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Word: braunsdorf (lookup in dictionary) (lookup stats)
Dates: during 1950-1959
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Usage:

...death of Virginia Braunsdorf in your story "Murder or Mercy?" [TIME, June 5]: I am compelled to ask the eternal question-"Why?" Similar cases are constantly occurring and yet we seem no nearer getting to the crux of the cause of these tragedies...

Author: /time Magazine | Title: Letters, Jun. 26, 1950 | 6/26/1950 | See Source »

Your write-up of the murder of Virginia Braunsdorf disturbs and disgusts me. You give the impression that a spastic is a hopeless case for which death is the logical, if illegal, solution. You should have at least investigated the records on cerebral palsy, the technical term for spasticity...

Author: /time Magazine | Title: Letters, Jun. 26, 1950 | 6/26/1950 | See Source »

...years after the birth of his child, Detroit Symphony Musician Eugene Braunsdorf did everything in his power to make her happy and comfortable. It was a heartbreaking task; Virginia was a spastic child, and grew slowly into a helpless parody of womanhood. At 21, she was only four feet tall, could not hold her head upright, and talked in gobbling sounds which only her father could understand...

Author: /time Magazine | Title: CRIME: Murder or Mercy? | 6/5/1950 | See Source »

...time, to keep her at home and well attended, Braunsdorf had four jobs-one playing the bass viol with the orchestra, one teaching music, one on a Ford assembly line, and one as registrar with Detroit Business University. The strain of such a working schedule soon began to tell. In 1942 Braunsdorf fell ill, put all his earnings in a florist shop to recoup his finances, but eventually had to sell it at a loss. Finally, he resigned himself to leaving Virginia at a private sanitarium...

Author: /time Magazine | Title: CRIME: Murder or Mercy? | 6/5/1950 | See Source »

...Eugene Braunsdorf lived, to be charged with murder. Last week, in Detroit recorder's court, a jury was faced with the question which has plagued law-abiding humans for centuries-what is justice for the distraught who kill in the name of mercy? The jury's answer: "Not guilty by reason of temporary insanity at the time of the killing." Spectators in the courtroom cheered; some of the jurors wept. It seemed certain that broken, weeping Eugene Braunsdorf-who had been judged sane when he was ordered to stand trial for murder-would be quickly freed after...

Author: /time Magazine | Title: CRIME: Murder or Mercy? | 6/5/1950 | See Source »

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