Murder or Suicide at the Mayflower? The 1930 Death of Lt. Col. Richard Creecy

Evening Star headline, September 29, 1930: CREECY SUICIDE DOUBTED

In September 1930, staff at the Mayflower Hotel found Lt. Col. Richard Creecy dead from a pistol shot and his wife dying from hatchet wounds inside a double-locked fifth-floor room. The coroner called it a suicide. Homicide detectives, the Marine Corps, and the Creecy family weren’t so sure.