Valerie Percy murder

In the summer of 1966, Charles F. Percy, a self-made millionaire, veteran of the second world war, and local golden boy, was campaigning to unseat three-term Illinois Senator Paul Douglas. The race was heating up, and Percy, a young Republican who recently failed in a bid to become the Illinois governor, was seeking to capitalize on discontent with the policies of President Lyndon B. Johnson. His daughter, Valerie Percy, age 21, had recently graduated from Cornell University and was now tirelessly helping manage his Senate campaign.

At about 5:00 a.m. on September 18, 1966, with most of the family at home in their 17-room Kenilworth mansion on a three-acre estate overlooking Lake Michigan at this address, an intruder slashed through a copper screen, sawed through a pane of glass on a downstairs door, turned the handle, and let himself in. Valerie's step-mother, Loraine, was roused by the sound of breaking glass, but figured one of her kids knocked something over, so she drifted back to sleep. A few minutes later, she heard some grotesque moaning, so she crawled out of bed and walked down the hall to investigate. When she arrived at Valerie's room, she glimpsed a shadowy figure bent over the bed. The intruder immediately straightened up and pointed a flashlight at her, blinding her in the darkness. Loraine raced back to the bedroom and activated a panic button, triggering a burglar alarm on the roof.

Valerie had been badly beaten and mutilated and was still clinging to life when her father reached her bedroom. He immediately called a physician and family friend who lived next door, but nothing could be done to save her. She had four cone-shaped puncture wounds in her skull and had been stabbed repeatedly -- six times around her nose and left eye, once in her neck, twice in the chest, and twice in the stomach. Nothing was stolen. Despite an intense investigation, the killer was never identified.

In the wake of his daughter's murder, Charles Percy briefly suspended his Senate campaign. Perhaps as a result of the tragedy, he ended up victorious in the November election. He assumed office in January 1967 and served as U.S. Senator until January 1985, when he was replaced by Paul Simon.

The home in which the murder occurred was an English manor house originally designed by Spencer Beman, Jr. in 1923. (Beman's father had designed the historic Pullman village.) The estate grew to include a guest house, tennis court, garden, and indoor swimming pool, and the Percys even had a boat hitched on the Lake Michigan shore. The house was sold in 1967 when the family moved to Washington, D.C., and was ultimately demolished over several weeks between April and May 2010.

CHICAGO, Jan. 24 (UPI) -- FBI files seen by a Chicago television station point to the late son of an Illinois industrial tycoon as the prime suspect in the 1966 killing of Valerie Percy.

Percy, the 21-year-old daughter of former Republican Sen. Charles H. Percy, was fatally stabbed and beaten in her bedroom in the family's stately lakefront home Sept. 18, 1966, in the wealthy north shore suburb of Kenilworth during her father's first U.S. Senate campaign.

Charles Percy served nearly 20 years in the Senate. He died in 2011 at the age of 91.

No one ever was charged in his daughter's slaying -- once dubbed America's No. 1 murder mystery.

WLS-TV, Chicago, investigative reporters Friday said newly obtained information from FBI records and a new book on the crime name William Thoresen III as a prime suspect.

Thoresen lived just a 1 1/2 blocks from the Percy home and was described as "violent," and a "mental case ... armed and dangerous" in a report by FBI agents who investigated the crime.

Glenn Wall, a Chicago native who wrote a book about the Valerie Percy slaying, told WLS authorities believe she was killed with a serrated bayonet and Thoresen had been arrested in Chicago and Los Angeles for aggravated assault and possession of illegal weapons.

Police found a bayonet in Lake Michigan three days after the killing, but it was never connected to the crime. Footprints in sand led from the Percy home to the beach.

Thoresen was living in New York when he was finally found but refused to answer any questions from police. He was fatally shot by his wife in 1970. She said he once admitted to killing several people.

Valerie Percy would have been 70 had she lived. The case was never closed.

FBI files I found that prove that they were investigating Thoresen just weeks after the murder. He refused to answer any of their questions, but they did not arrest him. "Oh, you didn't do it? Ok, have a good day." Idiots. I think there is a 95% chance that Thoresen committed this murder. He is a far better suspect than anyone else I have read or heard about...

Occupation: Writer.... what????? Thoresen was not a writer.

The police believe that Valerie was murdered with a boyonet. A few months later, Louise Thoresen was arrested for illegal weapons, including bayonets. William had several bayonets in his "collection" of weapons as well.

Here is a good read by a woman who knew Valerie Percy.

http://mrslinklatersguidetotheuniverse.blogspot.com/2014/01/degrees-of-separation.html

A deposit for $10,000 was put into Thoresen's bank account a couple days before Valerie's murder. Perhaps someone paid Thoresen to kill Valerie. I doubt it, but it is possible.

"As the investigation continued there was a flurry of excitement when an 18-year-old Arizona youth told police in Tucson that he had been paid $75 by a stranger "to kill anyone in the Percy home." The youth later admitted he had made the story up."

This is very interesting. Thoresen and a couple of friends used to light dynamite outside of a radio station in TUCSON, ARIZONA to scare the DJ, who supposedly was a friend of Thoresen. The police caught one of the friends, who told the police Thoresen was behind the dynamite pranks. The friend would not testify against Thoresen because he was scared to death of him, and rightfully so. Could there be a connection between Thoresen and this kid who said he was paid to kill anyone in the Percy home?


Also worth noting is that Thoresen owed architect George Livermore quite a bit of money. He paid some of his bill, but not all of it. He still owed Livermore a great deal of money. Livermore lived at the corner of Washington & Cherry in 1967, but was listed at a different address in 1969 when the Paul Stine murder occurred.

Money was a big deal to Thoresen (he once broke a waiter's arm over a 75 cent charge on his tab that he thought shouldn't be there) and he did not like to pay people he owed.

I have been speaking to Glenn Wall, author of Sympathy Vote, and he shared the following link with me...

"Attorney Sues for Records About 1966 Murder"
http://www.courthousenews.com/2016/04/18/attorney-sues-for-records-about-1966-murder.htm


CHICAGO (CN) — A New York attorney who represents families in high-profile wrongful death cases sued several Illinois agencies for refusing to release records about the 50-year-old cold case murder of a politician's daughter.

Valerie Percy, the daughter of the late U.S. Sen. Charles Percy, was stabbed to death in 1966 when she was 21, less than two months before her father was elected. She was asleep in the family's home in Kenilworth, Ill.

A lawsuit filed April 13 by attorney John Q. Kelly says Valerie's stepmother Lorraine heard glass breaking, moaning and then walked in on the intruder in her bedroom

The man escaped, but left a blood-stained glove in the home and a bayonet, thought to be the murder weapon, in a lake nearby.

Three days later, the entire family took a private jet to California and refused to directly speak with any police officers.

Former investigators have admitted that the Kenilworth police force was inexperienced in dealing with serious crimes at the time, and may have missed important evidence. Chicago police were eventually called in to help with the investigation.

Police kept Valerie's case open for over 20 years, but a suspect was never identified, according to a New York Times report.

Percy was a successful businessman before running for office, and "was a well known, wealthy and powerful public figure," according to Kelly's Cook County lawsuit. Percy ended up serving for three terms in the U.S. Senate and had presidential ambitions at one point. He died at age 91 in 2011.

Valerie's twin sister Sharon, who was also home when the crime was committed, went on to marry U.S. Sen. Jay Rockefeller.

Kelly, who represented the families of Nicole Brown Simpson and Natalee Holloway, claims in his lawsuit that his requests for "all records relating to the investigation" into the 1996 murder from the Village of Kenilworth, the Illinois State Police, the Cook County State's Attorney's Office, the Chicago Police Department and the Cook County Medical Examiner have been denied.

Some offices said they had no records at all, while others are "refusing to produce records from the investigation of an unsolved murder that occurred more than 50 years ago, claiming that there is not a single record from the investigation that can be released without interfering with an allegedly 'ongoing' investigation," according to the 7-page complaint.

Kelly sued the agencies for violations of the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). He seeks release of the requested records, with only exempt material redacted, and civil penalties.

The Illinois State Police and the Chicago Police Department said they cannot comment on pending litigation. The other defendants did not respond to an emailed request for comment from Courthouse News.

Kelly recently joined forces with Ivey, Barnum & O'Mara, a practice based in Connecticut. He is represented in Chicago by Matthew Topic of Loevy & Loevy.



Glenn, if you read this, thank you! I hope this helps solve the case.

That is good news right? If these files finally do get released it could help solve a 50 year old cold case. Lets hope there are still plenty of records that they actually can release.

I wonder what kind of stuff LE even has to make public. Is there any DNA, prints or anything on Thoresen to compare? Or any living relatives who may be willing to help?

I wonder if the glove left by the murderer is still around and has DNA?

Thoresen's son lives in Georgia. I'm pretty sure he is the only living relative. He has to know about his father's past, but I have no idea if he would cooperate as far as getting DNA testing done.

hope for the best. after 50 years it would be nice to finally put this case to rest.

ophion1031 wrote:Thoresen's son lives in Georgia. I'm pretty sure he is the only living relative. He has to know about his father's past, but I have no idea if he would cooperate as far as getting DNA testing done.

couldnt LE force him to do a DNA test if they felt it would help solve the case?

Eric X wrote:

ophion1031 wrote:Thoresen's son lives in Georgia. I'm pretty sure he is the only living relative. He has to know about his father's past, but I have no idea if he would cooperate as far as getting DNA testing done.

couldnt LE force him to do a DNA test if they felt it would help solve the case?

I doubt it. Can't really force someone against their will, but maybe Michael would do it on his own. If he is anything like his father then not a chance.

Any news on the case files being released?

pretty good report here from abc 7 chicago on the 50 year anniversary of the murder. it talks about thoresen


http://abc7chicago.com/news/officials-fight-to-keep-valerie-percy-murder-files-secret/1501024/

Eric X wrote:pretty good report here from abc 7 chicago on the 50 year anniversary of the murder. it talks about thoresen


http://abc7chicago.com/news/officials-fight-to-keep-valerie-percy-murder-files-secret/1501024/

Thanks for posting that!

JohnFester wrote:Any news on the case files being released?

Not as far as I know. They are doing everything they can to keep them "top secret." Why? What are they hiding? Maybe Thoresen's father knew his son was Percy's killer and paid police to keep it a secret. But that would have been a really long time ago...

A friend of Valerie Percy was murdered one week after Valerie...

On September 25, 1966, chemical engineer Jerry Bricca left work, picked up some milk at the store for his wife, Linda, and their daughter, Debbie, and arrived at his Cincinnati home around 8:00 PM. He got his trash ready for garbage day and, after engaging in some small talk with a neighbor who was walking her dog, went inside his house. In the morning, nobody saw Debbie at school, and Jerry never showed up for a flight he was supposed to take for a business trip to West Virginia.

By the next day, neighbors noticed that the Briccas’ dogs had been barking all day and that their garbage cans hadn’t been moved. So their friends Dick Meyer and Dick Janszen figured they’d check in on them. Meyer, a World War II veteran, opened their front door and recognized a familiar smell: Something was dead inside the house.

As the police searched the Briccas’ home, they found Debbie dead in her bedroom and Linda and Jerry dead in theirs. Linda’s body was laid on top of Jerry’s, and Jerry had a sock stuffed into his mouth. Both Linda and Jerry were tied up, and all three of the Briccas had been stabbed to death.

No murder weapon was found, but Jerry’s wallet and the family’s morning newspaper from September 26 were missing. Although some believed that the murders were part of a spontaneous robbery, others whispered that it was a carefully planned attack.

According to a neighbor, Linda had seemed nervous and scared several weeks before the murders. A week before Linda’s death, a woman she had known named Valerie Percy had been killed in her house in Chicago. Percy’s murderer was never caught. Although investigators never determined whether the two murders were connected, Percy and Linda were said to have run around with the same crowd when Linda lived in Illinois.

If only airlines kept records from back then... maybe they do?

It would be interesting to track Thoresen's movements.

There are people out there fighting to get the Percy murder files released, but Kenilworth PD is fighting to keep them private. Why? After 50 years what is the point?

Attorney John Q. Kelly is fighting to get the case files released! I hope he is successful.

http://www.ibopersonalinjurylawyers.com/Blog/2017/March/The-Valerie-Percy-Case-50-Years-Later.aspx

Here is a quote from that link: In September of 2016, a Cook County Judge ordered the Kenilworth police chief to release a 12-page memorandum, which outlined thousands of pages of secret evidence from the case. Most of the memorandum was redacted, making it almost as useless as the forbidden records. The reason for the redaction and the reluctance to release more details is that allegedly the investigation is still active. Later in December, a judge finally ruled that the thousands of pages of police reports related to the case will remain under wraps while the crime remains active. According to the judge, the release of the documents would, “jeopardize the investigation.”



Jeopardize a murder that hasn't been solved in 50 years... there has to be something more to it. They are hiding something. I bet they have information that would solve the case. My opinion is that Thoresen was always the top suspect ever since his name was given to the FBI, but before they could prove it, they were told to back off until Thoresen's weapons trial was over. And then he was dead and it was too late. That would be a good reason to want to keep the evidence private. Thoresen had to have done it. He admitted to murdering Dale Stoddard, who was a friend of his. He admitted to having his own brother murdered by Stoddard. Well, there are a lot more things, which are all posted on the site here, but the point is that he was a psychopath who was up all night and was known to break into other homes around this same time. Everything points to him.