ET looks at the Black Dahlia murder, from the discovery of Elizabeth Short’s mutilated body, to the decades-spanning investigation surrounding Hollywood’s infamous unsolved killing. In a rare interview, a reporter told ET about coming upon Short’s remains in Los Angeles’ Leimert Park before police arrived at the scene on Jan. 15, 1947. Newspapers at the time ran with a nickname she gained before her death at 22 years old, which referenced Veronica Lake’s 1946 film noir and Short’s head-to-toe gothic appearance. After an unprecedented media frenzy about the manhunt, LA detectives were left with a series of cleared suspects and dead-end tips. Inspired by Old Hollywood’s infamous cold case, bestselling crime novelist James Ellroy penned ‘The Black Dahlia’ in 1987, which helped kick off a renaissance of public interest and fresh leads. ET spoke with multiple people among the many proclaiming to know the identity of Short’s killer, but their claims were never proven and they remain unsubstantiated theories. Around the time of director Brian De Palma’s big-screen take on Ellroy’s novel, Steve Hodel – the son of one-time suspect George Hodel — opened up to ‘48 Hours’ about why his father matched the profile for the Black Dahlia’s murderer. Mia Kirshner played Short in the 2006 adaptation, followed by Mena Suvari for ‘American Horror Story’s inaugural ‘Murder House’ season. Patty Jenkins and Chris Pine’s 2019 miniseries, ‘I Am the Night,’ circled back to Hodel and long-held suspicion that the notorious surgeon killed Short at the famed John Sowden house in LA’s Los Feliz neighborhood. No one has ever been formally charged by law enforcement in connection with the Black Dahlia.
