Adolph Coors III was a low-key and well-liked beer executive. His father, Adolph Coors Jr., was a hard taskmaster, who ultimately gave control of the brewery to his 3 sons (Adolph III and his brothers, Bill and Joe). The brothers were expected to join the family business, although Adolph’s dream was to own a cattle and horse operation, and his brother Bill once confessed he had wanted to be a violinist until they both succumbed to “the family responsibility.” Ironically, much to his father’s disgust, Adolph III was allergic to beer. Adolph graduated from Cornell University, where he was president of the Quill and Dagger society. Coors was also a semi-professional baseball player. At the time of his death, he was CEO and Chairman of the Board of the Coors Brewing Company in Golden, Colorado. Coors married Mary Urquhart Grant in November 1940. This March 19, 1951 mug shot was taken upon Joseph Corbett, Jr.’s incarceration at the California Institution for Men in Chino, California, where he was sentenced to five years after pleading guilty to second-degree murder. He escaped from prison and committed the kidnapping and murder of Adolph Coors, III while a fugitive. On February 9, 1960, a milkman moving a car blocking a bridge to the side of the road noticed a reddish-brown stain on the bridge and a hat on the edge of the river bank below. The milkman reported the matter to the local police, who quickly determined that the car belonged to Adolph Coors, III. Heir to the Coors Brewing Company fortune, Coors had left his house—not far from the bridge—that morning, but had not been seen since. Searchers soon spread out over the area looking for the missing 45-year-old father of four. The hat belonged to Coors, but no trace of him was found during the wider search. Adolph Coors’ wife, Mary, received a typewritten note that day demanding a ransom for the return of her husband. Under the guidance of law enforcement, she followed the instructions regarding contacting the kidnapper but heard nothing back. State and local police pursued leads closer to the scene of the crime, conducting extensive interviews and other investigative activities. They soon focused on a canary yellow Mercury that had been seen in the area on several occasions and tried to track down its driver, a man who called himself Walter Osborne. The FBI learned that Osborne had disappeared around the time of Coors’ abduction, but before doing so had obtained a gun, handcuffs, and a typewriter (of the brand used to type the ransom note). The Bureau also learned that Osborne had obtained an insurance policy at a previous job, and that policy designated a man named Joseph Corbett as his beneficiary, and ultimately that Walter Osborne was Joseph Corbett Jr. Joseph Corbett, Jr. was placed on the FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list for the murder of the Coors Brewery heir, Adolf Coors. Joseph Corbett Jr. (October 25, 1928 – August 24, 2009) was a former Fulbright scholar at the University of Oregon. Corbett was convicted of shooting a man in the back of the head in 1951, which he claimed was self-defense. Corbett was placed in a maximum-security prison in California, and due to good behavior, was later transferred to minimum security, from which he then escaped. Corbett had an ongoing fascination with Lindbergh kidnapping case. Throughout the summer of 1960, Corbett, Jr.’s trail remained cold. But tragically, the trail leading to Adolph Coors ended on September 11, 1960, when hikers in the woods about 12 miles southwest of Sedalia (a town south of Denver) came across items of clothing, and skeletal remains determined to belong to Coors. A jacket and shirt had bullet holes that showed he had been shot in the back, and an analysis of a shoulder bone confirmed this. A manager of a rooming house in Winnipeg called police to report that a man who looked like the Corbett had recently stayed at her flophouse. When the FBI knocked on the door, Corbett answered, “I give up. I’m the man you want.” Joseph Corbett had carefully planned the kidnapping, but like most major crimes, things happen that are never anticipated. Corbett had followed Coors for week and discovered he crossed a one-lane bridge every day on his way to work in an isolated country area near Morrison, Colorado. Corbett parked his car on the bridge, pretending it had broken down, and when Adolph Coors approached to help him, Corbett pulled out a gun and ordered Coors in the vehicle. But instead of complying, Coors fought him and took off running. Corbett shot Coors in the back, multiple times, killing him. After the murder, Corbett burned his car to destroy any evidence. The FBI was able to prove the ransom note was typed on Corbett, Jr.’s typewriter, on paper with an unusual watermark that Corbett had purchased. Adolph Coors’ niece had recognized Corbett as being in the vicinity of Coors in the weeks prior to the murder. But the most damning evidence came from one of the first cases of remarkable work done by a forensics lab. They examined Corbett’s burned-out canary yellow Mercury, which was recovered in New Jersey shortly after Coors’ disappearance, and found that even though the interior had been burned out, there was soil still stuck on the car that contained minerals only found in the area near the bridge, where Coors had been murdered. On March 19, 1961, Joseph Corbett, Jr. was convicted and sentenced to life in prison. He was paroled and released from prison on December 12, 1980 (which seems a little light considering he’d been convicted of 2 separate murders). Corbett would shoot one more person. On August 24, 2009, Corbett, who was 80 and had been suffering from cancer, was found dead in his apartment as a result of a single self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head. Coors/Miller is now the largest American owned brewery, ever since Budweiser was purchased by a Belgium company. Prior to 1981, Coors beer could only be purchased in Colorado. My older brothers made a trip to California after high school, and paid for the trip by loading the car with Coors beer when they returned through Colorado, and selling it in Minnesota when they returned. My niece, Kate, is employed at the Coors Brewery in Golden, Colorado. Politicians haven’t been listening for 50 years For example: The National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders, known as the Kerner Commission, was an 11-member Presidential Commission established by President Lyndon B. Johnson to investigate the causes of the 1967 race riots in the United States and to provide recommendations for the future. President Johnson appointed the commission on July 28, 1967, while rioting was still underway in Detroit. Mounting civil unrest since 1965 had spawned riots in the black and Latino neighborhoods of major U.S. cities, including Los Angeles (Watts riots of 1965), Chicago (Division Street Riots of 1966, the first Puerto Rican riot in US History), and Newark (1967 Newark riots). In LBJ’s remarks upon signing the order establishing the commission, Johnson asked for answers to three basic questions about the riots: "What happened? Why did it happen? What can be done to prevent it from happening again and again?" Report Summary The Commission's final report, or Kerner Report, was released on February 29, 1968, after seven months of investigation. The report became an instant bestseller, and over two million Americans bought copies of the 426-page document. Its finding was that the riots resulted from frustration over the lack of economic opportunity for poor Americans. The Commission's suggestions included: "Providing employment for the swelling African American ghetto population will require ...opening suburban residential areas to African Americans and encouraging them to move closer to industrial centers..." "...cities will have African American majorities by 1985 and the suburbs ringing them will remain largely all white unless there are major changes in public policy." "...we believe that the emphasis of the program should be changed from traditional publicly built slum based high rise projects to smaller units on scattered sites." Aftermath President Johnson, who had already pushed through the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act, ignored the report and rejected the Kerner Commission's recommendations. In April 1968, one month after the release of the Kerner report, rioting broke out in more than 100 cities following the assassination of civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr. Quotes (The last of my Mitch Hedburg quotes—God rest his soul!) One time a guy handed me a picture, and said "Here's a picture of me when I was younger." Every picture of you, is when you were younger. I don't have a girlfriend, but I do know a girl who would be really angry if she heard me say that. I used to be a hot tar roofer. Yeah, I remember that day. I had a paper route when I was a kid. I was a paperboy. I was supposed to go to 2,000 houses... or one dumpster. I find that a duck's opinion of me is very much influenced over whether or not I have bread. You know when you go to a restaurant on the weekends, it's busy, so they start a waiting list. They start calling out names, they say "Dufrane, party of two. Table ready for Dufrane, party of two." And if no one answers, they'll say their name again. "Dufrane, party of two." But then if no one answers they'll just go right on to the next name. "Bush, party of three." Yeah, but what happened to the Dufranes? No one seems to care. Who can eat at a time like this? People are missing. You people are selfish. The Dufranes could be in someone's trunk right now, with duct tape over their mouths, and they're hungry - that's a double whammy. We need help. They should announce, "Bush, SEARCH party of three! You can eat once you find the Dufranes." My belt holds up my pants, but my pants have belt loops that hold up the belt. So who is the real hero? Thanks for listening, Frank I won’t watch a game where players don’t stand for the national anthem. I won’t even buy a ticket if I suspect the players won’t stand. I respect anyone who died for noble reasons and so did my father. Any struggles in my personal life, or frustration about politics, doesn’t diminish that respect for others. NFL--find another way to express your frustration.
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AuthorFrank F. Weber is a forensic psychologist specializing in homicide and sexual and physical assault cases. He uses his unique understanding of how predator’s think, knowledge of victim trauma, actual court cases, and passion for writing true crime thrillers. His Award Winning books include "Murder Book" (2017) "The I-94 Murders" (2018) "Last Call" (2019) and "Lying Close" (September 2020). Archives
April 2024
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