"...we should pass over all biographies of 'the good and the great,' while we search carefully the slight records of wretches who died in prison, in Bedlam, or upon the gallows."
~Edgar Allan Poe

Monday, August 19, 2013

The Strange Disappearance of Dorothy Forstein



Philadelphian Dorothy Cooper Forstein appeared to be happily married, comfortably well-to-do, a loving mother, and well-liked. She was, in short, one of the last people anyone would imagine as a victim of one of the creepiest disappearances in American history.

In 1944, Dorothy had been married for two years to city magistrate Jules Forstein. The couple had three young children: Myrna and Marcy, his offspring from a previous marriage (Jules’ first wife, Molly, died sometime around 1940,) and their new baby, Edward. One evening in that year, Mrs. Forstein dropped her children off at a neighbor’s house so she could do some shopping. By the time she returned home, it was nearly dark. As she entered her house, someone suddenly sprang up and attacked her, beating the helpless woman into unconsciousness. Her fall knocked over the telephone, and when the operator heard strange noises coming from the instrument, she alerted the police.

Mrs. Forstein was found with her nose and jaw broken, and a shoulder fractured. She was also suffering from a concussion. After she regained consciousness, all she could say was, “someone jumped out at me.”

Investigators were baffled by the crime. Burglary could not have been the motive, as nothing in the house had been taken. Her husband—the usual prime suspect in such cases—had a cast-iron alibi. She had no known enemies. Jules Forstein could think of no one who could have held enough of a professional grudge against him to attack his wife. The fact remained, however, that someone had enough hatred for this seemingly inoffensive woman to lie in wait and nearly beat her to death. But who?

The assault remained a mystery. Mrs. Forstein recovered physically from her injuries, but her emotional health was never the same again. Quite understandably, Mrs. Forstein became fearful, paranoid, and constantly on her guard.

Five years went by, and life for the Forstein family gradually returned to normal. On the night of October 18, 1949, Mr. Forstein was away from home for the evening. The eldest child, nineteen-year-old Myrna, was also absent, visiting friends. Mrs. Forstein and the younger children spent a routine evening at home. Around nine PM, Dorothy phoned a friend to arrange for the two of them to take a shopping trip the next day. She showed no sign she suspected anything was amiss.

Mr. Forstein returned home about 11:30 PM. He found young Edward and Marcy cowering in an upstairs bedroom. “Mommy’s gone!” they told him.

Very curiously, particularly in light of the previous attack on his wife, Jules Forstein waited two days before contacting the police. Officers then made a search all over Philadelphia, without finding any sign of the missing woman. Her purse and keys were still at home. As with the earlier attack, nothing in the house was taken. The front door had still been locked. All we know about her disappearance is the story told by nine-year-old Marcy Forstein. She told police that on the night her mother vanished, she was awakened by the sound of someone entering the house. When she went out in the hall to investigate, she saw a strange man coming upstairs. Her pajama-clad mother was lying face-down on the floor of her bedroom, “resting.” She saw this man pick the dazed or unconscious Dorothy up and carry her downstairs. Marcy asked him, “What are you doing?” He replied, “Go back to sleep, little one, your mother is all right.” He patted Marcy on the head and walked out with Mrs. Forstein's limp body still slung over his shoulder. About fifteen minutes later, she said, her father returned home.

Police were reluctant to credit the girl’s story—there were no strange fingerprints found anywhere in the house, no sign of forced entry into the securely locked residence, and it seemed impossible that anyone could carry a woman's body down a busy street unnoticed. And how could Mrs. Forstein have been rendered dazed or unconscious before this stranger entered the house? However, Marcy consistently stuck to this account, and psychiatrists who examined her were convinced she was telling the truth.

As bizarre and incomprehensible as the girl’s story may have been, it is all we have to go on in trying to solve the mystery of Dorothy Forstein’s disappearance. No trace of her has ever been found.

[A footnote: Shortly after Mrs. Forstein vanished, there was a second unsettling unsolved mystery in nearby Delaware County, where two gallons of blood was found spilled on a road in Sycamore Mills. There was speculation that this grisly find might be related to the Philadelphia puzzle, but no link was ever established.]



30 comments:

  1. Truly creepy story! I'm curious...how do you come up with your stuff? You have a lot of interesting things that I've never seen discussed any where else. Hope you keep it up!

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  2. For years now, my favorite reading has been those digitized archives of old newspapers. Do a search for "unsolved mystery," "mysterious death," etc., and you can come up with some of the damnedest things.

    And thanks! I hope so, too!

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  3. Nothing mysterious about this. The husband got tired of his wife and hired someone to get rid of her. Case closed...

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    1. My first thought was the husband. I'm curious how his first wife died. Awfully suspicious that he waited to contact the police, especially knowing that she had been attacked a few years before and suffered mentally from it, he would have been more sensitive to her fragility.

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    2. Agreed...yeah, how did the 1st wife die? Did the husband stand to profit financially from her death and did he remarry soon afterward?

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    3. She could also have been an alcoholic, which would explain her being passed out. But yes, my thoughts are he either did it or hired someone to do it to get rid of his wife.

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    4. I completely agree. The intruder did not threaten nor commit any violence against the children and even locked the door after he left with Dorothy's body. The 19 year old daughter just happened to be sleeping at a friend's house that night. The husband got away with murder and would likely have gotten major jailtime in this day and age.

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  4. Incidentally, there's a curious postscript to this story. I found an old Facebook post from a guy who in 2003 wrote an article about Dorothy Forstein's disappearance and posted it on his web site. A short while later, he received a letter from a lawyer representing the Forstein family. The letter politely asked him to remove the story, as a consideration to the feelings of the Forsteins. The lawyer did not threaten legal action, but the man still removed the story. Apparently, everyone who linked to his story on their own sites received similar letters from this lawyer.

    I found this very odd, as normally in missing-persons cases--particularly when it's clear foul play was involved--family members are desperate for all the publicity they can get, even years after the fact. Instead, the surviving Forsteins apparently want poor Dorothy to be forgotten.

    Hmmmm....

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    1. That's just what I need, to become Lawyer Bait.

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  6. Anonymous's comment doesn't close the case. Though it does seem very suspicious that the husband waited two days before contacting the police - especially in view of his daughter's story, which he must have heard right away - it doesn't explain motive. Nor does it explain the accomplice. I'm sure the police would have been able to comb the underworld for signs of a criminal who did such work. The entry of the stranger and his calm demeanour make this story creepy...

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  7. Apparently, Jules seemed to not do well with keeping wive(s). Yes, how curious it is that he waited two days to alert the authorities that his wife went missing....and the fact that there is a lawyer out there, apparently, asking for silence on the matter....the opposite of what most families in such situations are looking for. I'd be curious about Jules...in the years before BOTH his marriages AND in the years after Dorothy vanished. Somewhere in there the truth lies, me thinks.

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    1. Maybe the Forstein's lawyer isn't THEIR lawyer

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    2. Maybe the Forstein's lawyer wasn't THEIR lawyer

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  8. (Sorry for commenting on such old posts, just discovered your blog and am going through interesting stories!)

    I also find the husband suspicious but there are still unanswered questions. Why was she "resting" before mystery man went upstairs? Yes, she *could* be an alcoholic but that is pure modern speculation, as I'm sure her kids and friends would mention something about this? That's the most curious part for me.

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    1. Well we don't know what the girl missed. How long had the man been in the house? Just because the girl saw him coming up the stairs at that point doesn't mean he hadn't been up the stairs already and hadn't already done something to her mother before she came out of her room and saw anything. And also, it's possible the husband was involved and did something to help things along, but he was respected at that time and nobody wanted to pin his name into the mix even though if he did it today, I'd like to think not reporting his wife missing for two days, would raise some suspicions his way, and they would question their relationship and all kinds of things, for sure. Like why he would think she would just abandon her kids and husband for that long, if he just thought she had taken off, and why she would, what was their relationship like, etc, It is hard for me to think that even back then they didn't question him about these things and just let it slide. I guess that's how little they thought about this woman's life...Or how big of an influence her husband had on the community at the time...

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  9. After a botched first attempt on her life, I suspect that Jules may have somehow sedated her. Or perhaps she took sleeping medicine to help her get some shut eye after suffering from what seems to be severe PTSD... Regardless, it's clear that she either self medicated or was sedated so that a second attempt would be more successful.

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  10. Its entirely plausible that she was suffering from PTSD and may have taken sedatives to sleep... OR was more thouroughly sedated to make for a successful second attempt on her life

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  11. This is the version of the story that I came across:
    "Dorothy Forstein had three children and a husband who worked for the city of Philadelphia. One night in 1945, Dorothy was beaten up on her way home after a night out. The attack was seemingly random, and nothing was stolen. The attacker was never found.

    4 years later, her husband, Jules, came home from work to find his kids trembling in fear, and his wife Dorothy missing. According to one of his daughters, she had woken up to the sight of a man picking her mom up from the floor, and then turning to her saying “Go back to sleep little one, your mother has been sick, but she will be alright now.”

    There were no signs of forced entry, and Dorothy has been missing every since."

    The whole thing is a bit creepy. My first thought was that the mysterious man was there to "clean things up." Regardless, the additional information in this post makes the husband very suspicious. Has anyone else heard anything further on the lawyer? I found it odd that there would be a lawyer still following up on this case 60 years later. How old is this lawyer?

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  12. This was the version of the story I first came acrosS:

    "Dorothy Forstein had three children and a husband who worked for the city of Philadelphia. One night in 1945, Dorothy was beaten up on her way home after a night out. The attack was seemingly random, and nothing was stolen. The attacker was never found.

    4 years later, her husband, Jules, came home from work to find his kids trembling in fear, and his wife Dorothy missing. According to one of his daughters, she had woken up to the sight of a man picking her mom up from the floor, and then turning to her saying “Go back to sleep little one, your mother has been sick, but she will be alright now.”

    There were no signs of forced entry, and Dorothy has been missing every since."

    The comment about her being sick is interesting. Could he possibly be cleaning up the aftermath of some type of addiction? It is also possible that it is just what he said to get the girl to go back to bed. After reading this post, the husband does seem even more suspicious to me.

    Has anyone else heard anymore about the lawyer? What lawyer is still out there following up on this case 60 years later? I'm guessing this particular lawyer is not over 100 years old, so that would mean someone more recently is trying to put the story to rest.

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    1. Probably a different attorney hired by the now-adult children

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    2. Most likely an attorney hired by the now adult children

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  13. What I want to know is who locked the door behind this 'mysterious stranger'?? Did he have a key to lock it behind himself?? And why did he lock it? Was he concerned for the safety of the children inside, or perhaps instructed to make sure the children were safe? I believe it was the husband.

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  14. The house was freestanding, not a rowhouse. So she need not have been carried down a street in front of witnesses.

    Jules Forstein died of a heart condition in January 1956 at age 49. His death certificate lists him as "Married" rather than single or widower.

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    1. Interesting fact regarding the marital status of deceased Mr. Forstein. Perhaps the new Mrs. Forstein dodged a bullet.

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  15. HOW to get away with murder? DO NOT TALK TO THE POLICE!

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  16. I was struck by the age gap between the two daughters. I am sure the police at the time would have looked at the husband as a possible suspect. Do we know if Mrs Forstein had done missing before and then returned after a short period of time.
    Could it be the first attack was botched and it was meant for Mr Forstein?
    A puzzling case.

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  17. It is interesting that the husband, Jules was some type of political legal person within his city. He had a lot of clout. Here is his obituary and after reading it, I now wonder if he didn't have someone do her in. https://www.newspapers.com/clip/6791772/the-philadelphia-inquirer/

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  18. Hmm, it's the husband. Insurance money. He knew his oldest daughter would not be home and he would be home late and he knew the wife would put the kids to bed at a certain time. So he tells his hitman (or whatever)exactly what time to do the deed & what time to be gone by so that the kids wouldn't have to find her or be alone too long. He must have paid him well and in full. Be surprised how many people actually murder for hire and don't talk. More than you can imagine.

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