In 2008, the film "Substitution" was released with Angelina Jolie in the title role. According to the plot, the main character's child disappears, she goes to the police, but the child is not found. After some time, the boy was found, but the mother declares that this is not her son, although he himself insists on the opposite. As a result, the mother almost ends up in a psychiatric hospital.
Not many people know that this film was based on a completely real incident that happened in 1928.
Christine Collins and her 9-year-old son Walter lived in Los Angeles, California. Christine raised her son alone, as her husband was in prison for criminal offenses that she knew nothing about. On March 10, 1928, Christine gave her son 10 cents for a movie. However, Walter did not return home from the cinema.
Initially, the police did not even want to take a missing person report from the mother, and when they did, almost no one looked for the child. However, when the general public learned about this case, the people rallied alongside Christine and began to demand that the police do their job.
The grisly murder of 12-year-old Marion Parker, kidnapped and dismembered by psychopath William Hickman, also had its effect.
When the police began questioning witnesses about Walter, all these traces led to dead ends. The boy's father was sure that the child had been kidnapped to avenge his atrocities, and bystanders saw the boy either at a gas station or in the back seat of a car.
Walter Collins.
After 5 months in the state of Illinois, the police discovered a boy who identified himself as missing Walter Collins. Christine paid $ 70 to bring the child to Los Angeles, but when she saw him, she immediately declared that it was not her son.
Promotional video:
The police, however, were convinced that the mother was lying. They were already preparing to happily announce the closure of the case and reassure the public, and here is such a turn. They, and especially Captain J. J. Jones, began to convince his mother that the boy had simply endured hardships, that at home he would again become "her Walter" and Christine had given up.
Over the next three weeks, Christine steadfastly tried to accustom herself to the idea that it was after all her son. But her heart told her otherwise. Finally, she got out her son's dental records, enlisted the help of acquaintances and again went to the police to give them "fake Walter."
This time, Captain John gave Christine a real "shameful speech."
Fake Walter with Christine Collins.
But even after that, Christine insisted that the boy was not Walter, and then the police forcibly took Christine to the Los Angeles mental hospital to be checked for mental illness there.
While Christine was in the hospital, doubts crept into the soul of Captain Jones, and he decided to personally interrogate "Walter". And in the course of the conversation, the boy finally announced that his name was not Walter, but Arthur Hutchins, that he was 12 years old and he was from Iowa.
After the death of his mother, Arthur lived with an evil stepmother and a tyrant father, and then ran away from home, hitchhiked half of the country, and lived on begging and odd jobs.
While in Illinois, Arthur heard someone say about him that he looked like "that missing boy Walter, about whom the newspapers write." Then Arthur imagined that if he called himself Walter, he would be taken to Hollywood. He went to the police and stated that he was the missing Walter Collins.
Christine Collins was released from the mental hospital and she immediately filed a complaint for the forced confinement in the clinic against the police and personally against Captain Jones.
Meanwhile, terrible things were happening in the suburbs of Los Angeles.
His relative Jesse Clarke came from Canada to the so-called Wineville Chicken Coop farm, owned by Gordon Stewart Northcott, to visit her brother Sanford Clark, who was Norcott's nephew, who lived there with Norcott.
Sanford told Jesse that he was afraid for his life, because Norcott beat and raped him, and that four kidnapped boys previously lived in this farm in the barn, whom Norcott also raped and then killed.
The shocked Jesse Clarke wrote a letter to the police and after that Norcott was arrested. It turned out that between 1926-1928, Norcott kidnapped and killed four boys in Los Angeles, and forced his mother and 15-year-old Sanford to help kill and destroy their bodies. One of the boys was a Mexican and his body was beheaded by Norcott and left by the road, but he tried to destroy the other three bodies with quicklime, and then buried the remains in the ground.
Norcott pointed out the places where he buried the remains, but the police did not find full bodies there, only a few bones. Therefore, it remained unknown whether 9-year-old Walter Collins was among the missing. Captain Jones was convinced that Walter was killed by Norcott and told Christine Collins about it. But Christine couldn't believe it.
According to Sanford Clark, three boys were held in the farm shed before they were killed, two were brothers Lewis and Nelson Winslow, abducted on May 26, 1928, and the third was similar in appearance to Walter Collins. Norcott himself, however, vehemently denied involvement in Walter's kidnapping and murder.
Arrest of Gordon Norcott.
Gordon Norcott was sentenced to death. His mother received a life sentence for complicity. While under arrest, Norcott's mother confessed to the murder of Walter Collins, but later denied it in every possible way. The exact number of children killed by Norcott is unknown; according to the police, he could have been involved in the death of more than 20 boys.
Shortly before his execution, Norcott sent Christine Collins a telegram indicating that he lied when he denied any involvement in the disappearance and murder of her son Walter. "If you come to me, I will tell you the truth." Christine came to Norcott a few hours before the execution, but he only said "I do not know anything about this and I am innocent."
Norcott's ambiguous answers made Christine Collins believe that her son might be alive - kidnapped in another family under a different name, but still alive. And she continued to look for him. The legend that one of the kidnapped boys managed to escape happily from a barn on Norcott's farm kept her alive for the rest of her life.
