The Dutch Psychic--Peter Hurkos

I was just settling into an interview with someone who knew John Norman Collins. It was a late lunch meeting at Haab's--downtown Ypsilanti's oldest and finest restaurant. I overheard two women, sitting in a booth adjacent to us, talking in hushed tones about John Collins and those times. What a coincidence!

After the lunch crowd, the restaurant was almost empty, so I interjected myself into their conversation. "Ladies! I'm in town this week doing research and interviewing people for a book I'm writing about John Norman Collins."

Both ladies said in unison, "Really?" One of the women had worked for the county police as a dispatcher at that time, and the other claimed to be a psychic.

"How amazing is this?" I said. "I just learned something new about Peter Hurkos--the Danish psychic who was summoned onto the unsolved murdercases by an Ann Arbor citizens' group."

"He helped solve the Boston Strangler case, didn't he," the lady psychic added.

Peter Hurkos being fingerprinted.

"Not really," I said. "He played a controversial role in that case. Boston police arrested him for impersonating an officer when he aggressively interrogated an emotionally disturbed man. He was told to leave town or face a judge.

Back in Los Angeles, he parlayed his experience into a nightclub act. Hurkos entered the coed killing media circus in an attempt to punch up his waning career."

Hurkos was hired for one day as a consultant for the disturbing Tony Curtis movie The Boston Strangler--a film John Collins was obsessed with. Years later, Hurkos was hired to appear in a cameo role in the movie version of the Collins' killings entitled Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep--which began filming in 1969 but was never released.

I explained to the ladies, "Mr. Archie Allen--head of an Ann Arbor citizens' group--offered Peter Hurkos $1,100 for expenses to come down from LA to look into this case. Hurkos asked for $2,500 plus expenses and was insulted when the group could not raise more money. He reluctantly agreed to come anyway because of all the potential free publicity generated from this case--especially if he got lucky and helped solve it."

"The man had powers," the lady psychic insisted. "He was a painter who fell off a ladder and banged his head, or something like that. I don't remember exactly. From then on, he could sense people and events from handling their things. He had the gift."

"Yes, I know. That was his claim to fame."

The former police dispatcher added, "Yes, that's right. I remember Lieutenant William Mulholland--an investigator on the case--saying, "He (Hurkos) is making a believer out of me."

John Sinclair

Well," I continued, "do you know who the citizens' group was?" I gave the psychic another chance to divine the answer. She could not.

"Remember, John Sinclair? He was always in trouble with the Washtenaw County sheriff."

"Yes, we do!"

"Sinclair and a bunch of his followers were tired of the police harassment they were getting, so they offered to help. They wanted to show they were responsible, caring members of the Ann Arbor community. One of their members said she thought there might be something cosmic or supernatural going on with this case, so why not try to get a psychic involved?"

"That's interesting," the women agreed

"My theory is they wanted to throw a wildcard into the mix and make the police look stupid. Soon afterwards, the Washtenaw County police were called the Keystone Kops by the Detroit Free Press."

Sheriff Douglas Harvey

"I remember how upset Sheriff Harvey was with that reporter," the former dispatcher said.

"Harvey did take it personally," I agreed. "I also discovered John Collins came into close contact with Hurkos just before Hurkos left town for LA. Peter Hurkos did not have the slightest clue. I got that information from someone who was there with Collins."

Psychic Peter Hurkos vs. John Norman Collins

 

Ancient myths and tales abound with stories about oracles, seers, soothsayers, sorcerers, and fortune tellers. Common among these legends is an appeal to a charmed man or woman who has the gift of inner vision. Usually, the person comes from outside the village or town where an overwhelming problem is plaguing the community and he or she agrees to relieve the populace from their resident evil.

Since Jack the Ripper cast a pall over London's East End in 1888, in virtually every serial murder case that goes unsolved for any length of time, a psychic is called in to relieve the public of their collective angst. It is a common appeal for supernatural assistance when confidence in local law enforcement erodes.

Murderous crimes that go beyond simple killing and become ritualized orgies of carnage and butchery evoke antediluvian images of blood thirsty ghouls, evil witches, and demons in league with Satan. These images are deeply embedded in the human psyche and express our deepest psychological fears.

 

Enter psychic Peter Hurkos, the self-proclaimed first police psychic, arguably the most famous psychic of his day.  Hurkos believed he had a "psychometric" sense, the ability to gain information about people from physical contact with inanimate objects they had touched. He also believed he could enter a crime scene and pick up an aura. "Vibrations" he called them.

Peter Hurkos honed his skills into a popular nightclub act and rubbed elbows with many Hollywood and Las Vegas celebrities. He was a favored guest on the talk show circuit and appeared on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, The Merv Griffin Show, and The Dinah Shore Show to name just a few.  

After an inauspicious performance and ensuing bad publicity from his work on the Boston Strangler case in 1964, his bookings were fewer and farther between. He just wasn't news anymore.

His agent fielded an offer she took over the phone for him to go to Ann Arbor, Michigan, and see if he could help with the coed killer case there. At first, Hurkos declined, but his agent convinced him that if he could help find the killer, his career would get a boost.

On Monday, July 21, 1969, as he was getting off the plane at Detroit's Metropolitan Airport, Hurkos noticed a cadre of media waiting on the tarmac to interview him. There were too many newsmen chasing too little news in Ann Arbor, and Hurkos put some new life into the story, so they were there to welcome him, and he didn't disappoint them.

With characteristic bravura, the Danish psychic challenged the killer, "He knows I'm coming. I'm after him and he's after me. But I am not afraid. I come thousands of miles to find him and I won't give up." 

While he was in the area, the Danish psychic wanted to examine the landmarks of the cases and handle items of evidence obtained from earlier police investigations. What harm could there be with that?

Taking exception to Peter Hurkos' unauthorized collaboration on the case was Washtenaw County Sheriff Douglas Harvey. There were chain of custody issues regarding the collection, cataloging, storage, and admissibility of evidence. Law enforcement didn't have the time to waste on a man who some people thought was a media hound.

Peter Hurkos, with five police escorts, explored the Friday Ann Arbor nightlife to get a feel for the area. Hurkos also wanted to personally thank John Sinclair and members of his commune at Translove Energies on Hill St. in Ann Arbor. They were the people who raised the money to summon the psychic from California. 

When Hurkos returned to the Inn American early the next morning where he was lodged, the desk clerk told him that a young man about six foot tall with slicked down hair and wearing a turquoise colored shirt, handed her an envelope at about midnight addressed to Dutch psychic/Peter Hurkos. 

When his police security detail asked if she could recognize him again, she said, "No. I was busy with another customer and it happened so quickly. He was gone."

Hurkos opened the letter and read it silently. It directed him and the police to search for a burned out cabin on Weed Rd. in the northeast corner of Washtenaw County not far from where several other murder victims were found. They would find "something interesting" there the note assured them. The psychic had finally been enjoined in direct communication with the killer.

Hurkos had a "feeling" about this message and gave it to the police to investigate. Then he went to bed. A crew of investigators was hastily formed to investigate the tip in the middle of the night in the pouring rain. They searched the entire area for a burned out cabin they would never find. After an hour, the police returned to the Task Force Crime Center. They had had their fill of Mr. Hurkos. 

Three days after Karen Sue Beineman had been reported missing on Wednesday, July 23, her nude body was found in Ann Arbor township, face down in a small gully. The dump site was less than a mile from the Inn America where Hurkos was staying and the Holy Ghost Fathers Seminary where the crime task force was headquartered. 

The latest murder and the disposal of the body were a blatant affront to everyone connected with this case. Even worse for Hurkos, news of the police finding Miss Beineman's body was kept from him. When he was asked by a reporter for a comment on the matter, he was totally in the dark. The Dane was furious and complained to the prosecutor's office.

During his uneventful week in Ann Arbor, Hurkos cast a wide net. He variously described the killer as a troubled genius, an uneducated vagrant, a sick homosexual, a transvestite, a member of a blood cult, and a drug crazed hippie.

Arrow points to site where Karen Sue Beineman's body was discovered

Once Miss Beineman's body was removed from the gully and the scant evidence secured by the State Police Crime Lab, Hurkos was escorted by the assistant prosecutor and permitted to examine the drop site. Under the withering glare of Sheriff Harvey from the street above, Hurkos made his way down the gully to the spot where the body had been found.

He got down on his haunches and spread both hands out and felt the ground where the body had been. Try as he might, the spot was cold, no vibrations or emanations of any sort.  

With growing resistance from the police and his press entourage shrinking, there was little to be gained by staying in Ann Arbor. Hurkos and his assistant, Ed Silver, left town on Monday, July 28th, headed for the West Coast.

In the end, Sheriff Harvey turned out to be the only clairvoyant on this case. He predicted, "I think these murders will be solved with good old-fashioned police work." Their prime suspect was under arrest within a week. 

One Step Beyond: "The Peter Hurkos Story" 1/6

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RTXPzVIugsg

 

Psychic Peter Hurkos and the John Norman Collins Case

Dutchman Peter Hurkos billed himself as the first police psychic and parlayed that into a career in the 1950s and 1960s. After making many claims about his extrasensory abilities in Europe, he came to wider attention after he volunteered to look into the Stone of Scone theft from Westminster Abbey in 1951. He did so at his own expense without official sanction. Hurkos was among several others who were allowed to examine the throne where the stone should have been lodged.

Hurkos made a great show of it by doing a "cold" reading of the area in front of some French reporters, who wrote articles which described his examination of the area in great detail. Thanks to the French press and his adroit self-promotion, Peter Hurkos became a European sensation despite British Home Secretary, Chuter Ede's official statement made on behalf of the British government, "The gentleman in question... did not obtain any results whatsoever."

Peter Hurkos called his gift "psychometry" - the ability to see past-present-future associations by touching objects. He claims he discovered this ability after a serious accident. He was painting a building several stories up in Hague when he fell off a ladder and lapsed into a coma for several days. When he awoke in the hospital, he had the gift.

Hurkos was invited to The United States in 1956 by Andrija Puharich, a parapsychologist and researcher into ESP. After getting Puharich's public approval and a wealth of free publicity, he became a popular nightclub entertainer.

From time to time, Hurkos would involve himself in high-profile police cases such as The Boston Strangler, the Michigan Murders, and The Sharon Tate Murders. The Boston Police found Hurkos a nuisance. He was arrested and convicted of impersonating a police office trying to gather information he could later claim were psychic revelations. With the Manson case, he claimed to identify Charles Manson when it was Susan Atkins, Manson's supporter, who dropped his name in jail.

In the case of John Collins, he proclaimed that the murderer had blond hair and at other times said it was brown. He described the murderer as five foot five or six inches tall and weighing 140 pounds; Collins was over six feet tall and 180 pounds. All of Hurkos' other "revelations" regarding this case could have been easily derived from newspaper articles on the murders, which he insisted he never read. After an unsuccessful week in Ann Arbor, the psychic left for home discouraged, blaming his failure on lack of police cooperation.

Peter Hurkos had an uncanny ability to promote himself on talk shows like The Tonight Show and The Merv Griffin Show. He appeared in several documentaries about himself, and he was portrayed in the movie version of The Boston Strangler by veteran actor, George Voskovec. Peter Hurkos played himself in the never-to-be released movie about John Collins and the coed killings called Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep.

In 1960, the futuristic show One Step Beyond, brought to you by Alcoa Aluminum and hosted by John Newland, produced a two part show on Peter Hurkos' life story. I've attached the YouTube link below which includes the show's vintage opening. If you are sufficiently interested, the rest of the episode's segments can be found on that page's right sidebar.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RTXPzVIugsg