The Murder of Marilyn Monroe (30 page)

2:00 p.m.

Per the police report, Joe DiMaggio, Jr., 20, who was in the Marines, calls from Camp Pendleton in San Diego. Joe, Jr., said he could hear Mrs. Murray telling the operator that Marilyn was not home. Mrs. Murray never communicates the message to Marilyn.

~ 2:00 p.m.

Bobby and Peter arrive at Marilyn’s. Peter slips into her home to tell Mrs. Murray and Marilyn’s handyman Norman Jefferies (also Murray’s son-in-law) to get lost for an hour. Per Jefferies, Peter gives them money for Cokes and they leave in Jefferies’ pick-up. Per Peter, Marilyn offers Bobby some food she ordered from Briggs Delicatessen the day before: mushrooms, meatballs, and a magnum of champagne. Uninterested, Bobby says he’s here for one reason: to tell her she can’t contact him or his brother Jack Kennedy again.

Bobby and Marilyn argue for several minutes before per Peter, Marilyn threatens a press conference to announce her affairs with both Kennedy brothers. Later per Sydney Guilaroff, he learned from Marilyn that Bobby had responded, “If you threaten me, Marilyn, there’s more than one way to keep you quiet.” Per Peter, Marilyn then impulsively takes a kitchen knife lying next to the tray of food and lunges at Bobby. Peter joins in to help. Bobby eventually knocks her down to the ground and kicks the knife away from her.

During their typical Saturday afternoon bridge party, Marilyn’s next-door neighbor to the east at 12304 Fifth Helena Drive, Mary W. Goodykoontz Barnes, her guest Elizabeth Pollard, and two other ladies witness Bobby leave Marilyn’s. They see him run back to a white Lincoln convertible (which Kennedy borrowed from FBI agent William Simon whenever he visited Marilyn). Bobby Kennedy then retrieved one of his two long-time personal bodyguards Archie Case or James Ahern. From an upstairs window, they see Kennedy with Case or Ahern return through Marilyn’s courtyard back to Marilyn and Peter. The neighbors notice the man in the suit is carrying a little black case.

Regarding Bobby, one of the card-playing ladies shouted to the others, “Look, girls, there he is
again
!” Then, while Peter and Bobby restrain her, Case or Ahern subsequently sedates Marilyn with a heavy intramuscular pentobarbital injection under her left armpit.

While she’s temporarily stunned and immobile on the ground from the drugs, Bobby and Peter enter Marilyn’s home with the sole purpose of looking for her red diary, a potential basis for blackmail, where she documented highly sensitive political information.

Bobby keeps looking while screaming, “Where the fuck is it?” but can’t find “it.” Peter meanwhile flips through Marilyn’s address book and calls Ralph Greenson to come over and tend to his patient. The psychiatrist agrees to be there within the hour. At this time, Marilyn musters enough energy to enter her house and furious that her privacy is being violated, screams and chases the men from her home. They leave without the diary.

~ 2:30–2:45 p.m.

Marilyn calls her friend Sydney Guilaroff and relays to him much of what had happened. Per Sydney, she’s hysterical and tells him she’s having an affair with both Kennedy brothers and that Bobby had threatened her. She said Bobby left with Peter Lawford. Sydney tries to calm Marilyn down and promises her they will talk later in the evening.

3:00 p.m.

When Greenson comes out by the pool, per Pat Newcomb, the psychiatrist dismisses her so he can be alone with Marilyn.

4:30 p.m.

Per the police report, Joe DiMaggio, Jr., calls and again Joe, Jr., can hear Mrs. Murray tell the operator that Marilyn is not home. Mrs. Murray never communicates the message to Marilyn.

5:00 p.m.

Peter claimed he called Marilyn inviting her to his regular Saturday evening dinner party. She tentatively agrees.

6:00 p.m.

Ralph Roberts calls Marilyn to confirm their dinner engagement at her house that night. Greenson answers the public phone. Asking if he can talk to her, Greenson replies: “She’s not here” before rudely hanging up.

7:00 p.m.

Peter claimed he called Marilyn and that this time she begged off saying she was tired.

7:00–7:15 p.m.

Per the police report, Joe DiMaggio, Jr., phones for the third time. Mrs. Murray answers again but this time summons Marilyn from her bedroom to take the call. Mrs. Murray overhears how ecstatic and joyful Marilyn is at this time. Joe, Jr., tells Marilyn he broke off his engagement to Pamela Reis, a girl Marilyn didn’t like. She says to Joe, Jr., that he’s too young to get married anyway. Per Joe DiMaggio, Sr., Marilyn and his son “spoke for about fifteen minutes and Marilyn seemed quite normal and in good spirits.”

7:15 p.m.

Greenson leaves Marilyn’s. He goes home to prepare for dinner at the residence of actor Eddie Albert and his wife Margo.

~ 7:30 p.m.

Peter calls Marilyn to see if he can still get her to come to his party. Those at the Lawfords’ a half-hour later: Joe and Dolores Naar, producer “Bullets” Durgom, and Lawford maid Erma Lee Riley.

Instead of “Say goodbye to Jack . . .” private eye Fred Otash said he heard Marilyn say over wiretaps, “No, I’m tired. There is nothing more for me to respond to. Just do me a favor. Tell the President I tried to get him. Tell him goodbye for me. I think my purpose has been served.”

~ 7:30 p.m.

Per Dolores Naar, Peter calls the Naars and tells them not to bother picking up Marilyn because “she’s not coming.”

~ 7:30–7:40 p.m.

Per Greenson and Mrs. Murray, Marilyn calls Greenson while he is shaving. He notes she is in high spirits because Joe DiMaggio, Jr., broke off his engagement.

~ 7:40–8:00 p.m.

Milt Ebbins alleges Peter phones him in a panic, worrying that Marilyn may have taken too many pills and that they should go over there. Ebbins says he warned him against it because he’s the President’s brother-in-law. Before going over there, Ebbins asks Peter to wait until he calls Mickey Rudin first. Ebbins later reaches Rudin at Mildred Allenberg’s party.

~ 8:00–9:00 p.m.

Sydney Guilaroff got a call from Marilyn who sounds better. She told him she had just met with her psychiatrist. Before ending the call, Marilyn relayed to Sydney she knows a lot of secrets in Washington, a reference to her red diary.

~ 8:00–9:00 p.m.

Dress manufacturer and long-time friend Henry Rosenfeld calls Marilyn and he reports she sounded normal.

~ 8:00–9:00 p.m.

Peter’s friend Bill Asher claims Peter called him to see if he would go along with him to Marilyn’s house to find out if she’s okay. Asher advised against it because Peter is the president’s brother-in-law and that maybe they should call “old man Joe” Kennedy to seek his advice.

9:00 p.m.

Per the police report, Mickey Rudin called Mrs. Murray who informed him that Marilyn was fine, which she was.

9:30 p.m.

Per George “Bullets” Durgom, Pat Newcomb arrives at Peter’s party. She wears what appear to be pajamas and a dark coat over it.

~ 9:30–9:45 p.m.

Per Mrs. Murray, her son-in-law Norman Jefferies, Marilyn’s next-door neighbor to the east Mary W. Goodykoontz Barnes at 12304 Fifth Helena Drive, and FBI agent John Anderson, Bobby Kennedy goes into Marilyn’s house alongside LAPD veteran partners Archie Case and James Ahern, members of Chief William Parker’s off-the-books Gangster Squad. They happen to also be Bobby Kennedy’s personal bodyguards in Los Angeles ever since Jack Kennedy was a senator. They instruct Jefferies and Mrs. Murray to leave. Bobby, Case, and Ahern then proceed to the guest cottage with the sole purpose of looking for Marilyn’s red diary. They break into one of the two large filing cabinets and make a loud ruckus.

~ 9:45 p.m.

At this time, Marilyn is busy in her main bedroom chatting happily on her private line with her friend and sometimes lover José Bolaños. Marilyn tells Bolaños to hold on a moment while she goes to investigate the noise. According to Bolaños, she doesn’t hang up but never comes back on the line.

~ 9:50 p.m.

Marilyn storms into her guest cottage and she screams at Bobby. Case and Ahern throw her onto the bed, and per Bernie Spindel and Fred Otash, Bobby then shoves a pillow over her face to keep her from making noise.

Per Deputy Coroner’s Aide Lionel Grandison, Bobby Kennedy ordered Case and Ahern, “Give her something to calm her down.” Raymond Strait, who heard eleven hours of Otash’s bugging tapes, relayed to Joan Rivers, “It was horrible. You could hear the two men [Case and Ahern] talking to each other, saying, ‘Give her another one. Don’t give it to her too quickly’ and awful smothering sounds. After hearing those tapes, there’s no doubt in my mind that Marilyn was murdered.” A confidential source relayed to Jay Margolis, “There were needle marks behind her knees, the jugular vein in her neck, and bruises on her arms and back.”

Bobby had instructed Case and Ahern to give Marilyn injections of Nembutal to “calm her down.” After that didn’t effectively subdue Marilyn, Case and Ahern, stripped her of her clothes and using water and enema paraphernalia already available in the guest cottage bathroom along with Marilyn’s own Nembutal and chloral hydrate prescriptions, they forcibly administer to Marilyn a drug enema containing seventeen chloral hydrates and between thirteen to nineteen Nembutals to knock her out. Marilyn often took enemas daily and Bobby knew this.

10:00 p.m.

From the guest cottage, right after the enema had been given to her, Marilyn grabs the phone, the public line, and makes her last call to best friend Ralph Roberts. She reaches his answering service. When told he’s out for the evening, she hangs up before lapsing into unconsciousness from the drugs.

~ 10:20–10:25 p.m.

Someone calls Peter and tells him to get to Marilyn’s house, ordering him to hire a professional to remove any link with the Kennedys and the famous movie star.

10:30 p.m.

Per Jefferies, Bobby leaves with Case and Ahern. After his second search for Marilyn’s red diary that day, Bobby is thoroughly frustrated that he, Case, and Ahern couldn’t find it despite more than a half-hour search.

~ 10:30–10:35 p.m.

Jefferies and Mrs. Murray return. They hear Maf barking in the guest cottage and walk over. Per Jefferies and Mrs. Murray, they by their own independent accounts find Marilyn facedown leaning on the phone.

~ 10:35–10:50 p.m.

Per Jefferies, a frightened Mrs. Murray takes the phone from Marilyn and calls an ambulance then calls Greenson who tells her to call Engelberg. Engelberg claimed to the District Attorney’s Office in 1982 that he went to the house “immediately” upon receiving the call; however, he was double-parked so he had to move his car first. Engelberg would later tell investigative reporter Sylvia Chase that when he was called, it “must have been around eleven or twelve” and that an ambulance is “pure imagination.”

However, one-time Schaefer Vice President Carl Bellonzi, Schaefer Ambulance attendant Edgardo Villalobos, and Schaefer nurse and sometimes-attendant Ruth Tarnowski all confirmed to Jay Margolis that not only was an ambulance called to Marilyn Monroe’s house but Schaefer Ambulance driver Joe Tarnowski was the dispatcher on that call.

Villalobos stated that he and his late driver Larry Telling first received the call at Beverly and Western, the main station, before the call was transferred to James Hall and Murray Liebowitz in Santa Monica, who were more realistically able to respond to the call as they were closer.

After Mrs. Murray phoned for the ambulance and the two doctors, then per Jefferies, Peter Lawford and Pat Newcomb arrive together. Peter drove since Pat left her car at the Lawfords’.

Per Jefferies, Pat screams at Mrs. Murray. Jefferies says he then escorts Mrs. Murray into the main house. At that point, Mrs. Murray responsibly takes possession of Marilyn’s red diary (in the main bedroom) and one of Marilyn’s address books. She places them into her purse or basket of things. Then per Mrs. Murray and Jefferies, they wait in the living room and stay there until Marilyn is eventually declared dead in the guest cottage.

Per Strait, before arriving at Marilyn’s, a worried and hysterical Peter had called private eye to the stars Fred Otash to meet him at Marilyn’s house. Strait said, “Fred’s job was to clean the mess up . . . Fred was there as she was dying.”

Right after Mrs. Murray and Jefferies had left the guest cottage, Pat phoned the Hollywood Bowl. With his soundman, Otash arrives and Peter approaches them. Otash immediately assigns the soundman to the main house to remove all bugging equipment. Per twenty-four-year-old Jacobs press agent Michael Selsman and twenty-one-year-old Natalie Trundy, the person who phoned the Hollywood Bowl was Pat Newcomb. Per Natalie, an usher tells her boyfriend-at-the-time Arthur Jacobs, Marilyn’s publicist, that Marilyn’s “dying or on the point of death.”

Otash and Peter hurriedly take an unconscious Marilyn off the guest cottage bed. Per Strait, Peter “was just like a hysterical woman” and “Fred slapped the shit out of him” since they have to act quickly before the ambulance arrives on scene. Otash and Peter hastily remove the soiled sheets off the bed. Mrs. Murray is later told to do the laundry when the ambulance leaves.

After Marilyn is quickly cleaned and dried off from the expelled enema, Peter and Otash place Marilyn faceup back on the bed. The linens used to clean and dry her off were easily accessible from a nearby linen closet down one of the guest bedroom hallways.

Finally, Peter and Otash dash to her main bedroom and grab the rest of Marilyn’s pill bottles and neatly stack them onto the bedside table in the guest cottage, which was according to Mrs. Murray, delivered that very morning. When they’re done, they slip out of the room and return to the main house.