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Reason First: A Dream and a Nightmare in the Same Day- The Career Girl Murders

The murders of two bright, young women stunned America’s largest city in 1963.

By Skyler SaundersPublished 4 years ago 4 min read
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Years before the “Central Park Five” black and brown young men saw their exoneration, a black man named George Whitmore Jr. would eventually see freedom. The case dubbed “The Career Girl Murders” left New York reeling on August 28, 1963. The day remained fraught with both terror and promise as this also marked the day of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s famous “I Have a Dream” speech in Washington, D.C. But just over two hundred miles away in Manhattan, New York City, the horrific slayings of Janice Wylie, 21, and Emily Hoffert, 23, occurred.

This juxtaposition of some elements of reason and outright viciousness stand together in complete coincidence. One seemed to not have anything to do with the other but once the idea of racism became involved, then the two seemed to share association.

Whitmore Jr. had been interrogated for hours concerning the butchering of the two young white women. In the 1960’s, these women were called “career girls” because they sought out jobs in the big city rather than being domestic engineers. Newsweek researcher Wylie, and school teacher Hoffert, had lived in an apartment in New York.

What did Whitmore Jr. have to do with their slayings? Nothing. A white male named Richard Robles commited the double murder. This drug addict, rapist, and murderer just wanted to burglarize the apartment to feed his craving for heroin. When he discovered that the place had been occupied, his acts included sexually assaulting Wylie and knifing the two women dozens of times. At a parole hearing in 1986, he finally broke down and confessed to the murders.

This came after New York City Police Department (NYPD) officers coerced Whitmore Jr. over twenty years prior into supplying a “confession.” The March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom had it’s clear violations of individual rights embedded in its messages. It said that white business owners must give a job to blacks, that private businesses must serve blacks and that “black freedom” should be at the expense of “white freedom.” This of course represented a sham as only individuals have rights. There may be racism but there’s no such thing as race. But this is nowhere near the level of rights violations that Robles committed against the two women.

Whitmore Jr. had been watching Dr. King Jr. on television in Wildwood, New Jersey during the time of the murders, over a hundred miles away. He had with him a picture that he had found in the beach town of a young white woman with blonde hair. During his interrogation phase, the young man suffered a blow in his defense when the officers discovered the picture, believing it to be of Wylie. In actuality, the photograph featured Arlene Franco, one of Whitmore’s classmates. This information would not be available to the cops until well after the questioning phase. They elevated their suspicions and brought charges against the young man.

Whitmore experienced prison life until the government finally found Robles to be the real culprit. Robles is currently locked up behind bars teaching computer classes to fellow inmates based on his associate degree.

Whitmore’s life turned for the worse as he spent the money that the judge ruled to be recompense to the tune of half a million dollars. He started a business but after a boating accident disabled him, he turned to alcohol. His dollars dwindled and he found himself unemployed. This led to depression which combined with his previous bout with alcoholism, contributed to his death at the age of sixty-eight in a nursing home.

With this case, the bodies of the women often get discussed most. But what about their minds? They stood as women in the labor force in positions that at the time men usually held. This is especially true in Wylie’s case as women like Hoffert could more often than not find a career as a school teacher. They had been young, intelligent and ambitious, ready to challenge the paradigm set before them. The idealism that both women held should have continued throughout the decades, but their interrupted lives would forever remain as sources of study and art.

The crime that Robles committed against them served as the basis for books (Justice in the Backroom by Selwynn Raab) a film (The Marcus-Nelson Murders) and the pilot for the television series Kojak. The case also appeared in a scene of Mad Men.

Wylie and Hoffert would never live out the rest of their lives due to the selfless, self-destructive actions of one male.

If Dr. King’s speech means anything, it is that this nation ought to protect women and men innocent of any crimes and for freedom to be revoked from those who engage in blatant violations of individual rights.

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Skyler Saunders

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