of sufficiently abnormal psychology. Suddenly the sheriff stopped in his tracks. Come on, he commanded, I have a lead. The posse walked rapidly toward the Old two homestead while Sheriff Thompson explained that he wanted to question George Edward Whitfield. The sheriff graphically reconstructed a scene and acted. On July twenty fourth, nineteen twenty two, a little less than a year before Anna had disappeared.

5:28 At that time, Sheriff Thompson, armed with a search warrant, had rated the two house in quest of liquor, this being prohibition years. Of course, he secured the liquor, although that is irrelevant to this story. In executing his search warrant, he searched the trunk of Eddie Whitfield and pulled from that trunk many things of questionable character. There were articles of intimate women's apparel, garters, underwear there by the dozen silk stockings also numerous, and was more, much more, but enough has been described.

6:02 Along with the women's undergarments were poems written by George Edward Whitfield. They were not poems which a man would want to read aloud in the family circle. They were not poems for children. They were, for the most part vile sexual and violent. Sheriff Thompson also revealed that Eddie was a bit of an artist. In his room were many pictures, all of one subject, a naked woman, Eddie Whitfields. Our abnormality, Sheriff Thompson declared emphatically. Suddenly, the leaders of the posse paused and drew back.

6:33 In the presence of death. Anna Nosco's little body lay beside a big rock upon a natural couch of fur needles. One small, slim arm was thrown out from her side, the other arm was drawn across her chest, the hand resting on her throat. Guards were left with Anna's body and they built a bonfire against the chill of the night. The rest of the posse arrived at the took place, along with battleground officer James Holland, but Eddie Whitfield was not at home. Sheriff Thompson noted that it was peculiar that Eddie Whitfield didn't join in the search for the missing girl.

7:10 He was, after all, the nearest neighbor to the Nosco's, yet he made no effort to aid the Nosco family as they were facing dire tragedy. What manner of man was he? Could he feel no concern, could he manifest no grief? Of course, if Eddie Whitfield had done this awful thing, he likely would not show up at all. He might in fact be on his way out of the country. But no movement caught Sheriff Thompson's eye. Eddie Whitfield was there. He was leaning over a bit one hand, supporting himself on a big rock, straining to see the dead girl where she lay.

7:45 He was in his shirt sleeves. He wore no hat. His hair was white with snow particles. The night was bitter cold, but Eddie seemed not to feel the cruel bite of the wind. He did not remain long looking at the little girl who lay so still and death. The sight may have unnerved him. He could not stand still. He jiggled back and forth where he stood. He moved from place to place. His mouth was twisted into a leering grin. Quick as a flash, Sheriff Thompson closed the distance between himself and Whitfield, drew his gun and stuck it in Whitfield's gut.

8:21 Put your hands up, Whitfield, You're under arrest for the murder of Anna Nosco. The sheriff growled, Now a word on the state of Anna's body when it was discovered Anne who did the discovering. The search party that found Anna's body was made up of around thirty neighbors, including a man named Frederick Vandermast. They were all volunteers. It was Vandermast who discovered Anna's umbrella and the postal letters scattered on the ground, the first troubling indications of a crime. Later, as I've mentioned, a searcher came across Anna's body away from a road in the brush just over the border of the two farm.

9:00 Someone had ripped the clothes from her body, cut her throat, and bashed in her face. When Sheriff Thompson arrested Whitfield as he leered over Little Anna's corpse, Whitfield immediately protested his innocence, but there were scratches on the back of his hand and traces of blood on his underwear. Whitfield claimed this was because he'd butchered a chicken, but Thompson charged him with first degree murder, assuming a rape. Sheriff Thompson collected bits of foreign matter from Whitfield's groin, placing each in a cigarette paper.

9:33 He followed an evidence technique. He'd learned it a lecture by Luke May, an early Seattle forensic pioneer. The brutality of Anna's murder shocked and angered the entire county. Just a few days after Whitfield's arrest, the Tuke family farmhouse burned as flame shot skyward. A large group watched, making no attempt to extinguish the blaze. Reportedly, two men were seen skulking around the place with torch, but no arrests were made. Hearing rumors of a plan to break Eddie Whitfield out of jail to lynch him, Sheriff Thompson moved Whitfield to Pierce County and then returned him six days later.

10:11 Whitfield's brother, John, a material witness in the case, refused to return to Battleground fearing his own quote necktie party. During the trial before Judge George Simpson, the defense attorneys, Charles Lane and W. E. Yates first used an insanity plea, then they dropped it. They petitioned to change the venue but failed. Next, they tried to create doubt with the jurors by implicating Vandermast in the murder. Remember, Vandermast was the community member who found her umbrella and mail strewn about before they discovered Anna's body.

10:47 Attorney Lane claimed that Vandermast could not look at the body, while Whitfield walked up to view the body and was not shaken, implying that Vandermast's anxiety showed guilt while the defendant's nonchalance showed innocence. That's the opposite of the conclusion that I would likely draw, which is that Vandermath's anxiety showed empathy while the defendant's nonchalance showed sociopathy. But then, I'm not a defense attorney, am I? Meanwhile, working behind the scenes, the forensic scientist Luke May was scientifically saw in the case.

11:27 He told the press he'd uncovered highly damaging evidence, but would not reveal it except in court. At trial, May present that his forensic evidence he confirmed the blood on Whitfield's clothing was human and not belonging to a chicken, as Whitfield had claimed. May found half a fur needle near Anna's pelvis when he examined the girl. Sheriff Thompson had also collected half a fur needle, which he'd sealed in the cigarette papers. After the arrest of Eddie Whitfield may microscopically match the needle's two broken ends, that the half a needle the sheriff had taken from Whitfield's underwear was a perfect match for the half a needle may found in Anna Nosco's pelvic area, thereby proving the prosecution's case.

12:20 The jury found the defendant guilty of first degree murder, and Judge Simpson sentenced him to hang. Lawyers Yates and Lane filed an appeal and lost, and on June thirteenth, nineteen twenty four, a calm and collected Eddie Whitfield mounted the walla walla prison gallows stairs. After the trapdoor dropped, two prison doctors declared him dead at four forty four am, and finally the rape and murder of little Anna Nosca had been avenged. Although vengeance is nothing but the coldest of comforts when the life of a child has been taken.

13:06 Thank you for joining me on this trek through the darkness. Please do return this Sunday evening for a brand new episode. I'm Zevan Odelberg, and this has been kind of murdering