July 31

1977. "Son of Sam" serial killer, David Berkowitz murders his final victim, Stacy Moskowitz, one year after his killing spree began in New York City.

1988. Actor Gary Coleman is arrested and charged with assaulting a fan seeking his autograph while he was trying to purchase a bulletproof vest.

July 30

1954. Dr. Sam Sheppard, whose story was the basis of the movie The Fugitive, is arrested for the murder of his wife. Marilyn Sheppard had been found beaten to death in bed in their Ohio home. She was four months pregnant. He was tried and convicted, and served 10 years before being exonerated at a retrial. Visit the Crime Library for the full story.

1975. Former Teamsters president Jimmy Hoffa disappears in Detroit after leaving his Lake Orion home for a meeting. He had been paroled from federal prison three years earlier. Although police believe he was killed by organized crime, his remains have never been found. In 1983, he was legally declared dead.

July 29

1976. "Son of Sam" serial killer David Berkowitz shoots and kills his first victim, Donna Lauria, in the Bronx. Lauria, 18, was sitting in a car outside her Bronx apartment with her friend Jody Valente when Berkowitz pulled his .44 caliber Charter Arms Bulldog out of a paper bag and fired five times into the car. Valente survived the attack, but Lauria died instantly.

1999. Stock trader Mark Barton opens fire in two Atlanta brokerage offices, killing nine and wounding 13 before killing himself. The shootings began at about 2:30 p.m. at All-Tech Investment Group in the heart of the upscale Buckhead business district. Barton killed four people then went across the street to the building at 3522 Piedmont Road and killed five more people. Barton, upset over big stock losses, had also bludgeoned his wife and children to death a few days before.

July 28

1868. The 14th Amendment to the Constitution is ratified guaranteeing due process to every citizen, including former slaves. Known as the Reconstruction Amendment, it forbids states to deny to any person "life, liberty or property, without due process of law" or to "deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of its laws." Ratification of the document took a long time because it occurred toward the end of the Civil War. Southern states were required to ratify it to be readmitted into the Union.

July 27

1979. Alice Cooper's Arizona art gallery is firebombed by an unknown vandal. Several of his gold records and more than $200,000 in Indian artifacts are lost.

1981. Six-year-old Adam Walsh, son of "America's Most Wanted's" John Walsh, is abducted. He went to a shopping mall with his mother, Reve, in Hollywood, Fla. She left Adam in the toy department for a brief period of time and when she returned to claim her son he was gone. The ensuing investigation lasted 16 days. Adam's severed head was discovered in a Vero Beach, Fla., drainage ditch on Aug. 12, 1981. The rest of his remains have never been located.

1996. A pipe bomb explodes at the public Centennial Olympic Park at 1:20 a.m. during the Atlanta Summer Games, killing one and injuring more than 100 others. Authorities found two other explosive devices at the scene. The FBI originally suspected Richard Jewell, the security guard who had noticed the unattended knapsack containing the bomb, in the bombing. Later, they refocused their investigation on Eric Rudolph, who is still at large.

2001. Fourteen year old Nathaniel Brazil is sentenced to 28 years in prison for the shooting death of his seventh grade English teacher. A good student with little history of disciplinary problems, Brazill pulled a gun on his English teacher Barry Grunow, shot and killed him in a classroom doorway on May 26, 2000, the last day of classes for Lake Worth Middle School. He was 13 at the time of the shooting and claims it was an accident.

July 26

1984. Edward Gein, a cannibal murderer jailed in 1957, dies peacefully in a Texas home for the criminally insane. Characters in Psycho, Texas Chainsaw Massacre and The Silence of the Lambs were based on Gein.

1990. President George Bush signs the Americans with Disabilities Act. The law protects people with disabilities from discrimination. It is intended to protect qualified persons with disabilities from discrimination in employment, government services and programs, transportation, public accommodations, and telecommunications. The ADA supplements other federal and state laws that protect persons with disabilities.

1991. Actor Paul Reubens, also known as "Pee Wee Herman," is arrested for exposing himself in South Trail Cinema, an X-rated theatre in Florida. He had been visiting his parents, and the police recognized Pee-Wee Herman under Reubens' long hair and goatee. He later paid a $50 fine to Sarasota County and appeared in an anti-drug commercial. Reubens appeared only once more as Pee-Wee. At the MTV Music Video Awards. Once on stage, he asked the crowd, "Heard any good jokes lately?"

July 25

1974. Robert Lopez, 19, is arrested for stealing John F. Kennedy Jr.'s bike and tennis racket in New York City's Central Park. Lopez reportedly blocked Kennedy's path, waved a stick and shouted at Kennedy to "get the hell off the bike." He pushed the youngster to the ground and made a quick getaway with Kennedy's $145 bicycle and tennis racket, valued at $45. Neither was ever recovered. Lopez was later convicted and sentenced to three years after Kennedy testified.

July 24

1973. The Supreme Court unanimously rules that President Richard Nixon must turn over 64 Watergate subpoenaed tapes to the House Impeachment Committee and the Watergate special prosecutor, Leon Jaworski. Nixon reluctantly released transcripts of eight subpoenaed tapes, which reportedly indicated that he had known about the Watergate cover-up and that he had violated the law. Nixon resigned on Aug. 9, 1974, the only president ever to do so. President Gerald Ford gave Nixon an unconditional pardon on Sept. 8, 1974, for all federal crimes he committed or may have committed.

1998. A gunman opens fire in the U.S. Capitol, killing two policemen and injuring a security guard and a tourist. He allegedly entered the U.S. Capitol through the document room door located on the east side of the Capitol. U.S. Capitol Police Officer Jacob Chestnut and Detective John Gibson were killed by gunfire and a female bystander was injured. The accused gunman was later identified as Russell Weston, age 41.

July 23

1993. James Jordan, father of basketball great, Michael Jordan, is murdered in his car during a robbery near Bennettsville, S.C. He was shot during a holdup as he awoke from a nap along a dark highway in his $40,000 car. Daniel Green and Larry Martin Demery were later convicted of the crime. According to testimony, the men drove around in Jordan's red Lexus for four days after the slaying, picking up dates, and used the dead man's cellular phone to call friends and relatives.

1997. Andrew Cunanan, the alleged killer of designer Gianni Versace and four others, commits suicide with a .40-caliber handgun on a houseboat in Miami Beach. He had been one of the FBI's most wanted men in America. The houseboat was just 2.5 miles from where Versace was shot to death in front of his house and federal investigators say Cunanan may have been holed up there for days.

July 22

1934. John Dillinger, the notorious bank robber, is shot to death by federal agents in an alley outside the Biograph Theater in Chicago as he walked out with two women. His shooting was witnessed by throngs of bystanders, many of which reportedly dipped their skirts and handkerchiefs in Dillinger's blood. For months after the shooting, pieces of blood-soaked cloth and vials of blood could be purchased on the streets of Chicago.

1991. Jeffrey Dahmer is arrested by police in his Milwaukee apartment after they discover the remains of 11 victims in his apartment. Dahmer later confessed to 17 murders and was convicted and sentenced to 15 consecutive life terms. He was murdered by a fellow inmate in prison.

1991. Desiree Washington, a former Miss Black America contestant, files a complaint with Indiana police alleging that heavyweight boxer Mike Tyson had raped her in an Indianapolis hotel room. Tyson allegedly met Washington at a pageant rehearsal. Tyson was later convicted of rape and served three years in prison.

1994. O.J. Simpson pleads "absolutely 100 percent not guilty" to the murders of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend, Ronald Goldman. Simpson is later acquitted. Click here for more information on the case.

1996. After spending the weekend in jail, Robert Downey, Jr. pleads not guilty to drug and weapons charges. He was arrested June 23 by police who said they found crack, heroin and an unloaded .357 magnum in his truck. It was his third arrest in a month. After his plea was entered, Downey returned to a jail hospital where he had been receiving treatment for drug addiction. July 23

1993. James Jordan, father of basketball great, Michael Jordan, is murdered in his car during a robbery near Bennettsville, S.C. He was shot during a holdup as he awoke from a nap along a dark highway in his $40,000 car. Daniel Green and Larry Martin Demery were later convicted of the crime. According to testimony, the men drove around in Jordan's red Lexus for four days after the slaying, picking up dates, and used the dead man's cellular phone to call friends and relatives.

1997. Andrew Cunanan, the alleged killer of designer Gianni Versace and four others, commits suicide with a .40-caliber handgun on a houseboat in Miami Beach. He had been one of the FBI's most wanted men in America. The houseboat was just 2.5 miles from where Versace was shot to death in front of his house and federal investigators say Cunanan may have been holed up there for days.

July 22

1934. John Dillinger, the notorious bank robber, is shot to death by federal agents in an alley outside the Biograph Theater in Chicago as he walked out with two women. His shooting was witnessed by throngs of bystanders, many of which reportedly dipped their skirts and handkerchiefs in Dillinger's blood. For months after the shooting, pieces of blood-soaked cloth and vials of blood could be purchased on the streets of Chicago.

1991. Jeffrey Dahmer is arrested by police in his Milwaukee apartment after they discover the remains of 11 victims in his apartment. Dahmer later confessed to 17 murders and was convicted and sentenced to 15 consecutive life terms. He was murdered by a fellow inmate in prison.

1991. Desiree Washington, a former Miss Black America contestant, files a complaint with Indiana police alleging that heavyweight boxer Mike Tyson had raped her in an Indianapolis hotel room. Tyson allegedly met Washington at a pageant rehearsal. Tyson was later convicted of rape and served three years in prison.

1994. O.J. Simpson pleads "absolutely 100 percent not guilty" to the murders of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend, Ronald Goldman. Simpson is later acquitted. Click here for more information on the case.

1996. After spending the weekend in jail, Robert Downey, Jr. pleads not guilty to drug and weapons charges. He was arrested June 23 by police who said they found crack, heroin and an unloaded .357 magnum in his truck. It was his third arrest in a month. After his plea was entered, Downey returned to a jail hospital where he had been receiving treatment for drug addiction.

July 21

1873. Jesse James and his gang commit the first train robbery in the West. They had received word that the Rock Island and Pacific train was loaded with a gold shipment. The gang expected to find more than $100,000 in gold but found less than $2,000 in notes. The real haul sped by on the repaired tracks some 12 hours later.

1972. Comedian George Carlin is arrested and charged with obscenity after performing his routine "The Seven Words You Can't Say on TV" during the close of his act at the Summerfest Festival on Lake Michigan. He was released on a $150 cash bail. The routine was played on the radio, and subsequent complaints forced a criminal case. Eventually ending up in the U.S. Supreme Court, the justices ruled that "the government had the right to regulate broadcasts and performances that were deemed indecent but not obscene" during hours children might be watching.

July 20

1993. The first trial of Erik and Lyle Menendez begins in California. The brothers are accused of murdering their parents in Beverly Hills. Both juries were hung, and the brothers were later convicted in their second trial and sentenced to life in prison. Click here for more information or visit the Crime Library to read more on the case.

1994. O.J. Simpson offers a $500,000 reward for the capture of "the real killer" of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend, Ronald Goldman. Simpson was later tried and acquitted of the murders. Click here to visit the O.J. Simpson casefiles.

July 19

1692. Five women are hanged in Salem, Mass., for the crime of witchcraft. By the end of the Salem Witch Trials, a total of 20 women were executed.

1969. A dark blue Oldsmobile 98 driven by Senator Edward Kennedy plunges over the narrow Dyke Bridge into a tidal pond on the tiny island of Chappaquiddick, adjacent to Martha's Vineyard, killing 28-year-old Mary Jo Kopechne. Kennedy was later found guilty of leaving the scene of an accident.

1990. Pete Rose is sentenced to five months in prison and fined $50,000 for tax evasion. After he served his prison time, he served three more months in a halfway house. Rose was suspended from baseball Aug. 23, 1989, for committing baseball's capital crime. From 1985 through 1987, he bet on his own team.

July 18

1984. James Oliver Huberty opens fire in a McDonald's in San Ysidro, Calif., killing 21 and wounding 19 before being killed by a police sharpshooter from the roof of the post office next door. He was a self-professed hater of "children, Mexicans and the United States," and told his wife, "I'm going hunting humans" before the shooting. It was the worst single-day mass slaying in U.S. history. Not long after, the McDonald's was bulldozed and deeded to the city of San Diego with the stipulation that no other restaurant could ever be built there again.

1988. A California appeals court upholds the dismissal of a case against Ozzy Osbourne and CBS Records. A 19-year-old male had shot himself in the head while allegedly listening to Osbourne's song "Suicide Solution." When the coroner entered the room, he found the headphones still on the boy's head. On Jan. 13, 1986, the boy's parents sued Osbourne. The lawsuit was thrown out on Dec. 19, 1986, by a California Superior Court judge.

1989. My Sister Sam actress Rebecca Schaeffer is shot to death by fan, Robert John Bardo at her home. Bardo was later found guilty of murder and sentenced to life in prison. During the trial, prosecutors contended that Bardo tracked Schaeffer with help from a private investigator after a number of visits to Los Angeles, where he unsuccessfully tried to meet her. Bardo is from Arizona. Click here for more information on the case.

July 17

1998. Boxer Mike Tyson announces that he will apply for reinstatement of his boxing license in New Jersey. The Nevada State Athletic Commission had revoked Tyson's license a year before and fined him the maximum 10 percent of his $30 million purse for biting the ear of Evander Holyfield in a June 28 heavyweight title fight at Las Vegas. Under the law of revocation, Tyson had to wait one year before applying for a new license.

July 16

1973. Former Nixon aide Alexander Butterfield reveals the existence of White House tapes during the Senate Watergate hearings. Though the system, set up on Feb. 16, 1971, didn't work very well, as evidenced by the poor quality of 445 hours of tape recordings, the tapes provided the evidence that ended Nixon's presidency.

1996. Actor Robert Downey Jr. is arrested after wandering into the home of neighbor Lisa Curtis, wife of publishing magnate Bill Curtis. He passed out in a child's bed wearing a T-shirt and boxer shorts. His jeans were neatly folded over a nearby chair. Downey was cited for trespassing and being under the influence of a controlled substance.

July 15

1997. Designer Gianni Versace is murdered on the steps of his mansion on South Beach, Miami's Ocean Drive. A guard was unlocking the front gate of Versace's posh three-story home, located on the most heavily trafficked strip in South Beach, when a white male in his 20s approached him from behind and shot him at point blank range. The suspected gunman, Andrew Cunanan, was found dead eight days later.

1999. Oliver Stone enters a plea of not guilty to charges of driving under the influence and possession of a controlled substance. He later pleaded guilty to the possession charge and no contest to the charge of driving under the influence. He was placed on three years probation by Beverly Hills Municipal Court Judge Judith O. Stein.

July 14

1881. The notorious outlaw Billy the Kid is shot to death by Sheriff Pat Garrett in New Mexico. Garrett waited for Billy in a room at Pete Maxwell's home in Fort Sumner, N. Mex. Billy entered, and Pat Garrett fatally shot him. Billy the Kid was buried in the old Fort Sumner Post Cemetery near present-day Fort Sumner, New Mex.

1966. Eight student nurses are brutally murdered in their Chicago dormitory. After a search that led to him several times, Richard Speck was arrested. He was later tried, convicted and sentenced to more than 400 years in prison for the murders. Go to the Crime Library for the full story.

2000. A jury awards a record $144 billion in punitive damages against "Big Tobacco" in a landmark class-action suit filed on behalf of 700,000 Florida smokers suffering from smoking-related illnesses. Philip Morris, the largest defendant, was ordered to pay $74 billion.

July 13

1992. Jeffrey Dahmer changes his plea to guilty but insane in the deaths of 15 men and boys. A jury finds him to be sane and he was sentenced to 15 life terms in prison, but was beaten to death by a fellow inmate before he could serve his sentence. Click here for the full story.

July 12

1933. Congress passes the National Industrial Recovery Act to create fair practices in and remove obstacles to commerce. Two years later the U.S. Supreme Court declared it unconstitutional. Nevertheless, a number of states passed minimum wage laws in ensuing years, and in 1938 the federal government enacted the Fair Labor Standards Act, fixing the minimum wage of workers employed in interstate commerce at $0.25 an hour and providing for the raising of the minimum to $0.40 an hour after seven years.

July 11

1804. Vice President Aaron Burr fatally shoots Alexander Hamilton, secretary of the treasury, during a duel in Weehawken, N.J., at the Trinity Churchyard. Burr challenged Hamilton to settle a long-standing rivalry. Hamilton died from one gunshot wound the following day in New York City.

July 10

1925. Jury selection takes place in the Scopes "Monkey Trial" in Tennessee. John Scopes was charged with violating the law by teaching Charles Darwin's theory of evolution, which was a violation of Tennessee law. The jury was composed of 10 farmers, a schoolmaster and a shipping clerk. None of them believed in evolution.

1933. The first police radio system is installed in patrol cars of the Bayonne Police Department in Eastchester Township, New York. The system was designed by Lieutenant Vincent J. Doyle of the Bayonne Police and radio engineer Frank Gunther. Through the use of a combined transmitter and receiver in the patrol car, the two-way system allowed communication between patrol cars and with the police station.

July 9

1997. Mike Tyson's boxing license is revoked by the Nevada State Athletic Commission for biting Evander Holyfield on the ear during a championship fight. Tyson was winning the round when, with about 40 seconds left, Holyfield suddenly jumped up and down in anger and walked away with blood streaming from his right ear. Tyson ran after Holyfield and pushed him before referee Mills Lane pulled him away. Tyson was fined $3 million.

July 8

1777. Vermont becomes the first state to abolish slavery upon adopting its constitution.

July 7

1876. The Jesse James gang robs $17,000 from a Missouri-Pacific train. James rode with his brother Frank and many others who came away from the Civil War with a hardened attitude and with no way to make a real living. They terrorized Missouri for more than 20 years. Governor Thomas Theodore Crittendan offered a reward of $10,000 for James' capture, dead or alive. In 1882 he was shot in the back, in his home in St. Joseph, Missouri, by a former member of his gang, to collect the reward. Visit the Crime Library for more information.

1981. Sandra Day O'Connor is nominated to the Supreme Court by President Ronald Reagan. In September, O'Connor became the Court's 102nd justice and its first female member. Reagan had promised to appoint the first woman to the Supreme Court to offset criticism of his opposition to the Equal Rights Amendment in 1980. He got the opportunity when Justice Potter Stewart retired in June 1981. The Senate approved her nomination with 91 votes.

July 6

1535. Sir Thomas More is beheaded on Tower Hill in London after being convicted of treason against King Henry the VIII. His final words on the scaffold were: "The King's good servant, but God's First." More was beatified in 1886 and canonized by the Catholic Church as a saint by Pope Pius XI in 1935.

July 5

1921. Jury selection begins in the trial of eight Chicago baseball players accused of throwing the 1919 World Series against the Cincinnati Reds. The eight men were "Shoeless" Joe Jackson; pitchers Eddie Cicotte and Claude "Lefty" Williams; infielders Buck Weaver, Arnold "Chick" Gandil, Fred McMullin and Charles "Swede" Risberg; and outfielder Oscar "Happy" Felsch. Although the "Black Sox" were acquitted, they were later banned from baseball for life.

July 4?

1954. Marilyn Sheppard is found beaten to death in bed in her Ohio home. She was four months pregnant. Her husband, Dr. Sam Sheppard, was later tried, convicted and then eventually acquitted in a case that was the basis for the TV series and later movie The Fugitive. Visit the Crime Library for the full story.

1966. President Lyndon Johnson signs the Freedom of Information Act granting citizens and the press access to most government information. The act gives any person the right to request and receive any document, file or other record in the possession of any agency of the federal government, subject to exemptions. The act does not require the government to create documents in response to requests, but simply to provide documents that already exist.

July 3

1984. The U.S. Supreme Court upholds a Minnesota court's decision requiring the local chapter of the Jaycees to admit women as full members. The ruling said the chapter violated the Minnesota State Public Accommodations laws by denying women regular membership in the organization. The Jaycees were ordered to accept women as members in Minnesota. A milestone change in the organization took place on Aug. 16, 1984, in Tulsa, Okla., when delegates sent from each state voted in a special meeting to admit women into the organization for the first time in its history.

July 2

1881. President James Garfield is shot by a mentally ill attorney. Doctors were unable to find the bullet with a metal detector invented by Alexander Graham Bell. The device failed because Garfield was placed on a bed with metal springs, and no one thought to move him. Garfield later died from infection. He was the second president shot in office.

1964. President Lyndon Johnson signs the Civil Rights Act, a far-reaching law prohibiting discrimination in public places. When the bill was introduced, there was lengthy debate of its contents. Southern congressmen fought against it adamantly. It has had a lasting effect in the elimination of discrimination and segregation. The act enforces the constitutional right to vote, prevents discrimination in federally assisted programs, and prohibits discrimination in employment because of race, color, sex (including pregnancy), national origin, and religion.

1976. the U.S. Supreme Court rules in Gregg v. Georgia that the death penalty is constitutional and does not violate the Eighth Amendment ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

1994. Colombian soccer star Andres Escobar is shot to death outside a Medellin nightclub after an argument with a group of men who blamed him for the Colombian team's loss to the United States in the World Cup game just days before. He was shot 12 times. He had accidentally scored a goal on his team's own net.

July 1

1934. Alcatraz Federal Prison opens in San Francisco under warden James A. Johnston. It was originally established as a military prison. It housed notorious inmates for almost 30 years including Al Capone and George "Machine Gun" Kelly. The government eventually shut down the prison in 1963.

1991. Courtroom Television Network premiers in more than 2 million homes. Court TV is now seen in more than 60 million homes. It became the first and only cable network dedicated to crime and justice seven days a week.

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