The Lindbergh Kidnapping Suspect No. 1: The Man Who Got Away

Author, lawyer, and former judge Pearlman attempts to resolve what has been dubbed “the crime of the century”: the kidnapping and murder of the Lindbergh baby in 1932. The author’s meticulously researched, compelling work guides readers through a biography of famous aviator Charles Lindbergh and his family, the search for the missing Charles Jr., and Lindbergh’s interest in and support of the eugenics movement, as well as several bizarre ransom payments and the eventual discovery of the child’s body in the woods in New Jersey. This is a side of Lindbergh that his writings and many of his carefully crafted biographies have hidden—a man with a passion for unkind practical jokes, a Nazi sympathizer and proponent for the America First Committee, and, if Pearlman’s research is to be believed, the murderer of his own child. The argument is well reasoned, and Pearlman does not hide her agenda: to prove that Bruno Hauptmann, who was convicted of the crime and executed for it, was framed as the result of an investigation controlled by Lindbergh. It’s up to readers to decide if they are convinced by Pearlman’s evidence.