A GRAVE FOR BOBBY. The Greenlease Slaying - The True Story of the Midwest's most notorious kidnapping: murder, money and the Mafia

Hardback. A dozen chrysanthemums, newly planted, adding a touch of brightness to an autumn day. But under the flowers was the body of a 6yr old child, kidnapped from an exclusive private school and brutally murdered in a lonely field. Thus began the tragedy of Bobby Greenlease. It was a crime that shocked and horrified America - and then left an unsolved mystery in its wake. Now the complete story of one of the Midwest's most notorious murders is told for the first time - the first book ever written about the Greenlease kidnap-murder and the disappearance of $300,000 in ransom money - a follow-on crime that baffled and ultimately defeated J. Edgar Hoover's FBI. On September 28, 1953, two human monsters - Carl Austin Hall and Bonnie Emily Heady - kidnapped Bobby Greenlease in Kansas City, Missouri, took him to a remote spot, and shot him. Then, in a series of telephone calls, Hall repeatedly assured Bobby's parents that the boy was alive and well (the transcripts of these macabre conversations are revealed here for the firsr time). Millionaire Robert C. Greenlease paid a $600,000 ransom in a desperate effort to save his son. The kidnappers collected the money and fled to St. Louis. Then an odd assortment of characters - a cop, crook, a cab driver and a prostitute - all vividly portrayed in this book - were involved in the capture of Bobby's killers. Less than 3 months later, Carl and Bonnie were executed - but half of the ransom money disappeared. Based on 2yrs of interviews and other research, including more than 3,500 pages of FBI and police reports, this is the story of a crime that was solved and a mystery that wasn't. Or was it? After reading this book you may decide that, at long last, you know what happened to the missing $300,000. Illus. 286pp. 8vo. h/back. From the library of true-crime writer, Wilfred Gregg, with his personal b/plate. F. in f. dw.