Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb were two promising young men attending the University of Chicago. Both came from wealthy families, were well-liked, and showed extraordinary intelligence as child prodigies. Naturally, as anyone would, they came to the conclusion that committing murder without getting caught would prove their intelligence to the world.
Nathan Leopold is recorded in his family’s baby book as having spoken his first words at the age of four months and three weeks. He studied fifteen languages and claimed to speak five fluently, which was a great source of pride to him. With already an undergraduate degree with Phi Beta Kappa honors under his belt, on track to go to Harvard Law School, as well as some degree of national recognition for his studies in ornithology—the study of birds—the nineteen year old seemed to have everything going for him.
Richard Loeb was the son of a wealthy lawyer. Also exceptionally intelligent, he was an avid reader with a passion for true crime and history. He began high school at age twelve, and completed his high school education in two years. He became the University of Michigan’s youngest graduate, graduating in 1923 at age seventeen.
Both good friends growing up, the pair began to develop into a romantic and sexual relationship when Leopold was sixteen and Loeb was fifteen. Both committed minor, petit crimes as children and teens. Loeb often pickpocketed from stores and family members in order to impress his friends. They were also fond of arson, finding much enjoyment in setting buildings on fire, driving away, changing their clothes, and returning to the scene of the crime to feign concern and sympathy among witnesses and firefighters.
“A superman…is, on account of certain superior qualities inherent in him, exempted from the ordinary laws which govern men,” said Leopold in a letter to Loeb, explaining philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche’s theory of Übermenschen (“supermen”). “He is not liable for anything he may do.”
Leopold interpreted Nietzsche’s “supermen” as being transcendent individuals whose superior intellect gave them an automatic pass for the laws and rules that bound the unimportant, average populace.
Determined to commit a “perfect crime”, the pair settled on kidnapping and murdering a younger adolescent. They spent seven months planning everything, from the method of abduction to the disposal of the body. To obfuscate the actual nature of their crime and their motive for it, they decided to make a ransom demand.
On the afternoon of May 21, 1924, using a car that Leopold rented under the name Morton D. Ballard, they offered Robert “Bobby” Franks—the 14-year-old son of wealthy Chicago watch manufacturer Jacob Franks—a ride as he walked home from school. Leopold was behind the wheel of the car while Loeb sat in the back seat. Loeb struck Franks, who was sitting in front of him in the passenger seat, several times in the head with the handle-end of a chisel, then dragged him into the back seat and gagged him, where he died.
After disposing of the body, Leopold, under the alias “George Johnson”, called Franks’ mother to inform her that he had been kidnapped and that instructions for a ransom would be sent out shortly. After the ransom note had reached the Franks the next morning, Leopold called a second time to give them the first set of instructions for the delivery of the ransom payment. The overly intricate plan was immediately foiled when Franks’ father forgot the address of the store he was supposed to go to in order to receive the next set of instructions. The plan was ditched entirely when word came that Bobby Franks’ body had been found. Leopold and Loeb destroyed the typewriter they’d used to write the ransom note.
Chicago police jumped into action, offering a reward for any information about the murder. Leopold and Loeb enjoyed the indirect attention they were receiving from new outlets and horrified citizens all pondering whodunit? Both men enjoyed feigning concern and sympathy while discussing the murder with friends and family.
Shortly after finding Franks’ body, police found a pair of eyeglasses nearby. Both the prescription and the frame were common, but this particular pair was fitted with an unusual hinge. Glasses with this rare hinge had only been sold to three people in all of Chicago—one of whom was Leopold. When questioned by police, he suggested that his glasses might’ve fallen out of his pocket while bird-watching the previous weekend.
But in the end, Loeb was the first to confess. He claimed that Leopold had planned out all of the details and killed Franks in the backseat of the car while he drove. Leopold’s confession contradicted that statement. He insisted that he was the driver and Loeb the murderer.
Leopold later claimed that he’d pleaded with Loeb to admit to being the one to kill Franks. “Mompsie feels less terrible than she might, thinking you did it,” he quoted Loeb as saying, “and I’m not going to take that shred of comfort away from her.”
Most witnesses believed that Loeb did strike the fatal blows. Neither claimed to have looked forward to the murder, but Leopold later admitted to being interested in experiencing what it would feel like to kill someone. He reluctantly confessed that he was disappointed to note that afterwards, he’d felt the same as ever. As Leopold later explained to a psychiatrist: “Making up my mind to commit murder was practically the same as making up my mind whether or not I should eat pie for supper: whether it would give me pleasure or not.”
After a moving eight-hour long speech by Leopold and Loeb’s defense attorney, Clarence Darrow, the boys were spared the death penalty and were each sentenced to life imprisonment plus 99 years for kidnapping.
Loeb ended up dying in prison on January 28, 1936 after being attacked and stabbed 58 times with a straight razor by fellow inmate James Day. Day defended his actions by insisting that Loeb had tried to sexually assault him, something that Leopold, the prison’s warden, multiple prison officials, and several news outlets disagreed with. Loeb was defended by the prison’s Catholic chaplain, who said that it was more likely that Day attacked Loeb after Loeb rejected his advances. Day was found not guilty of homicide by a jury in June 1936.
Leopold was released from prison on parole on March 13, 1958, after 33 years of imprisonment. He then moved to San Juan, Puerto Rico, where he took up multiple conservation and aviary projects. He died of a diabetes-related heart attack on August 29, 1971, at the age of 66.