Everyone loves a story that withstands the test of time. And for the residents of Hamilton, Ontario, the story of Evelyn Dick certainly does just that.
Evelyn MacLean was born to Scottish parents Donald and Alexandra on October 13th, 1920. The following year, the family moved and settled in Hamilton, Ontario, where Alexandra was a homemaker, and Donald worked for the Hamilton Street Railway (HSR).
The family enjoyed living the high life, which often meant living far beyond their means. Somehow, abusive and alcoholic Donald always found a way to get more money. Evelyn even attended a private, Catholic academy for girls as a symbol of the family’s status.
Evelyn grew into a very pretty young woman, and her mother often praised her for her looks. Alexandra encouraged her daughter to use her looks – and her body – to entice men to her. From a young age, Evelyn was taught to use her looks to get men to buy her gifts, jewelry, furs, and money.
In 1942, Evelyn gave birth to her daughter, Heather, whom she turned over to her mother’s care, as her father was livid at his own daughter being pregnant out of wedlock. He refused to have either of them in his home.
A year later, Evelyn found herself once again pregnant. This time, it ended in a stillbirth. Shortly thereafter, Evelyn purchased a home for herself, her mother, and her daughter. Alexandra said she was moving to get away from her abusive husband, and where Alexandra went, Heather followed.
In September of 1944, Evelyn was hospitalized for a week. She gave birth to her son, Peter. She returned home, and told her mother that she had given little Peter over to the Children’s Aid Society to put him up for adoption.
For each of her pregnancies, Evelyn claimed a mystery Navy man with the surname White was the father of her children. It has been, and still is, highly suspected that this man never existed.
John Dick was a Mennonite man fleeing from the Russian Revolution when he arrived in Canada with his family. He worked for the HSR, and he knew Evelyn MacLean’s father. When he met Evelyn in 1945, he was 39, and absolutely smitten with the beautiful 24-year-old.
Within weeks, the pair were engaged. She believed that John would be capable of maintaining her expensive tastes and lifestyle, while he was happily in the throes of love. Even though her parents were against the marriage, they went ahead with it. However, it didn’t last long.
Within days, Evelyn and John were having massive arguments over money, and infidelity. When Evelyn realized that John wasn’t a wealthy man – which he had never claimed to be – she began relationships with other men, most notably Bill Bohozuk.
As the arguments grew more severe, and more intense, John moved out of the home. He wanted to work on the marriage, but soon realized that Evelyn had an extremely volatile temper. Instead, he stayed with a cousin and her husband to try to keep the peace.
As Evelyn began the divorce proceedings, John tried to appeal to her father. He begged Donald to talk to his daughter, to try to salvage the marriage. Donald refused, and that’s when John threatened Donald.
John had known that Donald had been stealing money from HSR for years – it was how the MacLean family was able to afford their lavish lifestyle. With the possibility of his life unravelling, Donald threatened to kill John if he uttered one word about the embezzlement. Undeterred, John reported the threat to the Hamilton police.
Within days of the report, John Dick vanished.
John was last seen on March 6th, 1946, having lunch. When he missed work the following day, and failed to return to his cousin’s home, where he was staying, John was reported missing.
A few days later, five children found a human torso near Albion Falls, on the Hamilton Mountain. The torso was found with two bullet holes in the chest area. It wasn’t long before the torso was identified as belonging to the missing John Dick.
As they had recently separated, police took Evelyn in for questioning. She denied having any knowledge that John had even been missing, let alone that he’d been murdered. She maintained her innocence, and stated that whatever had happened to John was none of her business.
As she was being questioned, a team was conducting a very thorough search of her home. When they reached the attic, they found a suitcase that was locked. When it was opened, they found that a paper bag had been encased in concrete, along with some paperwork, and a skirt. When they managed to break parts of the concrete, they found something that horrified them.
Inside the bag, inside the suitcase, was the body of an infant boy. The body was later determined to be Evelyn’s infant son, Peter.
After the discovery, the police made the decision to conduct a search of Donald MacLean’s home, as well. In both homes, they found charred human bones, and bits of bloodstained clothing that were part of a HSR uniform.
Police also found a car with bloodstained seats. Evelyn was known to borrow this car to run errands, and meet her dates out on the town. The blood was tested, and they blood type matched John Dick’s blood type. Inside the car, they also found a necktie that was identified as John’s.
Inside Donald’s home, they found a .32-calibre handgun that matched the calibre of the bullets that had been shot into John’s torso. Police believed this was the weapon used to kill John, before he was dismembered.
Evelyn Dick, Donald MacLean, and Bill Bohozuk were charged with the first-degree murder of John Dick. Evelyn and Bill were also charged with infanticide, while Donald was also charged with robbing the HSR of hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Following the charges, Evelyn began making wild statements to police. At one point, she turned on her boyfriend, Bill, claiming he’d murdered John in a fit of jealous rage. When that failed, she claimed that John had been kidnapped and murdered by the Italian mafia. Police didn’t believe that story, either, which seemed to shock Evelyn.
The case hit the papers like wildfire. The community of Hamilton was shocked, and enthralled, by the murder of John Dick, and all the sordid details. When the trials began on October 7th, 1946, the Wentworth County Courthouse was packed with spectators, the press, and those who were morbidly fascinated (as most true crime fans are).
But what took them by storm was some of the evidence that had been presented in court. Through the investigation, it had been discovered that Evelyn kept a little black book of all of her romantic partners. All of whom were rather wealthy men. One of those men was the son of the judge trying the case. The judge immediately demanded a publication ban be put in place to “protect the privacy” of the men Evelyn had implicated in her book.
Evelyn’s mother, Alexandra, more or less put the final nail in Evelyn’s coffin with her testimony – which she provided against her daughter in return for immunity.
Alexandra claimed that Evelyn had left home for a long time on March 6th, the last day John was seen alive. Two days later, she stated that she asked Evelyn if anything had happened to John, as she hadn’t heard or seem him. He was still in regular contact with Evelyn, Alexandra said, as he was trying to reconcile the marriage.
Evelyn huffed at her mother’s question, and responded that John wouldn’t be coming around anymore, because he couldn’t. Evelyn told her mother that John was dead, and that she had better keep her mouth shut if she didn’t want to be dead, too.
Police and prosecutors theorized that Evelyn hadn’t acted alone. They believed that Evelyn had lured John to Donald’s home, where they worked together to kill him and dismember him. They believed that Bill had helped with the dismemberment, and dropping the torso at the Albion Falls.
The jury found Evelyn Dick guilty of the murder of her husband. She was sentenced to death by hanging.
Defense attorney John J. Robinette took over Evelyn’s case, and appealed the conviction. A new trial was granted, where the defense tried to shift the majority of the blame onto Evelyn’s father, Donald.
The defense was a success – at her second trial, Evelyn Dick was found not guilty of the murder of her husband. But she wasn’t quite out of the woods yet.
Evelyn Dick was then tried for the infanticide of her son, Peter. The defense claimed that Evelyn had survived a traumatic childhood. To further drive the point home, a psychiatrist was called to testify, stating that Evelyn had the emotional mentality of a 13-year-old, and wouldn’t have fully grasped the severity of her actions.
The jury found Evelyn guilty of the lesser charge of manslaughter. She was sentenced to life imprisonment.
The evidence against Bill Bohozuk was so minimal, that all charges against him were dropped, and he was cleared of both the infanticide of Peter, and the murder of John Dick.
Donald MacLean was found guilty following his trial as an accessory to murder. He was also found guilty of theft. He was sentenced to five years in prison for both charges, totalling a 10 year sentence.
In 1958, Evelyn Dick was paroled after serving 11 years of her sentence. She changed her name, assumed a new identity, and vanished from the public. A condition of her parole stipulated regular check-ins with the RCMP. They have maintained her privacy, and have never revealed her new identity, or location.
In 1985, her file was permanently sealed.
While the woman herself may have disappeared, the imprint of her actions left behind an infamous legacy. The story of the notorious Evelyn Dick remains alive and well in Hamilton lore through songs, stage plays, and a radio drama broadcast by the CBC.
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Sources:
Evelyn Dick – Edward Butts – The Canadian Encyclopedia
Paul Wilson: Saved from the gallows, Evelyn Dick lives on – Paul Wilson – CBC News
Story of murderer Evelyn Dick enthralled and enraged Hamilton – The Hamilton Spectator
From The Archives: The Evelyn Dick story – CBC News
True Crime All the Time podcast – Ep 362 – Evelyn Dick