Severed: The True Story of the Black Dahlia Murder the most extensive non-fiction accounts of Elizabeth Short's murder. The grisly 1947 murder of aspiring starlet and nightclub habitué Elizabeth Short, known even before her death as the "Black Dahlia," has over the decades transmogrified from L.A.'s crime of the century to an almost mythical symbol of Hollywood Babylon/film noir glamour-cum-sordidness. The book offer a documented solution to the case as endorsed by law enforcement and forensic science experts. Through the narrative, Gilmore, whose father was an LAPD officer at the time of the murder, unravels the multilayered mystery of Short's slaying. Gilmore tells several previously unrevealed stories at once,
William Short (American ambassador) 1783 to 1784. After serving as the U.S.'s "chargé d'affaires" in France during the French Revolution (1789–92). In 1792 he was appointed as America's Minister to the Netherlands, and from 1794 to 1795 he served as a treaty commissioner to Spain. Although his diplomatic career was not as celebrated or long as Short may have wished, and his love affair with a French noblewoman ended with her marrying another man, Short was a successful businessman and an opponent of slavery who died very wealthy in America. William Short was born in 1759 to William Short (the Fifth) and Elizabeth Skipwith