Murderous Chicago

Discussion in 'Other Reminiscences' started by Frank Sanoica, Oct 9, 2018.

  1. Frank Sanoica

    Frank Sanoica Supreme Member
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    The name stayed with me forever, Corazon Amurao. The name popped into my head this morning, while shaving, of course. Another long-lost imponderable, I asked my wife to search those two words, which meant nothing to her. She did, as I looked on, then scowled, and said, "You're weird!" She refused to discuss it more.

    Corazon Amurao was a Filippino student nurse living in a townhouse in Chicago while studying the profession with 8 other girls. She was the only survivor of one of the most senseless, disgusting killing sprees in Chicago's history. Richard Speck, an itinerant sometimes drifter, broke into their residence and commenced to kill 8 of the young women; Corazon managed to evade his awareness, hiding all night long under her bed. She screamed for help from a balcony the next morning.

    Speck was quickly located in a dollar-a-night hotel. He received the death penalty, which was overturned by the Supreme Court. His sentence was 400 years. He died in prison in 1991.

    The girls he senselessly murdered:
    • [​IMG]


    A police photograph, grisly, but depicting the realism of this horrible act.
    • [​IMG]

    This was Richard Speck:
    • [​IMG]
    "THURSDAY, JULY 14, 2011
    On this day, 45 years ago, Richard Speck committed one of the most heinous crimes of the 20th century. Late in the evening of July 13, 1966, Speck broke into a Chicago townhouse that served as a dormitory for nurses who worked at the South Chicago Community Hospital. He brutally raped and murdered eight women - two Filipino exchange nurses and six American nursing students. One young exhange nurse, 23-year-old Corazon Pieza "Cora" Amurao of San Luis, Batangas in the Philippines, hid under one bed after another and survived the attack.

    It was Cora who had answered the knock on the door that night to a tall young man with pockmarks on his face and greasy slick-backed hair. The first thing she noticed about him "was the strong smell of alcohol." He was dressed in black and he pushed his way into the townhouse where the nightmare soon began."

    Further reading: http://www.joanne16.com/2011/07/nurse-who-survived-richard-specks-1966.html
    • Corazon Amurao
      • [​IMG]
     
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  2. Chrissy Cross

    Chrissy Cross Supreme Member
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    I remember that very well even though I was in Pittsburgh and in HS at the time. My grandparents lived in Chicago.

    I think the townhouse was near Ravenswood Hospital....we lived near there in 1971 and my husband worked there as a Bio medical engineer.

    This is just in my memories so I'd have to look it up,to see if I'm right....for some reason when I hear of Richard Speck...Revenswood Hospital pops into my head.

    I haven't read your link yet...maybe it's in there.
     
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  3. Frank Sanoica

    Frank Sanoica Supreme Member
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    @Chrissy Cross

    I cannot for the life of me imagine what sort of thoughts pass through a mind such as Speck's? He was a married man, with a kid i think. Even the worst of vicious animals do not kill their own kind in vengeance, only for food when necessary.

    Speck had "Born to raise Hell" tattooed on his forearm; his arrest totaled something like 45 times.
    Frank
     
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  4. Ken Anderson

    Ken Anderson Senior Staff
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    Reportedly, Speck had a good family life until his father died when he was six. His mother soon married a drunk and his life was a confusing hell after that. He became a drunk himself and was involved with a string of crimes from the age of twelve or so. The first couple of times that he was arrested for violent crimes, he was let off easy, and he was questioned but not arrested for the first murder that he committed.

    He was an unstable, angry drunk. Frustrated after losing out on one assignment with a merchant marine vessel, and not arriving on time to fill the second assignment, he was apparently just looking for a place to rob or to spend the night when he came across the nurse's townhouse, which was near the National Maritime Union hiring hall. When asked why he did it, he said that "it just wasn't their night."

    There was some question about his having an extra Y chromosome and a claim that this may have predisposed him to violence.
     
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  5. Frank Sanoica

    Frank Sanoica Supreme Member
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    @Ken Anderson
    Thanks for this. Personally, I see hacking up human beings as being beyond violence: I believe it takes madness.
    Frank
     
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  6. Ken Anderson

    Ken Anderson Senior Staff
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    It takes an anger far beyond that which would be reasonable for anyone else, and it takes someone without a conscience. If that qualifies as madness, I agree.
     
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  7. Frank Sanoica

    Frank Sanoica Supreme Member
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    @Ken Anderson
    I might see it as other than "anger", though I understand what you mean by use of the word. I am unable to imagine this event happening......I think about self defense, the many cases I've read about over the years......the subway incident in NY, where a guy midway in the car stood up and started shooting towards the other end......several dozen able-bodied individuals behind him sat cowering in their seats as his action continued......I don't understand why folks don't react.....several men could easily have jumped him from behind, witnesses corroborated. New Yorkers see a gun, and assume they are DEAD!

    The Bernhard Goetz story is yet another....best not to get me started!
    Frank
     
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