How easy was it to get away with murder in the 30’s and 40’s...

How easy was it to get away with murder in the 30’s and 40’s? A common theme in old blues songs is murder and I was wondering if they really mean it.

>A common theme in old blues songs is murder
So no different from modern rap music.

Very. Even up to the 80s and even 90s before DNA evidence really became a thing. Especially with lower population density, go kill a nigga in the woods, their family makes a stink but nobody suspects you and the police can't find a body, pretty much scott free.

Except rap artists today are pussys

This, I'm still on the lose. :)

Hopefully things start looking up for you soon.

If they can't find a body what does DNA evidence got to do with anything?

Usually circumstantial evidence of suspects such as their DNA at a crime scene or on a steering wheel leads to a bigger dragnet and search for the body. Without more tools in the toolbelt, or an apparatus to fund this type of investigation, it's basically
>lol prolly ran away with another woman

Not to mention that specialized detectives have seen an upsurge in local police agencies, so that Mr. podunk sheriff who makes sure the drunks don't beat their wives or drive too fast isn't the also splitting his time with having to follow up on why some rando up and went missing.

>be from bum fuck communal land village in central mexico
>dad tells me how people used to kill each other over land disputes and stealing crops
>grandpa used to the the "sheriff" for a while and he'd go to a nearby town about once a month and report shit that may have happened.

by and large people got away with it. and the only way people would be caught would be to get shot by local militias

this was back in the 40s and 50s in a very rural part of Mexico but I would imagine similar things would happen in rural areas in the US in the 20s and 30s

Murder has always been a common theme of music made by common people. Tons of old English folk songs are about murder, too.

Pretty much this. Before modern criminology, it was incredibly easy to get away with murder, especially in rural areas. Robert Johnson is actually a pretty good example, because everyone knew he was poisoned, who did it, and why, but nothing ever happened. Most of the times a person was convicted of a murder, it was because it happened publicly and there were tons of witnesses.

It's still easy to get away with murder, just kill homeless people.

>would imagine similar things would happen in rural areas in the US in the 20s and 30s

Your assumption is wrong. Even in rural areas disappearances have always been taken seriously and suspects have hanged on the mere assumption that they committed the murder. For example, X is suspected of killing Y, X was last seen arguing with Y in a bar before they both left separately, therefore X killed Y. Im not even shitting you, we've gone over cases like this in my philosophy of criminal justice class. The US never fucked around with murder.

As far as things go it is comparable to today. Less human density could be helpful in a murder or detrimental. Less people means everyone in town knows who you are, but you could easily go into the next town and do some dumb shit. It happened a lot, but people made a stir whenever they found a dead body.

Comparatively: There are a lot of unsolved murders every year in the US today. You could easily go into another place and not get noticed and do something out of sight. DNA is nowhere near as big a factor in crime as they make it out to be in movies (and yes people have beaten cases even when the DNA was indisputably theirs). Theres just too much noise in the world for all cases to get solved, so you have a pretty good chance of getting away with it, considering youre not a retard. The only question is why would you want to?

>The only question is why would you want to?
The thrill?

If your only reason to murder people is for the adrenaline rush, shouldn't you just join the army so you can kill legally?

Even signing on for combat arms in wartime (it's peace time, by the way) there's only the slightest ever chance that you will even fire a shot in anger. Let alone get up close and personal like some sadistic psychopath.

>it's peace time, by the way
There's always a war somewhere

I'm talking in the technical US military readiness sense. We aren't "officially" fighting ISIS right now, even though, y'know, we are.

You can always join the military so that you can be a military contractor when you leave

> The thrill
What thrill? You'd probably shit your pants and start panicking at the first sign of blood. Most people watch movies and think that its cool, but if youve ever smelled a dead body or seen how much a person bleeds or how they look, you probably wont want to do it. Even sociopathic killers have alternative reasons for killing (fame, sexual inadequacy ,mother issues, delusions, etc...) outside the "thrill". Grow the fuck up

Yes, but this has nothing to do with what we're even talking about.

And some killers like killing for killing's sake. He was being contrarian with a bite of satire, you're just being petty and gay.

youer mom gay

>seen how much a person bleeds
This is something I cannot emphasize enough.
There is a LOT of blood in a person and that shit gets EVERYWHERE. There is roughly a gallon of blood in a person, think of how much mess slinging a gallon of paint around a room makes.

Isn't the solving rate for murder cases at like 70% still? You can still get away with it if you know what you are doing.
I assume lol.

Yeah. The fact still remains that if you didn't actually know your victim (meaning you have no clear motive) it will be very hard to tie you to the murder. Assuming your DNA isn't already part of some database.

Pretty easy, especially in a country as large, rural and sparsely populated as 30's US. And especially among the black population when even if it gets reported the police are not going to investigate very thoroughly.
A parallel could be modern India where one dead Dalit out in the country is not going to cause a sensation.

Consider the amount of ways DNA could be useful without a body.

Did rural areas have more crime than urban areas back in the old days?

that made me think that profilers who made their careers saying than serial killers WANT to be caught and be famous have it completely backwards and confuse cause and effect.

Serial killer who wants to be caught send letters to police, leave trail and surprise, surprise! -- do get caught.

Killer who unironically doesn't want to be caught leaves no trails at all and fucks off into the night unpunished unnoticed.

But confirmation bias leaves only the information about the former.

Yes. Lack of state authority makes it like the wild-west but with a bunch of troglodyte "justice".

Look at Spain in 1920s. There are some mentions by spanish authors about the difference between village people who killed each other for fucking other's wife/insulting others/etc...with guns or knives, and how once they come to the city, the city people are seen as pussies, as they only yell at each other and later stop.

No, rural areas had far less crime in the early 20th century than in the cities. Do some fucking research before you throw in anecdotal evidence about you granny in spain.

It wasnt easy, look at crime logs of that time period and you would see that people were executed quite regularly for murder even if the evidence was slim. The US and India treat this thing very differently

>A common theme in old blues songs is murder
Because the people that wrote them were recorded in prison.

it's ridic easy to get away with murder today

in america pretty sure only 60% of murders get sovled

if you brain a nig in the hood in a drive by odds are you'll never get caught

desu rural communities in my part of the world were very communal and tight knit, disputes were settled via fist fights and/or mob justice and/or banishments, I'd imagine the casual murder we conceive of today was still very rare. like somebody else in this thread mentioned mob justice was a real thing and was a very effective tool of keeping everyone in line.

no one cares

It's only relatively recently that governments actually started keeping track of yearly homicide rates, so we don't really know.

I think I read somewhere that a lot of the "monsters" in various cultures were probably just serial killers that maimed people in grisly ways.

been listening to Robert Johnson lately?