Did the police ever systematically investigate Lizzie's claims about her father's enemies?

[questions]

One of the things I find odd about this case is Abby Borden's fears, expressed to Dr. Bowen the day before the murder, about poisoning. She didn't seem to think someone in particular was trying to kill her, but rather some food she was eating may have been contaminated in production (the baker's bread). That evening Lizzie also talks about fears that family members might be poisoned, but she has a different take on things - she thinks it might be her father's enemies deliberately trying to kill them.

People who think Lizzie is likely the killer explain this as some effort on her part to plant the idea her father had enemies, thus muddying the water to help cover her tracks for her own plans with an ax the next day.

However, if Lizzie is innocent one of the obvious implications is that Andrew Borden must have thought he had enemies who might murder him and his family. It's hard to see how Lizzie could have come up with the idea out of nowhere. She must have heard it from Andrew, or second-hand from Abby. When she was questioned about the specifics of who they might be, she could only think of a man who visited the house recently and had a disagreement with her father about his refusal to rent him a property. That suggests Andrew had specific concerns about an individual, presumably one who had made some sort of threat, but hadn't shared who that was Lizzie.

It's possible someone unbalanced enough to commit a double-ax murder may not even seem like an enemy to Andrew's circle of associates. The murderer's revenge may have been for something that seemed routine to others. Andrew's involvement with banking and property meant he likely had a role in decisions that led to bankruptcies or foreclosures. Andrew's action may have been the final straw for a deeply disturbed individual, and observed in isolation, might hardly seem to merit the suspicion it could incur murder.

Did the police ever systematically investigate Andrew's life and business dealings for any enemies?

[camgarsky4]

One would presume that the elite defense team Lizzie hired, with almost a year to prepare and an unlimited budget, would have surfaced any and all alternative murder suspects. Early on, detective Hanscomb was hired by Lizzie's defense team to dig around and find who murdered the Borden's. He went all the way to Iowa to check out John Morse.

The Borden's offered a $5,000 ($170,000 purchasing power in 2023) as a reward for helping find the killers. History doesn't tell us if any leads or tips were generated by this offer, but if there were, again, the presumption is they were followed up by Hanscomb or the police and they lead nowhere. The defense did have witnesses, so perhaps some of those folks surfaced out of the reward generated leads.

"That suggests Andrew had specific concerns about an individual....". I'm not following very well, what is "that" which suggests Andrew had a specific individual he was worried about?

[questions]

"That suggests Andrew had specific concerns about an individual....". I'm not following very well, what is "that" which suggests Andrew had a specific individual he was worried about?

Thanks for your reply camgarsky4

My logic was, that if you examine facts with an assumption of Lizzie's innocence, then the talk of "my father's enemies" was real, not a made-up ruse. It must have come from somewhere, it doesn't seem likely the idea would randomly come into Lizzie's head. The only logical source is Andrew (though perhaps Lizzie heard it second-hand from Abby). Again, if Andrew is expressing such sentiments, it can only be because he actually believes them to be true - that is he knows of some real possible threat. People don't start speaking of suspicions they might be murdered for no reason.

Aside from the issue of the private detectives, it is an interesting question to establish how seriously the police ever investigated alternatives to Lizzie. If they didn't (as sometimes happens when one suspect dominates their thinking) - then it has some bearing on why people might continue to think Lizzie guilty. A contributing factor might be that the authorities never properly investigated an alternative, though people may assume they did - thus the absence of other suspects, contributes to the weight of suspicion against Lizzie.

[Kat]

Here is a list of suspects in the case from the LABVM&L website. Maybe there is someone there you might want to further investigate?

https://lizzieandrewborden.com/suspects ... n-case.htm

[Kat]

Granted, there were 90 minutes-ish between the 2 murders in our case, but in a case I just watched the other night on Forensic Files, in a single murder scenario, was something nearly unbelievable:
A husband has a loud verbal argument with his wife in his home that was faintly heard by neighbors. The man stomped out of the house, got in his car, and “went to get burgers.”
When he returned, the front door was slightly ajar, he entered, and found his wife raped and beaten to death. So he was arrested, tried, and went to prison for 16 years.
Along comes cold case detectives, resurrected his case because over time they found 2 other similar murders. The DNA was still viable, and the three samples matched each other, so officials knew the husband was innocent, after all, and was released.

The point, for me, was in that 40 minutes or so that he was gone, someone just happened to choose his house and his wife to prowl, saw the husband leave after overhearing the loud voices (he was peeking at the window), and took his chance to enter and kill. So it’s not impossible, and the timing was sobering, and barely believable, just thinking about it: that’s all.

[Kat]

I do hope you have noted the topic “Suspect Lineup”, questions, created by camgarsky, to be fair to yr inquiry as valid. We are working towards answers there, since yr concerns brought the subject to attention.
Please feel free to comment or contribute any research.