A trunk dripping blood, discovered at a railway station in Stockton in 1906, launched one of the most famous murder investigations in California history--still debated by crime historians. In 1913, the dismembered body of a young pregnant woman, found in the East River, was traced back to her killer and husband, who remains the only priest ever executed for homicide in the U.S. In 1916, a successful dentist, recently married into a prestigious family, poisoned his in-laws--first with deadly bacteria, then with arsenic--claiming the real murderer was an Egyptian incubus who took control of his body.

Drawing on court transcripts, newspaper coverage and other contemporary sources, this collection of historical American true crime stories chronicles five murder cases that became media sensations of their day, making headlines across the country in the decades before radio or television.