The Man Who Killed Halloween

Each year, children eagerly dressed up as the person/thing of their choice and trick-or-treat. After the fun is over, a common tradition is consuming a few pieces of the candy received. Unfortunately, for Timothy O’Brien the night ended in tragedy.

Ronald Clark O’Bryan and Daynene had two children: Timothy, 8, and Elizabeth, 5. They resided in Deer Park, Texas. Ronald worked as an optician at Texas State Optical Company. He was amidst some serious financial problems. The family had been forced to sell their home to help pay for loans. Ronald discussed his money troubles with friends and acquaintances, telling some of them that he would receive some money at the end of the year.

O’Bryan decided to make the decision to increase the life insurance coverage on his children. By mid-October, both children had 30,000 on their name. O’Bryan and his wife, on the contrary, had minimal coverage to their names.

In August 1974, he discussed the varieties and availabilities of cyanide, which is known to have a bitter almond taste, with a friend who worked at Arco Chemical Company. He also discussed the subject with his coworkers. Shortly before Halloween, O’Bryan went to Curtin Matheson Scientific Company, which was a chemical outlet in Houston. Upon hearing that the company sold cyanide in large quantities, he inquired where he could get some in a smaller amount.

On that Halloween, the O’Bryan’s dined at the home of Jim Bates, a family friend who lived in Pasadena. The Bates and O’Bryan children had planned to go trick-or-treating in Bates’ neighborhood.

Despite the lights being off at a particular house, O’Bryan and the children went up to the home anyway. When no one answered the door, the children went on to the next house. O’Bryan, however, stayed back for around thirty seconds. He then went up to the children and produced five pixie sticks about 20 inches long. He gave one to each child and gave the last one to a boy came to trick or treat at that door. As to where he got the pixie sticks, O’Bryan claimed that the “rich neighbors” had given it to him.

After the children got home from the festivities, O’Bryan told his children that they could eat one piece of candy before going to bed. Timothy chose the pixie stick. He was having trouble opening the tube, so O’Bryan rolled the stick in his hand to help him open it. Upon consuming some of the stick, Timothy complained that it was bitter tasting. O’Bryan then gave Timothy some Kool-Aid to help wash the stick’s contents down.

Immediately, Timothy ran to the bathroom and started vomiting. When he started having convulsions, O’Bryan called for an ambulance. Timothy died with an hour after his arrival at the hospital.

Fear and Panic

Naturally, Timothy’s death cause fear in the community around them. Investigators told the public that they should bring the candy in if it looked suspicious. They wound up a lot of candy because of the fear that it was poisoned.

An autopsy found that Timothy’s stomach contained 16 milligrams and blood contained .4 milligrams of cyanide. The lethal dose is 0.2 – 0.3 milligrams. They found the pixie stick to contain two inches cyanide.

Officers worked to collect the remaining pixie sticks and luckily collected the rest of them. One of the sticks was holding the candy, asleep. The boy had been unable to undo the staples on the candy. A test was done and it showed that the rest of the sticks also had two inches of cyanide at the top

An Investigation

Investigators found out that O’Bryan would receive 40,000 if Timothy died and that his wife had no clue about this policy. They also found out that O’Bryan had to sell his home because he was in debt. They looked through the family home and found O’Bryan’s knife with traces of candy and plastic on the blade.

When O’Bryan was brought in for questioning, he first told the investigator that he did not know which house or street the pixie sticks were from. He also told them that he did not know the person. This confused investigators because the group had only gone on two streets.

O’Bryan finally showed the house that he had gotten the candy from. It belonged to a man named Courtney Melvin. However, Melvin was not in his home until 11 pm on the night of Halloween. He had been working at Hobby Airport and had many people able to vouch for him.

An Arrest and Trial

Ronald O’Bryan was arrested on November 4, 1974 and charged with the murder of the murder of Timothy O’Bryan. He never admitted to killing his son and plead not guilty.

During the trial, physical evidence was used along with the testimony of the O’Bryan’s wife, the chemist, and coworkers. The jury took less than an hour to deliberate and 71 minutes to sentence O’Bryan to death.

O’Bryan was dubbed the “Candy Man” by fellow inmates, not to be confused by the Texan killer “Candyman.” He appealed his case many times but they were all rejected. His final meal was a well done steak and Boston cream pie. O’Bryan was then injected with a cocktail of drugs more lethal than electrocution or cyanide gas. He was declared dead on March 30, 1984.

The Aftermath

Timothy O’Bryan’s death changed the community. People were more careful about the candy their children received and, for many years, Houston was not allowed to go trick or treating for years after the event.

Sources

Ronald Clark O’Bryan
‘Man Who Ruined Halloween’: Recounting the horror story of the notorious ‘Candyman’
35 years later, memories of the notorious Halloween “Candyman: murder remains vivid
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/423527/ronald-clark-obryan-v-wj-estelle-jr-director-texas-department-of/?q=ronald%20clark
https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/1793039/obryan-v-state/?q=ronald%20clark
The Haunting Legacy of Ronald Clark O’Bryan, the Man Who Killed Halloween

The Murder of Grace Brown

On July 12, 1906, a rowboat was found capsized by a steamboat which contained a search party for a couple that had rented that boat. A young boy on this boat noticed a large mass at the bottom and brought it to the attention of the crew. They pulled it up, thinking that it was just garbage but, to their surprise, it was a body.

The Beginning

Grace Mae Brown, Wikimedia Commons

Grace Mae Brown was born on March 20, 1886, the fifth of nine children. Her father, Frank Brown, was a farmer. Her mother was Betsy Minvera Babcock. They resided in South Otselic, Chenago County, New York on a dairy farm. She moved to Cortland in 1904 to live with her sister. There, she got a job at the Cortland Skirt Factory. While she was working at this factory, she met a young man named Chester Gillette.

Chester Gillette

Chester Gillette, Wikimedia Commons

Chester Gillette was born August 9, 1883 in Montana. His father was Frank, a silver miner, and Lousia Rice. His family moved to Spokane, Washington when Chester was three. His parents were financially comfortable but deeply religious, and eventually joined the Salvation Army after they lost everything in the Great Spokane Fire of 1889. The family traveled around the West Coast and Hawaii during Gillette’s adolescence. He attended Oberlin College’s preparatory school, paid for by his wealthy uncle, but left after two years. He worked odd jobs until 1905, where he took a job at his uncle’s business, the Cortland Skirt Factory.

The Love Story

Grace Brown and Chester Gillette began dating in secret. She was not the standards that Gillette’s family wanted for him. The Gillette’s were rich and Chester was handsome and from a good family. Grace, on the other hand was a farm girl and a factory worker. Chester didn’t want the others to know he as dating a factory girl. He had his eyes on a rich girl who was an acquaintance of Gillette.

In May of 1906, however, Grace revealed to Gillette that she was pregnant. At the time, unwed mothers were outcasts from society. Grace went back to her family farm where she and Gillette exchanged correspondence by letters.

Grace begged Chester to marry her through these letters, expressing her fear when her family found out about the baby. Chester finally responded that he would take her away to a romantic outing in July. Grace assumed that they would either get married or he would propose to her on this trip.

The Murder

On the first night of the trip, they spent their time in Utica. From there, they took the train to Tupper Lake. On July 11th, they took a train back towards Utica, stopping at Big Moose Lake in Herkimer County.

Gillette registered at the Glenmore Hotel under a false name which matched his monogrammed luggage. Grace had brought her whole wardrobe with her while, on the contrary, Chester brought very little luggage.

Gillette then took her out on a rented row boat. Vacationers had seen them boating and even go out for a picnic earlier that day. Gillette brought everything with him, including a tennis racket which was attached to his luggage. Around the early evening, Gillette smashed Grace’s head with the tennis racket, knowing full well from a letter that she could not swim. She then fell into the water. Gillette then fled o the Arrowhead Lodge under an alias.

Robert Morrison, the owner of the rented row boat, assumed that the couple had misjudged the size of the lake and ended up at a different hotel when they did not return after the sun had set. He was worried, however, the next day and formed a search party. They then found Grace Brown’s body and called the authorities.

The Investigation

The police found, through the investigation, that there was a couple with the names of Carl Graham and Grace Brown. The assumed that the man Grace was with would also be found in the lake, but after searchers dragged the lake, they found nothing. The authorities contacted Grace Brown’s family and found that she had not spent any time with a Carl Graham. She did, however associate with a Chester Gillette.

Police found Chester at Arrowhead Lodge through help from others and arrested him. He was socializing, laughing, and even bragging about the murder. Chester claimed that there had been an accident that resulted in her death. In another story, he claimed that he stood up and the boat capsized. Gillette did not help her, for fear that she would panic and drag him under. He shouted at her to grab on the boat and when she did, the boat turned over again.

An autopsy report showed that Grace was four months pregnant and was alive when she entered the water. She had also suffered a beating which caused bruising on her face. This had caused her death, not drowning.

The Trial

When Chester was in jail, he continued to maintain his innocence. Visitors were allowed to come in to wish him well or curse him to hell.

The case was the most sensational trial to be held in Upstate New York. Hundreds came to witness and famous newsmen, such as Bat Masterson, came from New York City to see the trial.

The trial began on November 12, 1906. Prosecution proposed that Chester was driven to murder Grace because of the insistence of marriage. They had no confession, however so the needed to collect as much circumstantial evidence as possible.

Guests at the hotel said they saw Chester speak harshly to Grace, although they could not hear the topic of conversation. They also witnessed Chester pace the hall nervously before the boat ride. The District Attorney Ward wondered why an innocent man would check into a hotel under an alias. The tennis racket, according to the coroner was suspected to be the murder weapon. The clothing and luggage was dry, even though Gillette had claimed to have retrieved it from the water. Gillette had taken a weird path to Arrowhead Lodge. Gillette also did not report the incident.

The fetus was presented as evidence in case the defense might deny the pregnancy. Chester’s lawyer, Charles D Thomas, promised that Grace’s condition would not be disputed because it had no bearing on the case.

The defense proposed the scenario that Grace was so distraught that she ended her life. Gillette testified this on stand, saying that she jumped in while he sat on the other end and cause it to capsize.

Thomas read out the letters Grace had sent to Gillette. Instead of finding Grace suicidal, the court empathized with her. Lawyers, jurors, and Grace’s family cried during these readings. Even Gillette shed a tear as he listened.

The Conviction

In the end, the jury believed the story the prosecution put together.

Chester enticed Grace into the boat with promises of a romantic day. He brought the suitcase and racket with him. When Chester found a private place out of earshot of other vacationers, he brought Grace to the shore and beat her with the racket. He then dumped her in the lake and made his escape trough a rugged and wooded trail to Arrowhead Lodge. He arrived bone dry, with his suitcase and racket in hand.

On December 5, 1906, after nearly five hours of deliberation, Gillette was found guilty of murder in the first degree. He was sentenced o death by an electric chair. Gillette was reportedly calm and smiling as the sentence was handed down. He telegrammed his father “I am convicted” upon hearing the verdict.

Gillette was transferred from Herkimer Country Jail to Auburn Prison, now the Auburn Correctional Facility, where he was electrocuted. After several failed attempts, he was finally executed on March 30, 1908.

As the end was near, it is said that he confessed to murdering Grace Brown, but only to his spiritual advisors. These advisors did not reveal the exact facts of his confession.

Gillette’s body was taken to Soule Cemetery where he was buried in an unmarked grave. It is said that his body was buried in a plot where the road was paved over, so the exact location is unknown.

Aftermath

Grace’s funeral was held in her home town and was buried in the Brown family plot.

The murder inspired Theodore Dreiser’s An American Tragedy, which was later adapted to the film called A Place in the Sun. There was a song called “The Ballad of Big Moose Lake” which was influenced by the murder.

The courthouse and jail still stand today and is the headquarters of the Sheriff’s Department. Tours are given by the Herkimer County Historical Society.

The public can take advantage of hiking, camping, and boating at the lake.

Sources

The Tragic Death of Grace Brown
Murder of Grace Brown: Relive Infamous crime at Big Moose Lake in the Adirondacks
The Murder at Big Moose Lake
Chester Gillette