In 1947, California’s infamous Black Dahlia killing inspired the largest manhunt in Los Angeles history. But police investigators failed to identify the psychopath responsible for the sadistic murder and mutilation of twenty-two-year-old Elizabeth Short. Decades later, former LAPD homicide detective turned private investigator Steve Hodel launched his own investigation into the grisly unsolved crime and it led him to a shockingly unexpected perpetrator: Hodel’s own father. In the last three hours, Hodel revealed why he believes his father also committed somewhere between 7 and 20 serial murders in the Southern California area from 1943 to 1949.

Hodel began with a biography of his father, starting when he received the news of his death in 1999. While going through an old photo album, he saw a picture of a woman who turned out to be Elizabeth Short, also known as the "Black Dahlia" for her habit of wearing black outfits. Hodel’s father George Hill Hodel was a child prodigy at the piano and entered Caltech at the age of 15. By 1936, at the age of 37, he had earned a medical degree. In 1949. he was arrested for incest with his daughter. Hodel said there was "a payoff of $50,000" to the D.A.’s office and he was found not guilty because of a skilled lawyer. He disappeared to Asia until almost 40 years later, when he moved to San Francisco, where he died in 1999.

While going through a stack of newspaper articles about the case, Hodel noticed one of the "taunting notes" that the Dahlia killer wrote to the press and realized that the sample of handwriting was exactly like his father’s distinct script. Later, when he was allowed to examine formerly sealed records on the case at the District Attorneys office, Hodel found that there had been "a stakeout for six weeks" and phone taps on his father while the DA investigated him for the murder. Hodel said that district attorney Stephen Kay told him that he would actually move for a trial based on the evidence he uncovered. He believes that the Los Angeles Police Department has covered up the investigation for 50 years, even though "the truth has been presented" and "it’s way beyond reasonable doubt now." Related images.

Psychedelic Plants

Dennis McKenna is an ethno pharmacologist who has studied plant hallucinogens for over forty years. In the first hour, he joined George Knapp to discuss the establishment of an organization based on psychedelic and spiritual experiences that examine the idea of symbioses, which McKenna explained as a close association between different species for mutual benefit - a holistic approach to ecosystems that not only includes plants and animals but people too. McKenna thinks that the mutual benefit that plants and humans derive from each other is because they are meant to be meaningful relationships. He sees his retreats/conferences as a model for the future, where all can experience what certain psychoactive plants have to teach us and to combine "scientific knowledge and the traditional knowledge" so all can reach their full potential.