FILE 398 / 17 June 2023 / 70 MIN / express

I Just Needed To See Blood

Liberty, New YorkListen

The town

N ↑Public placePublic placeTown centre (approximate places)
Static locations; no street basemap. Places and details. OpenFreeMap © OpenMapTiles Data from OpenStreetMap.

James says they are going to Liberty, New York, west of the Hudson and about two hours and five minutes from Albany. about 0:03:58

History, in brief

Town note

The town of Liberty is credited with providing 303 men who fought in the American Revolution.

about 0:06:14

Town note

Liberty was carved from a larger township called Lumberland.

about 0:06:24

Town note

Farms were cleared and tanneries came in for a long time, running through the Civil War era, and then dairy farming came in after that.

about 0:06:45

Town note

They tried to have hotels and make the town a summer resort for people from the city.

about 0:07:02
All 6 history facts

Town note

The town of Liberty is credited with providing 303 men who fought in the American Revolution.

about 0:06:14

Town note

Liberty was carved from a larger township called Lumberland.

about 0:06:24

Town note

Farms were cleared and tanneries came in for a long time, running through the Civil War era, and then dairy farming came in after that.

about 0:06:45

Town note

They tried to have hotels and make the town a summer resort for people from the city.

about 0:07:02

Town note

The village of Liberty contains the hamlets Ferndale, Parksville, Swan Lake and White Sulphur Springs.

about 0:07:29

1870

The Village of Liberty was not incorporated until 1870.

about 0:07:41

The figures, as told

Money

Median home value$236,500
Median household income$39,851 a year
All figures and comparisons, as told in 2023

Population

"10,146"

No direction stated.

As told in 2023 about 0:05:53

Median household income

"$39,851 a year"

Comparison: "15,000 below average". Direction: below.

As told in 2023 about 0:06:01

Median home price

"$236,500"

Comparison: "below average". Direction: below.

As told in 2023 about 0:06:06

Size of the Vogel house

"1,522 square feet"

No direction stated.

As told in 2023 about 0:25:30

Sale price of Willie Avenue in 2006

"$146,000"

No direction stated.

As told in 2023 about 1:05:04

Sale price of Willie Avenue in 2010

"$500"

No direction stated.

As told in 2023 about 1:05:29

Sale price of Willie Avenue in 2011

"$25,000"

No direction stated.

As told in 2023 about 1:05:34

Sale price of Willie Avenue in 2021

"$141,000"

No direction stated.

As told in 2023 about 1:05:39

The reviews

3.3 / 5 · average of 4

5 stars

“A family that moved there in 2018 says the kids love it and the town offers a relaxed lifestyle; it snows a lot but everyone is friendly.”
about 0:07:58

4 stars

“There are many things to do around the magnificent elementary, middle and high schools, low-income housing is good value, and it is a perfect area to start or continue your life.”
about 0:08:51

3 stars

“It is a little off the radar with not a very educated population and a lot of drug problems but not much violence; the nature is beautiful and it is cheap to live there.”
about 0:09:37

1 star

“It is extremely rural and not accessible without a reliable car; major chain stores are 45 plus minutes away, there are no social activities for the non-elderly and taxis cost a fortune. Please do not move here.”
about 0:10:08

In New York

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The story

Amelia Vogel was born in Lima, Peru, on July 10th, 1923, and came to the United States before the Second World War. The family moved into a newly built house at Willie Avenue, Liberty, around 1962, and Amelia lived there for the rest of her life. Amelia worked for many years as a waitress at Kutchers Hotel in Kiamesha Lake and retired from there.

She had repeated psychotic episodes and had been hospitalised several times; she was supposed to stay on strong antipsychotic medication. In November 2001 the Liberty police were called to her home after she impaled herself with a samurai sword. The blade missed every major organ and blood vessel and she recovered. By 2003 she had moved in with her mother at Willie Avenue, and her teenage daughter shared her room. Amelia was 79 and had just had her own bedroom repainted, so she had been sleeping elsewhere while the paint dried.

Amelia backed into her own freshly painted bedroom, where the bed was covered in plastic and the sliding closet door had been taken off its tracks and propped against the wall. She felt a pair of scissors on the bed, used for cutting the plastic, and began stabbing her mother in the head, repeatedly telling her to say that God is love. She cut off Amelia's bathrobe and pyjamas to expose her back, then stacked a nightstand and the closet door on top of her to hold her down, cut off the rest of her clothes and stabbed her repeatedly in the vagina. She later said she did it to destroy sin for life. At some point she stopped, took a can of disinfectant from the television and sprayed it over her mother's body because, she said, everything smelled. More than 120 stab wounds were found.

Police arrived within minutes. The scissors were still in Amelia's body. She said she had not planned to kill her mother but could not stop once she started, that she wanted to kill her, and that she did not remember how many times she stabbed her: she just needed to see blood. She signed every page, dotting the i's in her names with hearts and drawing a smiley face.

She then worked for four years in the cafeteria at Orange County Community College in Middletown, until the whole cafeteria staff, nine full-time and three part-time workers, were laid off in June 2017 and replaced by vending machines. Amelia Vogel is buried at St. Peter's Cemetery. The house at Willie Avenue was sold by the family in 2006 for $146,000 and changed hands several times, selling for $500 in 2010, $25,000 in 2011 and $141,000 in 2021.

The case

Murder of Amelia Vogel

Victims

Amelia Vogel (79). Retired waitress at Kutchers Hotel; mother of

Accused and outcomes

As told in the episode, on 17 June 2023.

Accused

Outcome

Other people

Dennis Vogel. Amelia's son; murdered in California in 1987
Steve Lundrin. district attorney
Henry Shawn. defence lawyer

The timeline

  1. July 10th, 1923 Amelia Vogel is born (Lima, Peru)about 0:12:36
  2. before the Second World War Amelia comes from Peru to the United Statesabout 0:12:50
  3. Amelia marries Carol Vogelabout 0:12:59
  4. 1957 Daughter is bornabout 0:14:05
  5. 1961 The house at Willie Avenue is built (Vogel house)about 0:17:51
  6. about 1962 Amelia, Carol and the children move into the house (Vogel house)about 0:17:54
  7. 1987 Amelia's son Dennis is murdered in California (California)about 0:14:20
  8. 1993 Amelia's husband Carol Vogel diesabout 0:14:49

Places and phrases

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Static locations; no street basemap. Places and details. OpenFreeMap © OpenMapTiles Data from OpenStreetMap.

Places in the story

Public places are marked on the map.

Heard in this episode