Deadpool1986
Cook with a Mouth
When death is inevitable some people decide it is a good time to confess to things that have burdened them during their lifetime. Perhaps it is in order to leave the world with a clear conscience or maybe to benefit the living ones they leave behind. This list contains 10 deathbed confessions and the stories behind them of people who, for whatever reason, decided to reveal their darkest secrets.
12
Lieutenant Walter Haut Confessed To The Secrets of Area 51.
unexplainedstuff
In 2006, the media officer at the Roswell, New Mexico site, where an alien space vessel supposedly crashed-landed in 1947, claimed on his deathbed that he saw actually saw an alien spacecraft and two alien bodies in Area 51. He also claimed that an extensive cleanup operation took place to keep everything secret.
11
Naomi Shemer
1930-2004
Confessed to: using a Basque lullaby melody for her song Jerusalem of Gold
Naomi Shemer is one of Israel’s best loved songwriters. The song Jerusalem of Gold was first performed in 1967 at an Israeli song festival shortly before the Arab-Israeli war and describes the Jewish people’s 2000-year longing to return to Jerusalem. It continues to serve as an unofficial Israeli anthem and is often played at national ceremonies. Shemer spent many years denying claims that she plagiarized a lullaby song and turned it into Jerusalem of Gold. Then in 2004 after years of angry denials she made her confession to another composer Gil Aldema just days before dying of cancer writing to him, “I consider the entire affair a regrettable work accident – so regrettable that it may be the reason for me taking ill,” she also wrote that she heard a well-known Basque lullaby which “went in one ear and out the other” and the song must have crept into her unwittingly. Aldema said that Shemer had agreed for her secret to be revealed after her death.
Interesting Fact: In 2005 the lullaby Pello Joxepe became known worldwide when it was published that Jerusalem of Gold was based on its melody. The Spanish singer Paco Ibáñez who performed the song in Israel in 1962 where Shemer first heard it was asked how he felt when he heard Naomi Shemer based most of the melody on the lullaby. He replied by saying he was honored that she chose to use his melody to use for Jerusalem of Gold. You can listen to the song here performed by Ofra Haza at an Israel concert in 1998.
10
Naaman Diller
1935- 2004
Confessed to: the legendary clock collection heist
In 1983, the costliest theft in Israel’s history saw 106 timepieces worth millions of dollars disappear from a Jerusalem museum. Included in the timepieces was a pocket watch made for Marie Antoinette which is valued at more than £19m ($30 million). The case remained unsolved for almost 25 years until 2006 when a Tel Aviv watchmaker told police that he had paid some $40,000 to an anonymous person to buy 40 items including Marie Antoinette’s pocket watch (pictured above). Forensic experts examined the clocks and detectives questioned the lawyer who negotiated the sale. The trail led to an Israeli woman in Los Angeles named Nili Shamrat who police identified as the widow of Naaman Diller who was a notorious criminal in the 1960s and 1970s. When Israeli police and US officials arrived at her home to question her they found more stolen clocks. Shamrat then told the police that her husband who she had recently married confessed to her just before he died that he had committed the heist. He then advised his wife to try and sell his collection after his death.
Interesting Fact: The Marie Antoinette watch was actually self winding and was ordered in 1783 by one of her admirers and was to be made by the famous Swiss watchmakers Abraham Louis Breguet. The order specified that gold should be used wherever possible instead of other metals and to make it the most spectacular watch possible. The watch was finally finished in 1827, 34 years after Marie-Antoinette was guillotined and four years after Breguet’s death.
9
Christian Spurling
1901-1994
Confessed to: faking the famous Loch Ness Monster photo
In 1934 a doctor named Robert Kenneth Wilson offered a picture to the Daily Mail newspaper. Wilson told the newspaper he noticed something moving in Loch Ness and stopped his car to take the photo. Wilson refused to have his name associated with it so the photo became known simply as “The Surgeon’s Photo.” For decades this photo was considered to be the best evidence of the existence of the Loch Ness Monster. In 1994 at the age of 93 and near death Christian Spurling confessed that the surgeon’s photo taken 60 years ago was a hoax and the mastermind behind it was his Stepfather Marmaduke Wetherell.
In the early 1930s, sightings of the Loch Ness Monster became commonplace, so Spurling’s stepfather who was a big game hunter was hired by the Daily Mail newspaper to investigate. Wetherell found some huge tracks leading to the lake that he proudly displayed to the press. When the Natural History Museum investigated they quickly discovered that the footprints were a hoax. Wetherell was humiliated when the newspaper reported this and for being fooled by the prank. For revenge he asked his stepson Chris Spurling who was a professional model-maker to make something that would fool the public. Spurling started with a toy submarine and then added a long neck and small head. The finished product was about 45 cm long, and about 30 cm high. Wetherell then went down to the lake and took some pictures of the “monster”. To add respectability to the hoax he convinced Dr. Wilson whom he knew through a mutual friend to develop the photo and sell it to the Daily Mail.
Interesting Fact: This deathbed confession is often mistakenly attributed to Roger Patterson of big foot fame. (The Paterson Film) Paterson died of cancer in 1972 and in this case swore on his death bed that the footage was authentic and he had encountered and filmed a large bipedal animal unknown to science.
8
Geraldine Kelly
1950-2004
Confessed to: the murder of her husband John Kelly
In 1991, after years of domestic violence, Geraldine Kelly shot and killed her husband and stored his body in a freezer at their home in Ventura, California. She told her young children that their father died in a car accident. Seven years later when she decided to move back home to Somerville Massachusetts she had the moving company move the freezer with the body inside and drive it across the country to a local storage facility in Somerville. In 2004, 13 years after the murder Kelly was gravely ill with breast cancer and confessed to her daughter that she had killed her father claiming he abused her for years and then told her where to find his body. Authorities investigated and found human remains in a locked, unplugged freezer in the storage room. The body was mummified but identified as John Kelly based on distinctive tattoos he was known to have including a panther, a Kewpie doll and a skull. The cause of death was a gunshot to the back of the head.
Interesting Fact: The District Attorney of Somerville said it wasn’t clear if Kelly wanted to unburden herself or if she wanted her children to know so if they found the body they wouldn’t be blamed for it.
7
Tor Hepso
1938-2005
Confessed to: the murder of Torunn Finstad and Sigrid Heggheim
In 1978, Fritz Moen (pictured center above) was 36 when he was arrested for raping and killing 20-year-old Torunn Finstad in Trondheim, Norway. There was no physical or forensic evidence linking Moen to the crime and no witnesses saw him with Finstad. Moen was deaf with a severe speech impediment and an interpreter was needed for him to communicate effectively. Moen was found guilty of the murder and sentenced to 20 years imprisonment. Several years later police claimed that Moen had confessed to the 1976 murder of 20-year-old Sigrid Heggheim. During the seven interrogations his confession came during the one time in which he did not have the benefit an interpreter. He was found guilty of this murder as well and sentenced to an additional 5 years in prison. In 1996 after spending 18 years in prison he was released and placed under preventative supervision.
During the next several years Moen’s attorneys tried desperately to clear his name. In 2004 he was acquitted for the murder of Sigrid Heggheim finding that reasonable doubt should have acquitted him in the first place. Then in December 2005 a convicted felon Tor Hepso confessed at a hospital one day before he died to three nurses and later to the police that he had murdered two women and mentioned the names Heggheim and Finstad. After Hepso’s deathbed confession was thoroughly investigated Moen was finally exonerated of the murder. Unfortunately Fritz Moen died of natural causes earlier that year in March and was not alive when he was declared completely innocent of the both crimes.
Interesting Fact: This case was publicly criticized as one of Norway’s most shameful miscarriages of justice. There is even talk of erecting a bust or statue of Moen in front of the Norwegian Ministry of Justice as a symbol of the responsibilities of the criminal justice system.
12
Lieutenant Walter Haut Confessed To The Secrets of Area 51.
unexplainedstuff
In 2006, the media officer at the Roswell, New Mexico site, where an alien space vessel supposedly crashed-landed in 1947, claimed on his deathbed that he saw actually saw an alien spacecraft and two alien bodies in Area 51. He also claimed that an extensive cleanup operation took place to keep everything secret.
11
Naomi Shemer
1930-2004
Confessed to: using a Basque lullaby melody for her song Jerusalem of Gold
Naomi Shemer is one of Israel’s best loved songwriters. The song Jerusalem of Gold was first performed in 1967 at an Israeli song festival shortly before the Arab-Israeli war and describes the Jewish people’s 2000-year longing to return to Jerusalem. It continues to serve as an unofficial Israeli anthem and is often played at national ceremonies. Shemer spent many years denying claims that she plagiarized a lullaby song and turned it into Jerusalem of Gold. Then in 2004 after years of angry denials she made her confession to another composer Gil Aldema just days before dying of cancer writing to him, “I consider the entire affair a regrettable work accident – so regrettable that it may be the reason for me taking ill,” she also wrote that she heard a well-known Basque lullaby which “went in one ear and out the other” and the song must have crept into her unwittingly. Aldema said that Shemer had agreed for her secret to be revealed after her death.
Interesting Fact: In 2005 the lullaby Pello Joxepe became known worldwide when it was published that Jerusalem of Gold was based on its melody. The Spanish singer Paco Ibáñez who performed the song in Israel in 1962 where Shemer first heard it was asked how he felt when he heard Naomi Shemer based most of the melody on the lullaby. He replied by saying he was honored that she chose to use his melody to use for Jerusalem of Gold. You can listen to the song here performed by Ofra Haza at an Israel concert in 1998.
10
Naaman Diller
1935- 2004
Confessed to: the legendary clock collection heist
In 1983, the costliest theft in Israel’s history saw 106 timepieces worth millions of dollars disappear from a Jerusalem museum. Included in the timepieces was a pocket watch made for Marie Antoinette which is valued at more than £19m ($30 million). The case remained unsolved for almost 25 years until 2006 when a Tel Aviv watchmaker told police that he had paid some $40,000 to an anonymous person to buy 40 items including Marie Antoinette’s pocket watch (pictured above). Forensic experts examined the clocks and detectives questioned the lawyer who negotiated the sale. The trail led to an Israeli woman in Los Angeles named Nili Shamrat who police identified as the widow of Naaman Diller who was a notorious criminal in the 1960s and 1970s. When Israeli police and US officials arrived at her home to question her they found more stolen clocks. Shamrat then told the police that her husband who she had recently married confessed to her just before he died that he had committed the heist. He then advised his wife to try and sell his collection after his death.
Interesting Fact: The Marie Antoinette watch was actually self winding and was ordered in 1783 by one of her admirers and was to be made by the famous Swiss watchmakers Abraham Louis Breguet. The order specified that gold should be used wherever possible instead of other metals and to make it the most spectacular watch possible. The watch was finally finished in 1827, 34 years after Marie-Antoinette was guillotined and four years after Breguet’s death.
9
Christian Spurling
1901-1994
Confessed to: faking the famous Loch Ness Monster photo
In 1934 a doctor named Robert Kenneth Wilson offered a picture to the Daily Mail newspaper. Wilson told the newspaper he noticed something moving in Loch Ness and stopped his car to take the photo. Wilson refused to have his name associated with it so the photo became known simply as “The Surgeon’s Photo.” For decades this photo was considered to be the best evidence of the existence of the Loch Ness Monster. In 1994 at the age of 93 and near death Christian Spurling confessed that the surgeon’s photo taken 60 years ago was a hoax and the mastermind behind it was his Stepfather Marmaduke Wetherell.
In the early 1930s, sightings of the Loch Ness Monster became commonplace, so Spurling’s stepfather who was a big game hunter was hired by the Daily Mail newspaper to investigate. Wetherell found some huge tracks leading to the lake that he proudly displayed to the press. When the Natural History Museum investigated they quickly discovered that the footprints were a hoax. Wetherell was humiliated when the newspaper reported this and for being fooled by the prank. For revenge he asked his stepson Chris Spurling who was a professional model-maker to make something that would fool the public. Spurling started with a toy submarine and then added a long neck and small head. The finished product was about 45 cm long, and about 30 cm high. Wetherell then went down to the lake and took some pictures of the “monster”. To add respectability to the hoax he convinced Dr. Wilson whom he knew through a mutual friend to develop the photo and sell it to the Daily Mail.
Interesting Fact: This deathbed confession is often mistakenly attributed to Roger Patterson of big foot fame. (The Paterson Film) Paterson died of cancer in 1972 and in this case swore on his death bed that the footage was authentic and he had encountered and filmed a large bipedal animal unknown to science.
8
Geraldine Kelly
1950-2004
Confessed to: the murder of her husband John Kelly
In 1991, after years of domestic violence, Geraldine Kelly shot and killed her husband and stored his body in a freezer at their home in Ventura, California. She told her young children that their father died in a car accident. Seven years later when she decided to move back home to Somerville Massachusetts she had the moving company move the freezer with the body inside and drive it across the country to a local storage facility in Somerville. In 2004, 13 years after the murder Kelly was gravely ill with breast cancer and confessed to her daughter that she had killed her father claiming he abused her for years and then told her where to find his body. Authorities investigated and found human remains in a locked, unplugged freezer in the storage room. The body was mummified but identified as John Kelly based on distinctive tattoos he was known to have including a panther, a Kewpie doll and a skull. The cause of death was a gunshot to the back of the head.
Interesting Fact: The District Attorney of Somerville said it wasn’t clear if Kelly wanted to unburden herself or if she wanted her children to know so if they found the body they wouldn’t be blamed for it.
7
Tor Hepso
1938-2005
Confessed to: the murder of Torunn Finstad and Sigrid Heggheim
In 1978, Fritz Moen (pictured center above) was 36 when he was arrested for raping and killing 20-year-old Torunn Finstad in Trondheim, Norway. There was no physical or forensic evidence linking Moen to the crime and no witnesses saw him with Finstad. Moen was deaf with a severe speech impediment and an interpreter was needed for him to communicate effectively. Moen was found guilty of the murder and sentenced to 20 years imprisonment. Several years later police claimed that Moen had confessed to the 1976 murder of 20-year-old Sigrid Heggheim. During the seven interrogations his confession came during the one time in which he did not have the benefit an interpreter. He was found guilty of this murder as well and sentenced to an additional 5 years in prison. In 1996 after spending 18 years in prison he was released and placed under preventative supervision.
During the next several years Moen’s attorneys tried desperately to clear his name. In 2004 he was acquitted for the murder of Sigrid Heggheim finding that reasonable doubt should have acquitted him in the first place. Then in December 2005 a convicted felon Tor Hepso confessed at a hospital one day before he died to three nurses and later to the police that he had murdered two women and mentioned the names Heggheim and Finstad. After Hepso’s deathbed confession was thoroughly investigated Moen was finally exonerated of the murder. Unfortunately Fritz Moen died of natural causes earlier that year in March and was not alive when he was declared completely innocent of the both crimes.
Interesting Fact: This case was publicly criticized as one of Norway’s most shameful miscarriages of justice. There is even talk of erecting a bust or statue of Moen in front of the Norwegian Ministry of Justice as a symbol of the responsibilities of the criminal justice system.
When Brewer was released from the hospital he surrendered to Tennessee authorities and appeared in court with the same lawyer he had almost 32 years earlier when he jumped bail. The picture above shows Mr. & Mrs. Brewer after their arrest.
@ the cac who lived
