August 13, 1922: Chicago Doctors

Beulah Pickerill, a Texas native, was 21 years old and living with her parents in the Louisville, Kentucky area. She worked there as a bookkeeper, but had other plans for her life. 

Beulah and her friend Floy L. Butler had ambitions for the stage, and on July 29, 1922 they left Louisville for Chicago. The presumption at home was that the two young women planned to develop careers as vaudeville performers, though the story Beulah had told her family was that she was going to visit friends.

An unidentified man, described as "wealthy and prominent," had arranged the journey. Whether he spirited the young woman to Chicago purely for the abortion or in order to support her dreams is unclear.

Upon arrival in Chicago, Beulah and Floy consulted with a physician on Chicago's Northside hoping to arrange an abortion, but he refused to do the abortion himself, instead referring her to Vincent Filletti and Michael Galgano. The friends went to Fillette's office on August 7 to make the arrangements and negotiate the price of $200. 

Beulah wired to Lousiville, presumably to the "wealthy and prominent" man, for the money. The abortion was perpetrated on August 9.

The young women's dreams died along with Beulah at Chicago's Mid West Hospital on August 13. In her deathbed statement, Beulah had identified Filletti as the abortionist.

After authorities determined that Beulah had indeed died from complications of an abortion, the two physicians were held by the coroner and indicted for felony murder. 

Floy, along with Patrick J. Owens, the manager of Chicago's Clarendon Hotel, were held as accessories. A physician identified only as Dr. Peterson was held as a witness.

Sources:

• Homicide in Chicago Interactive
• Death certificate
• “2 Doctors Held in Girl’s Death,” Detroit Free Press, August 17, 1922
• “Physicians Charged With Murder,” Cincinnati Enquirer, August 17, 1922
• “2 Chicago Doctors Held In Louisville Girl’s Death,” Louisville (KY) Courier-Journal, September 21, 1922