It was a warm September night when Sergeants Joe Friday and Ben Romero of the LAPD Homicide Detail caught a case unlike any other on the books. Betty Dixon, a divorced mother of one, was found stabbed to death in her Los Angeles home by her sixteen-year-old son, who had come home late from a double feature his mother had insisted he stay for. There was no forced entry, nothing stolen, and no sign of a struggle beyond the body itself. Neighbours heard raised voices and a woman's strange, pleading words through the wall, but no one thought to call the police until it was already far too late. The only real evidence was a bolo knife, a torn corner of an envelope postmarked from Sonoma, and one clean set of fingerprints that matched no name on file. Weeks of patient, unglamorous detective work - checking parole records, chasing a vague description of a jealous ex-boyfriend known only as Floyd - finally led Friday and Romero to a two-time state hospital parolee named Richard Floyd Coleman. It would take the courage of his own sister, walking unannounced into a parole office, to lead detectives down a lonely stretch of Highway 66 and bring the case, and a chilling confession, to its end. Episode Quotes “She dared me to kill her. She said I didn’t have the nerve.” - Richard Floyd Coleman “You had a motive, and you haven’t got an alibi.” - Sergeant Romero Special Thanks to our sponsor: Tablet Pharmacy for supporting ThePulseCommunity.ca. You'll find all episodes of The PULSE Community Podcast on Apple, Spotify, Amazon, iHeart, TikTok and YouTube Podcasts, as well as ThePulseCommunity.ca. Check out Skookum Kid's Stories on Apple, Spotify, Amazon, iHeart, and YouTube Podcasts, as well as SkookumKids.com. Sign up for our weekly newsletter of new podcast releases and contests! #ThePulseCommunity #ThePulsePodcast #Dragnet #RadioArchaeology #ClassicRadio #ParksvilleQualicumBeach #VancouverIsland #VancouverIslandPodcasts
