Piggyback - Paperback

by Jeffrey Dean Doty (Author)

On the evening of December 3rd, 1957, seven year old Maria Ridulph and her eight year old friend, Kathy Sigman, were playing in the new fallen snow on a street corner in the sleepy town of Sycamore, Illinois. A stranger approached the girls, introduced himself as "Johnny" and offered them piggyback rides. When Kathy Sigman ran home to get her mittens, she left Maria and Johnny behind on the street corner. Little did she know that she would be the last person to see Maria Ridulph alive. The FBI was called in and the search for Maria and her kidnapper caught the nation's attention. President Eisenhower and FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover demanded daily reports from the field agents. Nearly six months later, Maria's remains were discovered in a thicket 100 miles away. The search for Maria's killer went on, but all leads were slowly exhausted and finally the case went cold. A series of events begun by a mother's deathbed confession led to Jack D. McCullough being convicted for the murder of Maria Ridulph 55 years after the crime, making it the oldest cold case in U.S. history ever to be successfully prosecuted. Follow along with the author as he investigates this historic event to discover if justice was truly served, or was another tragedy piled on top of the first, riding piggyback?

Author Biography

Jeffrey is a journalist and associate editor with Outer Boundary magazine. He has published both fiction and non-fiction books. He teaches writers' workshops, and mentors young writers. Jeffrey lives in northern Illinois with his wonderful wife, Jean, who keeps him on track in spite of all his idiosyncrasies. He has two teen-aged children, John & Heather. He also coexists with a cat named Stella, with whom he holds meaningful conversations, mostly concerning the merits of ear rubbing, the zen of purring, and nefarious plans to catch the little red dot.