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Sylvia Marie Likens (January 3, 1949 – October 26, 1965) was an American teenager who was tortured and murdered by her caregiver, Gertrude Baniszewski, many of Baniszewski's children, and several of their neighborhood friends.
May 20, 2023 · After being left in the care of family friend Gertrude Baniszewski, 16-year-old Sylvia Likens was brutally tortured and ultimately murdered in Indianapolis on October 26, 1965.
Oct 24, 2012 · But in 1965, prosecutors painted her as one of the ringleaders in the torture of Sylvia Maria Likens, a 16-year-old who moved in with the Baniszewskis while her mother was on the road as a...
Gertrude Baniszewski (1929–1990), also known as Gertrude Wright and The Torture Mother, was an Indiana divorcee who oversaw and facilitated the prolonged torture, mutilation, and eventual murder of Sylvia Likens, a teenage girl she had taken into her home.
Oct 24, 2013 · In 1971, the Indiana Supreme Court granted Gertrude and Paula Baniszewski a new trial due to "prejudicial atmosphere," but Gertrude was again convicted of first-degree murder on Aug. 5, 1971.
Oct 21, 2015 · On October 26, 1965, police found Sylvia Likens’s emaciated corpse—covered with more than 150 wounds ranging from burns to cuts—sprawled on a filthy mattress in the Indianapolis home of 37-year-old Gertrude Baniszewski, mother of seven and the architect of the girl’s gruesome death.
Oct 23, 2015 · Richard Hobbs, 15-year-old neighbor of Gertrude Baniszewski, yesterday took the witness stand in his defense and told how he etched words on Sylvia Marie Likens' stomach and how he branded her.
May 4, 2017 · Paula Baniszewski, Gertrude’s 17-year-old daughter who subjected Sylvia to some of the worst abuse, got life in prison for second-degree murder. The three minors who were also arrested, including Baniszewski’s two sons, each did two years in a reformatory.
May 19, 2023 · Gertrude Baniszewski (left), in custody of a police matron, weeps after a jury delivered a guilty verdict against her and four teenagers in the torture slaying of 16-year-old Sylvia Liken on May 19, 1966.
In December 1965, a grand jury indicted Gertrude Baniszewski, her daughters Paula, 17, and Stephanie, 15, and her son John Jr., 12, and two neighbors, Coy Hubbard and Richard Hobbs, both 15, on charges of first-degree murder. The highly publicized April 1966 murder trial drew national attention.
