The Boston Stranglers (24 page)

Albert was on somewhat surer footing with the Sophie Clark murder, perhaps because unlike that of Evelyn Corbin, this case had been diagrammed on the “Strangle Worksheet” as well as highly publicized elsewhere.

Albert recounted what had happened after he knocked on Sophie's apartment door.

Sophie's height and weight had been given on the “Strangle Worksheet,” as had her coloring.

Albert's Frederick's of Hollywood fantasy was only partially accurate. Sophie's hair wasn't very long at all—it was done in a medium-length bouffant flip, the style Jacqueline Kennedy as First Lady had made so popular. That Sophie had been wearing a blue floral housecoat (not white, as Albert had said), a bra, a garter belt, a half-slip, black stockings, and black shoes was noted on the “Strangle Worksheet,” and tallies with the description of her attire given in the autopsy report. Albert seems to have taken this description and embellished it, turning the plain baggy robe (or so it appears in the crime scene photo) into a diaphanous negligee and the flat, corrugated-sole tie shoes on Sophie's feet into sexy spikes.

The power the image of Sophie as seductress had over Albert is clear from the fact that he described her thus even after Bottomly had shown him the police photos of the crime scene, which are graphic close-ups of Sophie sprawled on her back, legs apart, the half-slip she had been wearing wrapped around her neck.

It also explains how he knew she had been menstruating, and was wearing a sanitary napkin and the harness to hold it in place. Albert said he had ripped the pad from Sophie and thrown it behind a chair.

Albert also told Bottomly that he had used his Measuring Man con on Sophie, telling her that with her superb figure and statuesque bearing (although not in those words), she would make a perfect model. He said that he'd grabbed her around the neck with his right arm and that she'd lost consciousness almost immediately.

There was some debate about when the crime had been committed. “Now, this is a work day, Al, this isn't like your usual routine, y'know that?” Bottomly said. “I'll tell ya, December fifth.”

Albert had in fact worked three hours that day, although just when was not clear. The weather had been quite stormy; Albert didn't recall this fact. The anniversary he spoke of on December 5th was that of his and Irmgard's wedding.

Albert recounted for Bottomly how he'd wandered around Sophie's building seeking an appropriate target. (The layout of 315 Huntington Avenue, with its distinctive divided staircase, had been minutely described in the
Record American
series by Loretta McLaughlin and Jean Cole.)

The fact that a man named “Thompson” had come to Marcella Lulka's door claiming that he had to paint her apartment had of course been extensively written up in the newspapers. So had the fact that “Thompson” had made advances to Lulka. Similarly, her ruse—telling the intruder that her husband was asleep in the next room—to get rid of the man had been well publicized.

The “honey-haired” man who identified himself to Lulka as Thompson had worn, according to the eyewitness descriptions of three different people, completely different attire than Albert claimed he had the day of Sophie's murder: a light gray hooded cloth jacket and green pants for Albert as opposed to “Thompson's” dark leather jacket and black pants. And one of the witnesses was actually acquainted with the man who posed as the apartment painter—a man who despite the bizarre coincidence that he was nicknamed “Al” clearly wasn't Al DeSalvo, since the former was black and the latter was white.

Bottomly brought up an interesting point during this interrogation: that discussing the murders of the older women didn't seem to bother Albert nearly as much as discussing the murders of the younger ones such as twenty-year-old Sophie. “I can't see hurting no girls, nobody,” Albert said. “What a hell of a feeling to know you really hurt somebody.”
⁶¹

It was as if he were speaking of the actions of another person. “It kills me, boy,” Albert added.

Whoever had killed Sophie had apparently masturbated just afterward, because the forensic investigator found a seminal stain on the rug near her body. Albert seemed not to know that this had happened. In any case, he told Bottomly that he had left the apartment quickly but discreetly.

Eyewitnesses told police that the man they'd seen had been agitated and perspiring heavily.

Albert said he'd passed a few people on the stairs to whom he'd nodded “very politely.”

Albert then said he hadn't encountered anyone while leaving the building.

He talked about the length of time it had taken him to enter Sophie's apartment, kill her, and depart.