The Mammoth Book of Hollywood Scandals (13 page)

Unfortunately, as the passengers began to depart the train, it soon became apparent to Christine that Walter was not aboard. Confused, she looked along the platform, and there, coming towards her, was a boy who had a slight passing resemblance to her son, but nothing more. He clearly was not her child; she knew it from the moment she set eyes on him, and his appearance at the station was confusing to say the least. Nevertheless, he was the boy who had come home as her son, and when the police thrust “Walter” into her arms, flash bulbs popped and everyone was happy – except Christine.

“I do not think that is my boy,” she said. “I do not think that is my boy.”

But unbelievably, instead of becoming embarrassed by the lies he had told in order to get to Los Angeles, the imposter immediately flung his arms around his “mother” for a much longed-for hug. The woman was uncomfortable and told the police so, but they chose to ignore her cries of confusion. Instead, she was encouraged to smile sweetly and pose for the cameras, all the time being told that she must simply be mistaken; that Walter recognized her so of course he must be her son.

The child’s recognition of his “mother” was all the police needed to see, and although she continued to tell them that he did not belong to her, they shrugged off her concerns and quite astonishingly sent Christine home to “try him out” for a couple of weeks. No one can possibly imagine just how gut-wrenching this decision must have been for the woman, returning home to 217 North Avenue 23 with a boy who was clearly not her own.

What must they have spoken about during the journey home? Did Christine ask the boy what was going on or did she choose to remain silent? We’ll never know, but it is exceptionally clear that Christine Collins was distraught beyond belief in the knowledge that not only was she now looking after a child who was not hers, but that the police had given up their search for the real Walter Collins.

On the next day the newspapers beamed photographs of the mother–son reunion and while they reported Christine Collins’s remarks, they also assured readers that they were only as a result of confusion. Walter was emaciated and drawn due to the harrowing time he had endured at the hands of his kidnapper, they said, therefore it was – according to them – only natural that Christine would not recognize him straightaway. They also added that there was absolutely no doubt in Walter’s mind that Christine was his mother, and that over the course of the reunion she had gradually become convinced of the matter too. This was not true, of course, but at that point nobody seemed to care.

While Christine Collins remained convinced that her child was still missing, the new Walter gave a performance worthy of an Oscar during concise and informative interviews, covering every detail of how the kidnapping had taken place. According to the child, he was playing with some children at a vacant lot near to his home, when a man approached and told him he had been sent to get him by his mother. “He said mother had given him $15 to go and buy me a suit of clothes,” “Walter” told police, before adding that he had been expecting to get a new suit and, as the man had promised he was a friend of his mother, he had believed it was perfectly fine to go with him.

The child then went on to invent an elaborate tale where he was taken to the home of a Mexican woman and then they all moved to Hollywood, where they stayed for several days. The man apparently told “Walter” that his parents were not really related to him and he was then introduced to his real father, who took him “way east, getting rides when we could and sometimes riding on trains when daddy had enough money to pay for our fares”.

Finally, he described how they eventually reached DeKalb, where he was picked up by police and questioned as to who he was and what he was doing there. The boy then told the Los Angeles police that at first he had not wanted to say anything about his real identity because his “daddy” had told him not to.

The entire story was a lie, every tiny part of it, though where the child acquired the guts and cheek to make up such an elaborate tale is anyone’s guess. What is tragic, however, is that while “Walter” enjoyed telling everyone about his harrowing experience and revelled in the attention it brought, Christine Collins had to witness the spectacle, knowing that the child was an imposter and lying in front of her very eyes. But the police were happy to listen to and believe his lies, it would seem, and for three weeks Christine and “Walter” lived together in the home she had once shared with her real son.

While it seemed to those in authority that Christine had finally accepted the child as her own, the reality was that at the very time she was sharing her home with the imposter, she was quietly but efficiently researching how best to prove that the boy was not her own. Here was the woman who fought for years to get her husband out of prison, who would not accept no for an answer, and who worked all the hours she could to keep her family together. There was no way she was ever going to give up trying to find her son, and she put all her energies into her research.

At first it seemed a daunting task, but finally Collins was able to obtain absolute proof that the boy was an imposter by accessing official documents relating to the real Walter Collins Jr. The child in her care had been circumcised, and medical records allowed her to prove that her Walter had not, while dental records showed that Christine’s child had completely different teeth to the new Walter. This was not all. Christine spoke to her son’s teachers and friends and not one of them would believe that the new child in class was the original Walter Collins.

The distraught mother finally had something positive to work with and she compiled everything she had found in order to convince the authorities of their mistake. Shockingly, even at that point, the police still believed that the new Walter was the child they had been looking for all those months and instead of believing Christine’s research, she was chastised and called a cruel-hearted woman who wanted to shirk her responsibilities. Then, as if things could not get any worse, the police decided they’d had enough of Christine Collins’s constant bombardment and declared her insane because of her refusal to accept the child as her own. She was packed off to the Los Angeles County General Hospital on a Code 12, reserved for what the police described as “bothersome people”.

Still, in spite of the fact that they had now disposed of Christine Collins, the police were beginning to worry that maybe she was telling the truth. They sat down with the new Walter and asked him to write a paragraph of text, which was then compared to a sample of the real Walter’s handwriting. Surprise, surprise, the two did not match and the imposter was exposed. But faced with such damning evidence, the child still did not crack. Instead, he wrote a note saying his name was Billy Fields and he had pretended to be Walter Collins to get into the movies. When questioned further he then changed his mind and pretended to be called Tommy Danny Ozburn, before finally confessing once and for all that he was actually Arthur Hutchins Jr from Marion, Iowa.

As soon as the truth came out, suddenly Arthur Hutchins wanted to tell the entire story of why he had impersonated Walter Collins. He told police that he had always dreamt of moving to Hollywood, gaining fame in the movies and meeting his idol, Western actor, Tom Mix. He had originally run away because he hated his stepmother Violet, and it seems the feeling was mutual as she had been in no rush to find him. However, she did decide to travel to California to collect Arthur once he had made headlines around the world and, as they were reunited, posed happily for the photographers, revelling in her new-found Hollywood fame.

The devastating consequences of Arthur’s actions must surely have been realized by the boy as he grew older, but for now the child travelled back to Iowa with his stepmother, feeling no remorse for what he had done. When asked about it by journalists, he replied that it had all just been a game.

But for Christine Collins, the whole experience had been nothing like “a game”. On 13 September 1928, she was finally released from the psychiatric ward. She later wrote in a letter that she had been held for five days and five nights “among the maniacs” in the hospital because “I would not accept him . . . I was called a liar, damn fool, crook . . .” She also painfully revealed that while she had lost her son, she had also lost her job, too, due to the stigma of being admitted to the insane ward.

The episode had caused great trauma in her life, but Christine was at least relieved that she had been right about Arthur Hutchins all along. However, the question on everyone’s lips was that if Arthur was not Christine’s child, then what on earth had happened to the real Walter Collins? Whole books have been written on the subject, but it would seem that, more than likely, Walter had tragically become involved in what were to become known as the Wineville Chicken Coop Murders.

The case is a long, complicated and confusing one, but in short, it involved a psychopath by the name of Gordon Northcott, who kidnapped many young boys, held them captive on his chicken ranch, raped, tortured and finally murdered them with the help of his mother and nephew, Sanford Clark. Sadly, it was later revealed that Sanford was himself a victim of Northcott and was forced to take part in the events very much against his will.

Gordon Northcott would have gone on kidnapping and abusing young boys if it were not for Sanford’s sister Jessie who arrived in Wineville to visit her brother. Sanford was originally from Canada but had been brought to the ranch by the deranged Northcott under false pretences, and then had been too terrified to leave. Jessie noticed a real change in her little brother but at first he denied that anything was wrong. However, one evening shortly before she returned to Canada, Sanford finally had the strength to tell the girl exactly what had been going on at the ranch, and how he feared that his uncle was going to kill him too.

Though she was shocked beyond belief, Jessie pretended to Northcott that she knew nothing of the crimes, for fear he would kill both herself and her brother if she spoke out. However, on her return to Canada she immediately contacted the American Consul, who in turn contacted the Los Angeles Police Department. On the pretext of visiting over an immigration issue, inspectors travelled to the ranch. As they approached along the dusty road, Northcott caught sight of them and, along with his mother, fled to nearby trees, but not before telling Sanford that if he dared tell the officers what had been happening, he would shoot him from his hiding place.

After two hours of questioning, Sanford finally felt confident enough to share his horrific story with the men, and a warrant was immediately taken out on Northcott and his mother. By this time the pair were heading towards Canada, which is where they were both eventually picked up and brought into police custody.

Police were absolutely appalled to learn exactly what Northcott had been up to. Sanford told them that his uncle had apparently used quicklime to dispose of some of the bodies, while burning others, and that any further remains had been buried in shallow graves on the ranch. The police then showed the boy a photograph of Walter Collins and, on close inspection, Sanford sadly confirmed that the little boy had been just one of those murdered and buried on the property.

When police scoured the area, they did indeed find the shallow graves described by Sanford, though they never found complete bodies. As Sanford had previously told them, the evidence had been destroyed with quicklime and burning, so all that remained were various body parts and personal items from the missing boys. Added to that, it was also claimed that Northcott and his mother had exhumed some of the bodies and buried them in the desert during August 1928.

Because of Sanford’s identification of Walter Collins, it was believed that the boy had indeed been at the ranch, and had more than likely been murdered and buried with the others. However, after his arrest and during his subsequent trial, Northcott’s testimony about exactly what he had done and who was involved was shaky to say the least. Smiling wildly for the cameras, it soon became apparent that he enjoyed the fame and notoriety brought by the case, and he changed his story frequently.

Even the announcement that he would be sentenced to death for his crimes did nothing to deter his confidence, and much to everyone’s surprise, he agreed to be visited by Christine Collins while he was awaiting his death sentence. The strength shown by Walter’s mother was enormous, but the monster she encountered behind bars showed no remorse for what he had done. Instead, he actually seemed to enjoy toying with the grief-stricken woman, making comments that would boil the blood of the calmest of people. A photograph of Christine meeting the cold-blooded killer is hard to look at; the uncomfortable woman is sitting in a chair, hands in her lap and lips closed tightly; Northcott, who was recovering from flu at the time, looks slightly out of it, his eyes rolling upwards to the ceiling, his body covered in a cheap blanket.

It had been widely reported that Northcott’s mother (and later Northcott himself) had confessed to killing Walter, but when Christine asked the murderer straight, “Did you kill my son?” he replied, “I did not kill your boy.” The confusing meeting ended with Christine telling Northcott that she still believed her son was alive, and with that she left the room.

Christine Collins showed the strength of her resolve when, shortly afterwards, she sued Captain J. J. Jones of the LAPD for the unlawful confinement that had led to her being sectioned, and in September 1930 she won her case. Just two days before Gordon Northcott was hanged for his crimes, Christine was awarded $10,800 in damages, and told reporters that she had not pursued the case for money for herself. Instead, she declared with utter conviction that she had never been satisfied with the belief that Northcott had killed her son, and that “I intend to spend the money obtained in this judgement in seeing my lost son, if he still lives.”

Just before Northcott was hanged, Christine Collins had the opportunity to question him again, but was left distraught when the “awful person” (as Christine described him) continually teased her and contradicted himself, happy in the knowledge that Christine would never know the extent of his involvement with her son. Northcott then went to his death knowing all the answers, and confident that the families of those he had murdered would never know anything but the scantest detail.