In the winter of 1935, a young man from Birmingham, Alabama, named Artemus Ogletree, age 19, found himself in Kansas City, Missouri, a city then known as a "wide-open town" of jazz clubs and rampant vice. Described by his family as adventurous, Artemus had left home in April 1934 with a friend to hitchhike across the country, eventually making his way to California before arriving in Kansas City that August. He was a male with brown hair, a cauliflower ear, and a distinctive, hairless scar on his head from a childhood accident with hot grease.
On the afternoon of January 2, 1935, Ogletree checked into the opulent Hotel President in downtown Kansas City, asking for an interior room on an upper floor. He registered under the alias Roland T. Owen, giving a Los Angeles address. He was well-dressed in a dark overcoat but carried no luggage; his only possessions were a comb, a hairbrush, and toothpaste that he took from his coat pocket.
A bellhop, Randolph Propst, escorted him to Room 1046. The strange visit began almost immediately. A maid, Mary Soptic, entered the room later that day to find the man she knew as Owen inside. She was surprised, as she had been told the room was occupied by a woman the night before. He allowed her to clean but insisted she leave the door unlocked, as he was expecting a friend. During his stay, hotel staff noted he kept his room unusually dark, with the shades always drawn and only a single dim lamp for light. Soptic later told police she felt he was "either worried about something or afraid."
The odd behavior continued over the next two days. On one occasion, Soptic returned with fresh towels to find Owen lying fully clothed on his bed in the dark. A note on his bedside table read, "Don: I will be back in fifteen minutes. Wait." The next morning, she found the room locked from the outside, but Owen was inside, sitting silently in the dark. She overheard him on the phone, telling someone named Don that he wasn't hungry. "No, Don, I don't want to eat," he said. "I just had breakfast." Later that day, Soptic heard two male voices in the room. When she knocked to offer towels, a gruff voice from inside told her they didn't need any. A guest in a neighboring room reported hearing loud talking and cursing from both men and women.
On the morning of January 4, the hotel's telephone operator noticed the phone in Room 1046 was off the hook. A bellboy sent to the room found the door locked. He knocked, and a low, gruff voice told him to come in, but no one opened the door. When the phone was still off the hook hours later, a bellboy used a master key to enter. The room was dark, but in the light from the hall, he saw Owen lying naked on the bed, seemingly drunk. It wasn't until a third trip to the room, around 11 a.m., that the horrific scene was discovered. A bellboy found Ogletree on his knees and elbows, his head in his hands. The room was spattered with blood—on the walls, the bed, and in the bathroom.
Police found Artemus Ogletree brutally tortured. He had been tied with cord at his neck, wrists, and ankles. His skull was fractured, he had been stabbed multiple times in the chest, and there were bruises on his neck, indicating strangulation. Miraculously, he was still alive. When a detective asked who had done this to him, Ogletree whispered, "Nobody." He claimed his injuries were the result of falling against the bathtub. He lost consciousness shortly after and died at a local hospital just after midnight on January 5, 1935. Investigators found no weapon in the room, and his clothes were missing.
The man's identity was a mystery, as police could find no record of a Roland T. Owen. After his body went unclaimed for weeks, authorities planned to bury him in a pauper's grave. An anonymous man called police, however, and instructed them to bury the victim in Memorial Park Cemetery, stating he would pay for it. The caller cryptically added that "cheaters usually get what's coming to them." The funeral was paid for by an unknown party, and a floral arrangement of 13 roses arrived with a card signed, "Love for ever - Louise." It wasn't until 1936 that a woman in Alabama saw a photo of the victim's scar in a newspaper and recognized him as her son, Artemus Ogletree. His mother, Ruby, confirmed his identity. She later revealed she had received typed letters, purportedly from her son and postmarked from abroad, long after he had been killed.
The investigation by the Kansas City Police Department explored many leads, including a man named Don Kelso, who was tied to another murder, but no definitive connection was ever made. The case grew into a local legend, a nearly perfect crime, according to the police chief at the time. Over the decades, amateur sleuths and historians have pored over the bizarre facts, but the identities of "Don," the gruff-voiced man, and the mysterious "Louise" remain unknown. As of July 2026, the murder of Artemus Ogletree remains unsolved, and no one has ever been charged.
