Crime of the Century: The Lindbergh Kidnapping Hoax

After it was announced that the twenty-month old son of Charles and Anne Lindbergh was abducted on March 1, 1932, the entire world grieved for their loss. Seventy-two days later, the body was found in the woods next to a roadway, a short distance from Lindbergh's house, near Hopewell, New Jersey. In 1927, Lindbergh was the first to fly solo across the Atlantic in his Spirit of St. Louis. By 1932, he was perhaps the most famous man alive. A great American hero, he was allowed to be the chief architect of the investigation into his son's kidnapping. He demanded that the body be cremated without an autopsy. This book traces the 2½ year investigation by the New Jersey State Police, headed by Colonel H. Norman Schwarzkopf, and which led to the arrest, trial, conviction and execution of Bruno Richard Hauptmann. It challenges the effectiveness of the investigation, and the evidence advanced by the prosecution, which convicted Hauptmann. It also details the role that Mr. Lindbergh played in the investigation. More importantly, it dissects evidence previously overlooked of Lindbergh's own role in his son's disappearance, which, in combination with the authors' expert analysis, leads to a new and bold assertion as to who actually committed the “Crime of the Century.”