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The investigation remained dormant until the arrest of a man named Roger Lewis Gardner, aka 'Grant Terry,' on the fugitive warrant in New York in March 1944. Gardner was extradited to California, where, after Latona Leinann changed her tentative identification to a 'positive,' he was formally arraigned for the murder of Ora Murray.
At Gardner's two-week jury murder trial in Los Angeles in October 1944, the defendant took the stand in his own defense and, while he admitted that he had 'promised to marry Jeannette Walser and did commit the theft of her ring,' adamantly denied knowing or ever seeing Ora Murray or her sister Latona. He stated he had never set foot in the Zenda Ballroom and denied any involvement whatsoever in the murder of Ora Murray.
Gardner testified, and his alibi was confirmed by defense witnesses, that he had been with his 'fiancee' Jeanette Walser until 8:15 P.M on the night of the murder, therefore making it physically impossible for him to be at the downtown dance hall at 8:30 P.M. Further testimony showed that on the night of the murder, just minutes before 'Paul' was seen dancing with the victim, Gardner was twenty miles away wearing 'sport clothes' rather than the dark suit and fedora known to be worn by 'Paul.'
On November 11,1944, the jury was 'hopelessly deadlocked,' with half of them convinced that it was a case of mistaken identity. Gardner, some of the members of the jury believed, while a self-confessed con man, lothario, and thief, was nevertheless not the same sophisticated, well-dressed 'Paul' who drove Ora Murray away from her sister's house to see Hollywood and later bludgeoned and strangled her to death at the nearby Fox Hills golf course.
The Walser photograph of 'Grant Terry' that appeared in the newspaper and was later determined to be Roger Lewis Gardner was of poor quality. In checking records, I found that the photographic negative from the
Both of the above photographs were taken in the same year, 1943. The photo of Father, where I am seated on his knee, was taken in November 1943, just three months after the Ora Murray murder.
At the Ora Murray crime scene, police also discovered a Native American bracelet on her wrist, the kind of bracelet my father collected when he was working for the Public Health Service on the Navajo and Hopi reservations. My father had given just such a bracelet to my mother (exhibit 54a), which she was wearing in the photograph taken by Man Ray in Hollywood in 1944. Man Ray's photograph clearly shows the Indian bracelets and Thunder God ring my father had given her at the time of their marriage three years before this photograph was taken. The sheriff's department detectives never released a photograph or a complete description of the Native American jewelry that 'Paul' gave Ora Murray on the night they met and danced together; the actual bracelet, or photographs of it, may still be in the unsolved-case file.
Photograph B shows a Southwest Native American bracelet given to witness Jeanette Walser by con man Roger Gardner, which is also similar to my mother's, and is identical to the type given to the murder victim, Ora Murray, by the suspect.
Some of the available information pertaining to the Ora Murray murder investigation remains confusing and unclear. Without access to the actual case files a number of questions remain unanswered. For example, to whom did the torn credit card found next to the body belong? And did the detectives ever check out this easily traceable evidence, as they told the press they would? Certainly the card did not belong to their suspect Roger Gardner, because the information was never introduced at his trial. Could the credit card have been exculpatory evidence and thus, the way things were done in 1944, held back from the defense?
From researching the investigation and trial testimony prior to Gardner's release from custody, I found that on the night of the murder Gardner had borrowed Jeanette Walser's blue convertible, which he claimed he drove to the Ambassador Hotel and parked overnight. Upon preparing to return it the following morning, Gardner discovered that it had a flat tire. Gardner also had given Walser an Indian bracelet, similar in appearance to the one found on victim Ora Murray's wrist. Gardner, having completed his con and theft of her jewelry, then told his fiancee — who at this point had become his victim — that something unexpected had come up and 'he had to go to San Diego with a man named George, to try a case.' Was the mysterious 'George' actually George Hodel?
While all of these facts may be an accumulation of coincidences, the very real possibility exists that Gardner and Hodel knew each other and that George Hodel, either with or without Gardner's knowledge, may have 'borrowed' the convertible from where Gardner had parked it at the Ambassador Hotel. The cocktail lounge at the Ambassador was one of Father's favorite hangouts. It is possible that after taking the car, George Hodel, calling himself 'Paul,' drove Ora Murray on her late-night tour of Hollywood, committed the murder in the early-morning hours, and returned the vehicle to the hotel, where Gardner found it parked with a flat tire.
In all likelihood, we will never know the facts surrounding this murder. I strongly suspect, however, that Hodel and Gardner did know each other and that Dr. George Hill Hodel did murder Ora Murray.
Ora Murray did not immediately fade into history after the trial and acquittal. Her name resurfaced two years later on January 23, 1947, when she was mentioned by crime reporter Agness Underwood in her feature article wherein the reporter asked rhetorically in a headline, 'Will Dahlia Slaying Join Album of Unsolved Murders?' Underwood raised the possibility that the 1943 Ora Murray, the 1944 Georgette Bauerdorf, the 1946 Gertrude Evelyn Landon, and the 1947 Elizabeth Short murders might all be connected.
