A real life locked room mystery

The death of Emilie Russ

On February 9, 1916, Oscar F. Russ was convicted of the second-degree murder of his wife, Emilie Russ. The conviction was entirely on circumstantial evidence. No physical evidence or witness testimony connected him to the crime.

The conviction was affirmed in a decision issued in 1919. The Supreme Judicial Court summarized the evidence against Oscar:

The defendant and his wife, both young and natives of Russia, were not of the same race. The wife was an Esthonian and the defendant of Lettish and German stock, the two peoples generally not being friendly either in Russia or in the United States. The wife before her marriage was strong, healthy and of attractive appearance, but for some months prior to her death she lost flesh and was not so well.

[…]

In August, 1915, with their baby girl eleven months old, they lived in a tenement of three rooms on the first floor of a six-tenement wooden house in Roxbury. The front room was a parlor or sitting room, back of which was the kitchen, and behind that a bedroom.

The wife was last seen alive by any one except the defendant on the evening of Sunday, August 22…The deceased spent the evening with friends but returned home about ten o'clock, the defendant having remained at home.

The defendant, a painter by trade, worked the usual hours of labor on Monday, August 23, leaving his home not far from seven o'clock in the morning. …

A little before seven o'clock in the evening he was seen sitting on the steps of the house by a man named Vollm, who occupied an upper tenement. The defendant said that he had been sitting there for about two hours and could not get into his apartment. Together they tried the doors. That of the front room was locked from the inside and the one into the kitchen also was locked, having a Yale lock which fastened the door when it closed. At Vollm's suggestion the defendant entered the bedroom through a window by pushing aside a screen. Vollm went through the kitchen into the front room of the defendant's apartment and there found the cold and lifeless body of the wife stretched on the floor between a couch and table.

[…]

The clothing found on the body consisted of shoes and stockings, an undervest, a nightdress and kimono, the latter being partly over the face. A somewhat bloody open razor belonging to the defendant was lying on the nightdress, which bore no stain in the immediate vicinity. There was no trace of any struggle in the tenement. Its furnishings were in order.

The kimono was gathered in an irregular mass about the neck. It was "pulled tightly under the arms in front as though the force causing this had been directed from behind at a level of about the shoulders and from below up." Save in these particulars the scanty clothing upon the body was in perfect arrangement, and there were no traces of violence to her person except about the neck. The body was lying on its back with arms outstretched at a slight angle from the body, with palms upward.

There was no blood on the hands, body or clothing of the deceased except about the neck and head and the upper parts of the clothing. Two small ropes or cords tied about the neck were similar to others in the tenement. There was unburned paper and other waste in the kitchen stove.

Vina, the eleven-month-old daughter of Oscar and Emilie Russ, was found sleeping, peacefully, in the back bedroom.

The Commonwealth conceded, at trial, that Oscar’s alibi was confirmed; he’d been seen by others from the time he left the house that morning, until he entered the apartment with the encouragement of his neighbor, Mr. Vollm, after 7:00 PM that night.

Therefore, Oscar could only be guilty if Emilie died before 7:00 AM, more than twelve hours before she was found.

It was August. In a wooden tenement building, in Roxbury. The only evidence admitted as to time of death was not temperature, not rigor, not general appearance, but, somehow, stomach contents.

No evidence was offered concerning Vina; a toddler, left alone for a few hours will be in a different condition than a toddler left for a whole day, in the heat of August. In the days before disposable diapers, and bottles of formula, and squeezable fruit packets.

Reading the account of this trial, and the evidence presented, I needed to know more.

Who were Oscar and Emilie? What were their lives like, before this? Who were the experts who testified at trial? Who were the lawyers? Who was the judge? Why did suspicion fall on Oscar? What happened to Vina?

****

New England, in the early part of the 20th Century — like most places, actually — had an abundance of papers. Trials were covered like sports. And Massachusetts, in particular, has wonderfully abundant public and vital records, so long as you like them dusty, incomplete, and out-of date.

And so, I decided on a deep dive. A deeper dive, even, than usual. Rather than trying to find a single bit of information, a photograph, a “what happened next” — this time, I wanted to go as far as I could.

From newspaper articles, along with the case report, I was able to develop a list of people involved, from the lawyers, judges, and police officers, to the witnesses at trial.

What I found was remarkable. From a prosecutor later targeted by a shady anti-vice organization, to an oddly over-involved Reverend, and, ultimately, a possible explanation for the lonely death of Emilie Russ.