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The Arrest

Crime Files

The Arrest

Detective Mike Chitwood led the search of Einhorn’s apartment on 28th March 1979, almost 20 months after Maddux had gone missing. In a wardrobe, Chitwood found Maddux’s suitcase, handbag, driver’s licence and social security card. In the same wardrobe, he also found Maddux’s body in a trunk, packed in styrofoam, air fresheners and newspapers. Her decomposing body was partially mummified and the remains weighed only 37 pounds.A post-mortem revealed that Maddux had suffered trauma to the head and her skull was smashed in several places as a result. However, the position of the body and size of the trunk meant that she had actually been alive and semi-conscious when placed in the trunk and had died trying to claw her way out. Upon his arrest, Einhorn reportedly shrugged indifferently and said, “You found what you found”. He was charged with murder, as Pennsylvania has no degrees of murder.Einhorn was represented by the notorious defence attorney Arlen Specter. Later a Senator, he served on the infamous Warren Commission and was the author of the ‘single assassin/crazy bullet theory’ used to explain the assassination of John F Kennedy. Specter argued successfully at the bail hearing on 3rd April 1979 for bail to be set at the strangely low sum of $40 000, of which only 10% had to be paid in cash to secure the release of the bailor.The bail hearing in itself was abnormal, as it was unheard of for bail to be granted in murder cases. While Einhorn’s friends in high places might not have influenced the bail hearing or the amount of bail itself, they certainly did put up the money for his release. Barbara Bronfman, a Montreal socialite who had married into a wealthy distillery family, paid Einhorn’s bail.Still vociferously protesting his innocence, Einhorn was released onto the streets. He told anyone and everyone that he would clear his name, claiming it was a conspiracy by the CIA or FBI, who wanted to discredit him and halt his political activities. Then, on 21st January 1981, Einhorn skipped bail on the eve of the pre-trial hearing and disappeared, probably to Europe. Thus began the most determined international pursuit of a fugitive since the Israeli Mossad’s hunt, capture and cross-border kidnapping of Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann.Conducting the manhunt was Assistant District Attorney Richard DiBenedetto, who, through Einhorn’s 60 handwritten journals, knew his prey better than anyone else. In 1985, Einhorn was traced to Dublin, Ireland, where he was living under the name of Ben Moore. However, there were no extradition papers in effect and Einhorn fled Dublin after the alert. From there, he probably travelled throughout the United Kingdom, crossing the English Channel at some point, to enter continental Europe. In 1993, the unprecedented step, in Philadelphia at least, was taken to try Einhorn in absentia, a hugely significant development that would later be exploited by Einhorn. He was convicted of murder and sentenced to life imprisonment.Circa 1994, DiBenedetto learned that Einhorn’s benefactor, Barbara Bronfman, had been financing his flight from his hunters. However she had a change of heart, to one in the belief in Einhorn’s guilt, and she provided DiBenedetto with the Stockholm address where Einhorn was residing. The address turned up one Annika Flodin, who disclaimed all knowledge of Einhorn, saying that she knew him as Ben Moore, and that she had no idea where he was. When Flodin subsequently disappeared, investigators ran her name through Interpol and found that she had relocated to France and married Einhorn, who was then known under the moniker of Eugene Mallon.On 13th June 1997, DiBenedetto and his men arrested Einhorn in a converted millhouse outside Champagne-Mouton, a beautiful village in the French countryside near Cognac.