lois jurgens' death

Her brother, Jerome Zerwas, was the police lieutenant of the town of White Bear Lake, Minnesota, where she lived at the time. Dr. Dennis Craig Jurgens was an American 3-year-old boy who was murdered in White Bear Lake, Minnesota in April 1965. Are you sure that you want to delete this photo? Jurgens, now 69, was convicted of third-degree murder in 1987 in what at the time was the oldest homicide to go to trial in Minnesota. Learn how and when to remove this template message, "Child Abuse and Neglect in the Home | Center for Problem-Oriented Policing", "A woman was convicted Friday of third-degree murder in", Child Murder: The town that lived in silence, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Murder_of_Dennis_Jurgens&oldid=1138138523, This page was last edited on 8 February 2023, at 06:11. Notes References A Death in White Bear Lakeby Barry Siegel. A dead boy, though, was something else. Now the town is most frequently described as middle class. The next day, Dennis brother, Robert, was picked up and taken to a local hospital, on order of Juvenile Court Judge Archie Gingold. They had cited the Fifth Amendment protection against self-incrimination. You see, Gingold said, I didnt have to go that far. . Lois had had a history of mental illnesses including depression and psychosis and was originally deemed . To this end, she forced religious training on her young sons; reports had young Robert flawlessly reciting the Rosary at two. From their patio, they could see huge bass jumping in the water. This flower has been reported and will not be visible while under review. He had one great friend, his world's Lois, but she died and now he sees another version of her still alive and pregnant. On April 26, Korolchuk drafted an analysis of the information they had gathered. Lois E. Jurgens, 82, passed away on Friday, September 7, 2012 at Lakeland Health Care Center Elkhorn, WI.

 

``You have to understand this child is only 3 1/2 years old and virtually every day Lois Jurgens had him he was a victim of some kind of physical or mental abuse, and I dont think eight years was quite enough to compensate society for the act she committed, Robinson said. Three-year-old Dennis Jurgens is murdered by his adoptive mother. Woodburn could find no subcutaneous fat at all, something everyone normally has in varying degrees. The hearing would prove to be a curious affair. The official records say 1,200 children died of abuse in 1986, but many experts believe the figure would reach 5,000 if closer attention were paid to some deaths attributed to accident or blamed on sudden infant death syndrome. So it was that Dennis Jurgens death resulted not in a murder prosecution but, rather, in a juvenile court hearing over custody of his brother, Robert. Many years later, at his mother's trial, by then 27-year-old Robert recounted the events of that evening, testifying that his mother had beaten Dennis extensively and had thrown him down the stairs. When Dennis messed his bed, she said, she forced the boy to eat his feces. A system error has occurred. Sign up for The Lineup's newsletter and get terrifying tales delivered straight to your inbox. Aided by the testimony of the Jurgens' other adopted son, Robert, Jurgens was the only fatal victim of Lois Jurgens, his adoptive mother and a prolific child abuser, who abused a total of six adopted children from 1960 to 1975. That isnt an issue at all. .
This is a story about respectable men and women of the middle class--doctors, lawyers, priests, social workers, policemen, neighbors and relatives--whose behavior, taken as a whole, led not to that milieus promised decency and justice but to a moral outrage, dark and hard to understand. DENNIS JURGENS WAS ONLY 3-YEARS-0LD WHEN HIS LIFE ENDED AT THE CRUEL HANDS OF HIS MOTHER LOIS JURGENS AND SHE WOULD HAVE GOT AWAY WITH IT, BUT HIS BIOLOGICAL MOTHER JERRY SHERWOOD STARTED. However, he was in failing health and his autopsy results did not indicate poisoning.

Lois Jurgens served eight years of her sentence and had a quiet life as a widow in Stillwater, Minnesota. White Bear Lake, a picturesque American town where kids freely ride bikes, play two-square and parents throw neighborhood BBQsand where 3 year old Dennis Jurgens died on Palm Sunday 1965. Harold's testimony in 1965 showed he was in Wisconsin from the evening of Friday, April 9, until 9 or 9:30 p.m. on Saturday, April 10. Harold Jurgens died in 2000; at the time of his death, there was suspicion that Lois had poisoned him, but this was investigated and ruled out. The coroner noted in his report that Dennis had almost zero subcutaneous fat, at the level of a person who had died of starvation. All photos appear on this tab and here you can update the sort order of photos on memorials you manage. People were not then inclined to believe that middle-class families in suburban homes killed their children. She believed that Lois Jurgens was accepting and embracing Dennis, and he seemed healthy and adjusted. She knew he had high school and one year of college behind him, and that he was an only child with strong bonds to his mother. In 1987, Jurgens was convicted of third-degree murder of Dennis. [citation needed], Dennis Jurgens was born Dennis Craig Puckett in Sauk Centre, Minnesota. In 1965, Votel said, he thought this was certainly a battered-child case, but the reports indicated that the child had fallen down some stairs. "There was obviously going to be trouble, and he didnt want to get involved.". In 1992 A made-for-TV movie was made based on both Jerry's story and this case called, ' A Child Lost Forever ' w/ the remarkable Beverly D'Angelo as Jerry Sherwood and Judith Ivey as Lois Jurgens. But how did such an infection occur in the first place? She was born February 25, 1927 to Leslie and Margaret Stowell in Cass County Il. Jurgens was the only fatal victim of Lois Jurgens, his adoptive mother and a prolific child abuser, who abused a total of six adopted children from 1960 to 1975. He attended Olney Rural Elementary School and graduated from Filley High School in 1959. No prosecution was taken at that time. . They covered the face, the head, the arms. It was highly unlikely that a fall on a flat surface could have caused this. In fact, they remain strangely forgotten. Sherwood eventually located Dennis's death certificate; because the death was categorized as "deferred", the case was still technically open. The first few days of the police investigation by VanderWyst and Sgt. There was a bluish mark on the right side of the head that started at the temple and extended to behind the right ear. You are only allowed to leave one flower per day for any given memorial. Some had seen or heard Dennis being beaten. The White Bear Lake police log for the morning of April 11, 1965--Palm Sunday--included the sort of events to be expected in such a town. In early December, 1963, Rekdahl paid her last postplacement visit to the Jurgenses. cemeteries found in Maplewood, Ramsey County, Minnesota, USA will be saved to your photo volunteer list. Her attorney Doug Thomson (left) follows, and Harold Jurgens is behind him. When patrolman Robert VanderWyst arrived at the Jurgens home soon after, he found the doctor, the Jurgenses and 5-year-old Robert in the living room. Description above from the Wikipedia article Lois Jurgens, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia. But neither the judge nor anyone else was willing to face the implications of such findings. Mornings there were wonderful, but the dusk was the doctors favorite time, for the sun set each evening over the water and trees, falling behind Manitou Island, leaving behind a fiery orange sky. She wanted assurances. Doug Thomson, who defended Jurgens, said his client did not get out early. There are a lot of dead babies in the ground who were killed.. He does not sound very well behaved, she said. Rekdahl did not know that a psychiatrist at the Mayo Clinic had diagnosed Lois Jurgens as having a longstanding psychoneurosis dating to her childhood--a childhood spent in a tension-filled home with an alcoholic, abusive father. To this end, she forced religious training on her young sons; reports had young Robert flawlessly reciting the Rosary at 2. . One day, Zerwas walked into the squad room and found the two officers investigating Dennis death. They beat my baby to death, Sherwood told Buzz Harvey. On the other hand, he could not bring himself to embrace the notion that Lois Jurgens was a murderer. Retired now for several years, he suffers from angina and does not go out much, but he recalls the 1965 hearing. This sort of thing happened back then.. Leave a sympathy message to the family in the guestbook on this memorial page of Lois Jean (Jones) Jurgens to show support. The psychiatrist also observed that Lois had an obsession about order and cleanliness. All I could do was shake my head.. About 50 witnesses provided a mixed story. But, at a hearing just one month after Dennis death, Peterson, when asked if there was anything unusual about the burn accident, said: No, not in particular.. The case drew widespread publicity and was the subject of a book and a made-for-television movie. Your Scrapbook is currently empty. They just werent going to get any damaging information from him. Peterson, a slender 6-footer, was a respected local doctor, a University of Minnesota medical graduate who had served in the Marines before opening a private practice in White Bear Lake in 1951. No one here is being punitive, Gingold told the Jurgenses and their attorney from the bench. Searching him out, she discovers he died at 3 1/2, though the death certificate does not show what killed him. Share this memorial using social media sites or email. Lois Jurgens had a reputation amongst her extended family and neighbors as an intense, angry woman with a short and volatile temper, but Dennis' arrival in her home provoked sadistic rages that targeted Dennis as he aged from one to three-and-a-half years of age. Sherwood became suspicious and persuaded authorities to investigate. At the hearing a month later, Peterson was asked whether he saw anything unusual as he viewed the body in the crib. Donna Mae, about 5 feet away, watched in horror as Lois force-fed that vomit to him, made him eat it. To use this feature, use a newer browser. We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites. This browser does not support getting your location. Please reset your password. No. Harold told relatives he was going to be out of town the weekend of April 10 and 11, 1965. Votel went through living hell, one local judge said.

 

Verify and try again. In spite of extensive physical evidence pointing towards severe abuse, the medical examiner did not classify the death under any of the standard classifications of accident, suicide or murder; he simply marked it "deferred". . Lois Jurgens at the time that she had custody of Dennis. Jurgens was the only fatal victim of Lois Jurgens, his adoptive mother and a prolific child abuser, who abused a total of six adopted children from 1950 to 1970.The trial of Lois Jurgens for the murder of 3-year-old Dennis made national . He wrote deferred in the box where he was to specify the manner of death, and put the certificate aside. When it froze, hed hang lights on the seven surrounding elm trees, put out snow sculptures of bears and seals tinted with food coloring, and invite all the neighborhood kids to join his own two children in skating and hockey games. She always proclaimed her innocence. They said it was from a fall down the basement stairs.