LEOPOLD AND LOEB [1924] Photo

Leopold and Loeb. 1924. Photo. Chicago: Underwood and Underwood, [1924]. Vintage original 8 x 10″ (20 x 25 cm) black-and-white glossy silver gelatin photo. Typed blurb attached on verso, Underwood and Underwood ink stamp on verso and printed on front. Minor rippling, near fine.

The two young men at left, killers of Robert Franks, are seen with their attorney Walter Bachrach and famous psychiatrist Dr. James Whitney Hall, who had been brought in to determine the boys as mentally deficient.

University of Chicago students Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb, age 19 and 18 respectively, were involved in a romantic relationship at the time of their crime. They committed a murder which, at the time, was called “the crime of the century”. Because they believed they possessed superior intellect, they felt they could commit a perfect crime without consequence. It was their homosexuality which was considered abnormal and therefore it was felt that entering a plea of insanity would allow them life in prison rather than the death sentence.