California's Lamson Murder Mystery

The Depression Era Case that Divided Santa Clara County

Tom Zaniello

• Publisher: The History Press
• Year: 2016
• Edition: 0
• eBook ISBN:
  9781439658192
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Social Science Biographies
• Index: History

On Memorial Day 1933, Stanford executive David Lamson found his wife, Allene, dead in their Palo Alto home. The only suspect, he became the face of California's most sensational murder trial of the century. After a judge sentenced him to hang at San Quentin, a team of Stanford colleagues stepped in to form the Lamson Defense Committee. The group included poets Yvor Winters and Janet Lewis, as well as the "Sherlock Holmes of Berkeley," criminologist E.O. Heinrich. They managed to overturn the verdict and incite a series of heated retrials that gripped and divided the community. Was Lamson the victim of aggressive prosecutors, or was he a master of deception whose connections helped him get away with murder? Author and Stanford alum Tom Zaniello meticulously examines the details of a notorious case with a lingering legacy.

Table of contents

• Front Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• 1. The Dark Side of the Valley of Heart’s Delight
• 2. Stanford University Dreams of Silicon Valley
• 3. The Death of Allene Lamson on the Stanford Campus
• 4. David Lamson: Why Did You Kill Her?
• 5. Bill Sykes Beats Nancy to Death
• 6. A Lynching in San Jose’s St. James Park
• 7. Murderers’ Row at San Quentin
• 8. The Radical Lawyer from San Francisco
• 9. A Prosecution Witness Cuts His Own Throat
• 10. “Hangman” Buffington Tracks Blood in the Lamson Home
• 11. Cleaning Up Santa Clara County
• 12. Prisons in Hollywood
• 13. Silicon Valley: Not a Fruit Tree Remains
• Sources
• About the Author