LA Forensics: Mysterious Confession

The detectives next tracked down Edith's boyfriend, Mike Swanson. Swanson was tall, with shoulder-length curly hair and a horseshoe mustache.

When the detectives first questioned him, Swanson was uncooperative, but when the cops pressed him, he dropped his Southern California cool. Giving attitude to drunks in a bar might earn you points with the waitresses, but giving attitude to a couple of LAPD homicide detectives just might earn you a trip to the police station.

Swanson admitted that for a brief time he had been getting it on with both sisters. He'd been seeing Lois behind Edith's back. Edith found out and blew up. He said he stopped calling Lois a few weeks before her death.

Lois and Edith's mother confirmed Swanson's story.

Detectives took a set of Swanson's fingerprints and compared them to those they found in Lois's apartment. They didn't match. Nor did Swanson's blood type — the most advanced forensic science available at the time — match the blood on the pillow. That blood, the Crime Lab determined, belonged to Lois.

Swanson was a dead end.

So was Libby and Joseph the truck guy.