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Clutter investigators didn't have high-tech tools of today
Published 11/14/2009 in Local News
By KATHY HANKS
The Hutchinson News
With no motive or any trace of a weapon, a bloody boot print, waterproof adhesive tape and nylon cord was all the evidence investigators had to go on in search of the murderers of the Herb Clutter family.
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Patrick Traylor/The Hutchinson News A display documenting the 1959 Clutter murder at the Finney County Law Enforcement Center in Garden City.
Officers investigating this horrific crime that shattered the region's sense of well being, didn't have the technology crime scene investigators use today to work the case.
If any hair or clothing fibers had been left behind in the Clutter home, it went unnoticed 50 years ago. Today, however, that simple shred of information can be a case closing clue.
The greatest advance in technology, according to Bruce Mellor, KBI special agent for the Great Bend region, is DNA, which can be found in a drop of blood, saliva, skin or hair. Arriving at a crime scene, investigators routinely collect hair fiber and blood samples for analysis.
Moreover, today's technology includes bloodstain pattern analysis, where experts can take measurements of blood drops to determine the direction of the attack and the positions of the victims and attackers.
Fifty years ago, investigators didn't have CODIS, a national database of DNA profiles taken from convicted offenders. Mellor said CODIS was how the KBI recently solved a rural farm burglary that resulted in a homicide.
The Clutter murderers -- Perry Smith and Richard Hickock -- were on parole from the Kansas State Penitentiary at the time of the killings; today, their DNA would be in the system.
However, despite the low-tech form of investigation, the two men were caught less than two months after the murders, and Finney County Sheriff Kevin Bascue describes it as "one heck of case."
Reading through the investigation, he's impressed with the work of the investigative team, which included Sheriff Earl Robinson, Finney County Attorney Duane West and KBI Special Agents Al Dewey and Harold Nye.
But, what also impresses Bascue is the relatively short amount of time the investigation took, despite being swamped with tons of leads from all over the region. Investigators had no idea who they were looking for, so they explored each tip that came in, whether it was in southwest Kansas, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Texas or Colorado. A major investigation tool back then, Bascue said, was going out and interviewing people. Plus, because they were searching in the dark with so little clues, part of the investigation was to interview every person who ever worked on Herb Clutter's River Valley Farm.
"Things were done so differently back then," Bascue said, noting in his 13 years as sheriff he hasn't experienced a crime of this magnitude. Along with tracking down people and interviewing them, they used polygraph tests.¬ Though not admissible in court, it was a tool to help gauge whether police were on the right track.
They also used the crime scene photographs as evidence. Included in the batch of photographs was one of the boot print in a pool of blood, which helped them nab Smith and Hickock.
Bascue finds it incredible that investigators would be sent to Mexico City to retrieve the Clutters' binoculars and transistor radio.
"No way would we go to Mexico and recover evidence today," he said. "We have the technology, but we wouldn't be able to go to another country and recover evidence. Today, instead, we would call law enforcement and ask them to find and recover it."
He noted that very rarely does law enforcement get the in-depth confessions like they got from Smith and Hickock.
"The rights afforded people are greater today than back then when there was no Miranda warning, and you could question all you wanted," Bascue said.
Five days into the murder investigation, The Hutchinson News offered a $1,000 reward for any information leading to the arrest of the killer or killers.
Hickock's former cellmate, and former Clutter farm hand Floyd Wells, confessed to a KBI agent on Dec. 10, 1959, that he had told Hickock that Herb Clutter kept large sums of money in a safe in his house.
Wells statement, along with the bloody boot print, led the KBI to their suspects. Hickock and Smith were arrested in Las Vegas on Dec. 30, 1959.
Even without today's high technology, it took less than six weeks to apprehend the killers.
"Once they knew who their suspects were, I think it went pretty quick," Bascue said.
Regarding Floyd Wells, Bascue says nowhere in any of the evidence does it reveal whether he was given the $1,000 reward. Even if he hadn't spoken up, Bascue believes investigators eventually would have gotten to Wells, as they interviewed all former Clutter employees.
Ultimately, if it hadn't been for Floyd Wells' bragging, Bascue wondered, would the Clutters still be alive today?
"What if Floyd Wells had kept his mouth shut?" Bascue asked, then answered his own question, "There would never have been a reason for Smith and Hickock to come to Holcomb, Kansas."
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