Raymond Martinez Fernandez: The Lonely Hearts Killer
Overview
Raymond Martinez Fernandez was an American confidence swindler and serial killer whose crimes became inseparably linked with his lover and accomplice, Martha Jule Beck. Together they became known in the press as the "Lonely Hearts Killers" because Fernandez located many of his targets through lonely-hearts clubs and personal advertisements. He presented himself as a respectable, romantic and financially secure bachelor, gradually winning the confidence of women who were seeking companionship or marriage. Once inside their lives, he attempted to obtain their savings, jewelry, automobiles and other property. After Beck joined him, the fraud scheme became increasingly violent and ultimately resulted in murder.
Fernandez and Beck were suspected over the years of involvement in numerous unexplained disappearances and deaths. Claims that they killed as many as 17 or 20 people appeared after their arrest, but investigators were never able to prove such a large victim count. The strongest evidence connects Fernandez with the murders of Janet Fay and Delphine Downing and with the killing of Downing's young daughter, Rainelle. Two earlier deaths, those of Jane Lucilla Thompson and Myrtle Young, have also frequently been attributed to Fernandez, although neither resulted in a murder conviction.
Early Life and the Beginning of the Lonely-Hearts Scheme
Raymond Martinez Fernandez was born in Hawaii in December 1914 to Spanish parents and spent part of his youth in Connecticut before returning with his family to Spain. As a young man he married Encarnacion Robles and became the father of four children. During and after World War II he spent time at sea and eventually returned to the United States without his wife and children.
Accounts of Fernandez's life describe a serious head injury suffered when a heavy hatch struck him while he was aboard a ship. Later writers speculated that the injury may have affected his personality, although that explanation cannot establish why he subsequently chose a life of fraud and violence. After serving a prison sentence for theft, Fernandez began corresponding with women through lonely-hearts organizations. He became skilled at inventing identities, flattering women through letters and making himself appear to be an attentive potential husband.
Fernandez generally sought women who had savings or other property. After establishing a relationship, he attempted to gain access to their money and possessions. Some women were persuaded to marry him even though he remained legally married. Others lost cash, jewelry, vehicles or other valuables before Fernandez disappeared. Because his schemes involved intimate relationships, some victims were apparently reluctant or embarrassed to report what had happened.
Martha Beck Becomes His Accomplice
Fernandez met Martha Beck through the same type of lonely-hearts correspondence he used to locate other women. Beck, a nurse and mother from Florida, initially appears to have been another prospective target. Instead, she became intensely attached to Fernandez and eventually traveled to New York to remain with him. Fernandez disclosed his schemes to her, and Beck agreed to participate.
The pair developed a method in which Fernandez courted women while Beck accompanied him, normally posing as his sister or sister-in-law. Her presence helped create an appearance of respectability and made women more comfortable allowing Fernandez into their homes. Beck could also watch the targets, help obtain their property and assist Fernandez in maintaining his false identities.
The arrangement had a dangerous weakness: Beck became intensely jealous when Fernandez displayed genuine or sexual affection toward the women he was supposedly courting. The combination of Fernandez's financial schemes, his manipulation of vulnerable women and Beck's jealousy transformed their partnership from confidence fraud into a series of increasingly violent crimes.
Early Deaths Connected to Fernandez
One of the earliest suspicious deaths associated with Fernandez involved Jane Lucilla Wilson Thompson. Fernandez had met Thompson through his schemes and traveled with her to Spain in 1947. During the trip she met Fernandez's legal wife and family. Thompson was found dead in a hotel room in La Linea de la Concepcion, Spain, on November 8, 1947, following events the previous night. Accounts of the case differ regarding the precise circumstances and cause of her death. Fernandez reportedly offered inconsistent explanations afterward, and investigators later reconsidered the death once his other crimes became known. No court ever established that Fernandez murdered Thompson, so she is most accurately described as a suspected or attributed victim rather than a legally proven one.
Another woman, Esther Henne, survived Fernandez and Beck. Fernandez married Henne in Fairfax, Virginia, on February 28, 1948. He pressured her over her insurance, pension and property, but she became suspicious and left. Fernandez obtained money and property from her, but Henne survived the encounter and later became important in demonstrating the pattern of deception he used against women.
Later that year Fernandez became involved with Myrtle Young of Arkansas. Fernandez married Young in Cook County, Illinois, on August 14, 1948, with Beck continuing to pose as a relative. Within days the arrangement deteriorated. Young was reportedly given a large quantity of sedative drugs and became severely incapacitated. Fernandez and Beck took thousands of dollars from her and placed her aboard transportation back toward Arkansas. Young was eventually taken to a hospital in Little Rock, where she died on August 18, 1948. Her reported medical cause of death involved a cerebral hemorrhage, and Fernandez was never convicted of murdering her. Nevertheless, the suspicious circumstances surrounding the drugging, robbery and death caused investigators to associate her case with the later Lonely Hearts murders.
The Murder of Janet Fay
By late 1948 Fernandez had begun corresponding with Janet J. Fay, an Albany, New York, widow with considerable savings. Using the name "Charles Martin," Fernandez portrayed himself as a respectable businessman and shared Fay's religious interests. After a period of correspondence he traveled to Albany with Beck, whom he presented as his sister. Fernandez proposed marriage, and Fay accepted.
Fay withdrew thousands of dollars from her accounts and traveled with Fernandez and Beck to their apartment at 15 Adeline Place in Valley Stream, Long Island. During the early morning hours of January 4, 1949, the situation turned violent. According to the evidence presented at trial and the defendants' earlier statements, Beck attacked Fay with a hammer during an argument fueled by jealousy. Fay remained alive after the blows, and a scarf was tightened around her neck. Prosecutors maintained that Fernandez participated directly in the strangulation and was legally responsible for the killing.
After Fay was dead, Fernandez and Beck attempted to conceal the crime. They obtained a trunk large enough to hold her body and temporarily stored it before Fernandez found a more permanent hiding place. Roughly ten days after the killing, he transported Fay's remains to a rented house in South Ozone Park, Queens. He broke through the cellar floor, dug a grave, placed the body beneath the floor and covered the area with concrete.
The killers also attempted to make Fay's disappearance look voluntary. Communications were sent to members of her family suggesting that she was happy and preparing to marry. Her relatives became suspicious, particularly because the communications did not resemble Fay's normal habits. Their concern eventually contributed to the investigation that exposed the crime.
The Murders of Delphine and Rainelle Downing
After leaving New York, Fernandez and Beck traveled to Michigan and entered the home of another woman Fernandez had been courting, Delphine Downing. Downing was a widow living with her two-year-old daughter, Rainelle, at 3435 Byron Center Road in Wyoming Township near Grand Rapids. Fernandez again used a false identity and presented Beck as a female relative.
By late February 1949, Downing had become suspicious and upset. On the night of February 26, she was given sleeping medication and became unconscious. According to Fernandez's own later testimony, he obtained a handgun and shot Delphine Downing to death that night. Her body was carried into the basement, where Fernandez and Beck concealed it beneath the floor.
Rainelle remained in the house after her mother's death. The child cried for her mother and reportedly refused to eat. Two days after Delphine's killing, on February 28, 1949, Beck drowned Rainelle in a container of water. Fernandez was present and, according to accounts derived from their confessions, had told Beck that the child had to be killed. Rainelle's body was buried in the basement near her mother's.
The pair then continued using Downing's home and property instead of immediately fleeing. Their behavior and the unexplained absence of Delphine and her daughter alarmed neighbors. Police arrived at the house on the night of February 28, 1949. Fernandez and Beck were taken into custody, bringing the Lonely Hearts killing partnership to an end.
Known and Attributed Victims
- Jane Lucilla Wilson Thompson — November 8, 1947 — La Linea de la Concepcion, Spain: Thompson was found dead in her hotel room after traveling through Spain with Fernandez. Her death was later considered suspicious, but Fernandez was never prosecuted for it and the case remains an attributed or suspected killing rather than a proven murder.
- Myrtle Young — August 18, 1948 — Little Rock, Arkansas: Young had married Fernandez in Cook County, Illinois, four days earlier. She was reportedly heavily drugged, robbed and placed aboard transportation toward Arkansas. She died after reaching a Little Rock hospital. Her death was associated with Fernandez and Beck but was never adjudicated as one of their murders.
- Janet J. Fay — January 4, 1949 — Valley Stream, Nassau County, New York: Fay was attacked with a hammer and strangled after traveling with Fernandez and Beck from Albany. Her body was later buried beneath a concrete cellar floor in South Ozone Park, Queens. Fernandez and Beck were both convicted of first-degree murder for Fay's death.
- Delphine Downing — February 26, 1949 — Wyoming Township near Grand Rapids, Michigan: Downing was rendered unconscious with sleeping medication and shot by Fernandez. Her body was buried beneath the cellar floor of her home. Fernandez later admitted the shooting in court and had entered a guilty plea to killing Downing in Michigan before the case was set aside in favor of his extradition to New York.
- Rainelle Downing — February 28, 1949 — Wyoming Township near Grand Rapids, Michigan: The two-year-old daughter of Delphine Downing was drowned by Martha Beck after her mother's murder. Her body was concealed in the basement near Delphine's remains. The child was killed shortly before police arrived at the house and arrested Fernandez and Beck.
Confessions, Arrest and Investigation
Once in custody in Michigan, Fernandez and Beck gave investigators extensive statements about the Downing killings and the murder of Janet Fay. Their information led New York authorities to the South Ozone Park house where Fay had been buried. On the night of March 1, 1949, investigators broke through the cellar floor and recovered her remains.
Fernandez initially cooperated extensively and admitted killing Delphine Downing. On March 2, 1949, he entered a guilty plea in Michigan to having shot and killed her. He later attempted to retract or minimize parts of his confessions, arguing that he had made statements to protect Beck or because he believed the couple would remain in Michigan. The discovery of Fay's body, however, gave New York authorities a powerful murder case.
Investigators examined other women who had corresponded with Fernandez, and sensational claims soon circulated that the couple might have killed 17 or even 20 people. Those numbers were never established in court. Some women were found alive, some had merely been defrauded, and other suspected deaths could not be conclusively connected to Fernandez and Beck.
Trial and Conviction
Michigan did not have the death penalty at the time, while New York did. Michigan authorities ultimately allowed Fernandez and Beck to be extradited to New York for prosecution in the Janet Fay case. Although the Downing murders formed an important part of the investigation and Fernandez admitted Delphine's killing, the New York capital trial centered on Fay's murder.
The trial became a national sensation. Prosecutors described the pattern of lonely-hearts fraud, Fernandez's relationships with numerous women, the financial motives behind the schemes and the defendants' conflicting accounts of Fay's death. Fernandez testified in his own defense and attempted to distance himself from the actual killing of Fay. Earlier confessions, forensic evidence and the circumstances surrounding the concealment of her body severely damaged his defense.
On August 19, 1949, the jury found Raymond Fernandez and Martha Beck guilty of first-degree murder. Neither received a recommendation for mercy. On August 22, Judge Ferdinand Pecora sentenced both defendants to death in New York's electric chair. Their appeals eventually failed, including an appeal decided by the New York Court of Appeals in 1950.
Execution and Legacy
Raymond Martinez Fernandez and Martha Beck spent their final period imprisoned at Sing Sing Prison in Ossining, New York. Despite the murder convictions and the evidence describing their violent relationship, the pair continued to proclaim their devotion to one another through the end of their lives.
On March 8, 1951, Raymond Fernandez was executed by electrocution at Sing Sing. He was 36 years old. Martha Beck was executed shortly afterward the same night.
The crimes of Raymond Fernandez remain one of the most notorious examples of the "lonely hearts" murder phenomenon. What began as a calculated scheme to exploit women searching for companionship evolved into a partnership involving robbery, deception, concealment and murder. Fernandez's ability to manufacture a romantic identity gave him access to victims' homes and finances, while Beck's participation provided him with both an accomplice and a convincing cover story. Their arrest in Michigan finally exposed the pattern, uncovered Janet Fay's hidden grave in New York and brought one of the most sensational American murder cases of the late 1940s to an end.
