This Day in History: Albert DeSalvo, the "Boston Strangler", was convicted of numerous crimes and was sentenced to life imprisonment on this day in 1967. He had killed 13 women. He was never charged for the murder of those women because there was never any physical evidence to link DeSalvo to those crimes at the time. He was however charged with different crimes and sentenced for those. One month after this, DeSalvo and two other inmates escaped from Bridgewater State Hospital. He then disguised himself as a US Navy Petty Officer Third Class, but he actually gave himself up the next day.
However, some to this day still have problems accepting Albert DeSalvo as the lone Boston Strangler. "One of the problems with the confession that DeSalvo gave was the theory that he would have confessed to just about anything if it gave him enough notoriety. He was an egomaniac who wanted people to believe he was far more vicious and calculating than he was, and criminal profilers have argued that his profile fits exactly with someone who would lie and claim ownership of crimes that they did not commit. Indeed, there was also some confusion over his identification. Gertrude Gruen was the one woman who survived an attack by the Strangler. After his confession, she was brought in to ID him. She did not think DeSalvo was her attacker, but when she saw his cellmate, George Nassar, she felt “something upsetting, something frighteningly familiar about that man.” Could it be that Nassar told DeSalvo about the crimes in detail and then allowed him to confess in his place? Perhaps the last murder of Mary Sullivan was nothing more than a copycat crime, the only one which DeSalvo was responsible for." Rhiannon_D
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