In early June, Joseph Shovell, who lived seven doors away from the Thompsons on Merchant Avenue, noticed a foul smell coming from somewhere in the house. The building housed two families: the Shovells in one half and the Leuths, a family of German immigrants, in the other half. At the time, Mrs. Leuth was in the hospital and Mr. Leuth was away on business. Their sixteen-year-old son Otto was staying with his older brother but had a key to his parents' house and would come and go.
Shovell complained to Otto about the smell. Otto said rats had probably died in the cellar. Also, a mattress upstairs was full of worms, and he would attend to them. He carried a mattress and featherbed to a shed, and the smell abated somewhat.
Two days later, Otto’s parents returned to the house and immediately noticed the smell. By the following Sunday, June 9, the stench became intolerable. The Leuths and the Shovells investigated together. The ghastly scene they found in the Leuths’ cellar left them nearly paralyzed with fright. The naked body of a child, partially covered by rags, lay mutilated and decomposing. The head and right arm had been severed. There was little doubt; it was Maggie Thompson's body. Mr. Leuth hurried to the police station to report the crime.
The police moved the remains to the yard outside, and the coroner examined them on-site. The skull was broken in three places, the jaw was broken, the head was severed, and the right arm was torn off at the elbow. Both families, including Otto Leuth, were arrested on suspicion.
Mr. and Mrs. Leuth had solid alibis and were released. The Shovells were released as well when the investigation focused on Otto Leuth. Otto seemed indifferent, treating the whole matter as a joke. He said he had never seen Maggie in his life and did not know the body got in the cellar. But the police harshly questioned Otto, and when they confronted him with the bloody mattress he hid in the shed, he broke down and confessed to the murder.
He confessed to the police that he enticed Maggie into the house and attempted to assault her sexually. When she resisted, he smashed her skull with a hammer and continued the assault. At the coroner’s inquest, gave the following statement:
I am sixteen years old and live at No. 42 Merchant Avenue. Right after my mother went to the hospital, I stopped work at Rauch & Lang's. On Thursday, May 9, I was standing at our gate when little Maggie Thompson came by and asked me about some buttons. This was about 11:30 o'clock in the morning. I told her to come into the house and she came in and went upstairs with me. When she got upstairs, I struck her on the head with a hammer two or three times. When she fell, I pulled off all her clothing, put her on the bed, and covered her up. I went out on the street but returned to the house again in the afternoon. I left the body in bed for nearly a week but did not sleep at home during that time. The Wednesday following, I took the body and carried it to the cellar and carried the clothes down there also. I wrapped the remains in the clothing and pushed them through the opening which communicates with the space between the cellar wall and the foundation. I crawled behind the body and pushed it to the spot where it was found. I killed her because I wanted to outrange her, and after I had struck her, I renewed the attempt. The hammer I had had been upstairs for a long time, and I think it was brought from the old country.
Otto Leuth was charged with first-degree murder and held without bail at the county Jail.
Though he had confessed several times, he pled not guilty at his indictment. When his trial began the following December, his attorneys tried to have the confessions excluded, claiming they were not voluntary statements. The judge ruled against them, leaving the jury to decide their merit.
The trial lasted nearly a month, and after deliberating for six hours, the jury found Otto Leuth guilty of first-degree murder. His attorneys moved for a new trial, and the judge refused. He sentenced Leuth to hang on April 16. Otto’s mother, Lena Leuth, screamed and frantically waving her arms she began to shriek in German. The New York World translated (and censored) her rant:
The jury be ______. The judge be ______. All thirteen men be ______. They are all bought, they are all fools. They killed my boy. It is a shame to hang a child sixteen years old. The jury be ______! Their children and grandchildren be ______! I ____ them, I the mother of that poor murdered boy!
The bailiffs carried and half-dragged her out of the courtroom.
On August 29, 1890, Ohio held a double hanging in the annex of the Ohio Penitentiary in Columbus. “Brocky” Smith, who murdered an elderly widow in Cincinnati, would also die that day. At 11:00 pm, August 28, the prisoners were marched to the gallows. Leuth would hang first, and Smith would hang immediately after Leuth was declared dead.
Leuth’s last words were, “Now do that business good; all ready. Let it go.”
At 12:05 am, the trap was sprung. Seventeen minutes later, Otto Leuth was pronounced dead.
Sources:
“A Child Beheaded,” Eau Claire Daily Free Press, June 11, 1889.
“Condensed Telegrams,” Newark Daily Advocate, June 17, 1889.
“Crimes Expiated,” Salem Daily News, August 29, 1890.
“Cursed Judge and Jury.,” New York World, January 4, 1890.
“A Ghastly Find,” Salem Daily News, June 11, 1889.
“A Ghastly Story,” Salem Daily News, December 14, 1889.
“Hanged at Midnight,” World, August 30, 1890.
“Leuth's Confession,” Salem Daily News, December 13, 1889.
“Lured Her on to Death,” New York World, June 11, 1889.
“Otto Leuth's Death,” Syracuse Evening Herald, September 12, 1890.
“Otto Leuth's Hanging Postponed,,” Newark Daily Advocate, April 20, 1890.
“Respite for Cleveland's Boy Murderer,” Piqua Daily Leader, June 20, 1890.
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