In 1892, Andrew and Abby Borden were murdered by a psychopath with a hatchet. Andrew was a fairly well to do man, worth $8 million in today's cash. However, that didn't keep him from living his life rather frugally, living in a modes two story house, with no indoor plumbing, in a fairly average neighborhood. Abby was Andrew's second wife, and with them lived Andrew's two spinster daughters from his first marriage, Emma age 41 and Lizzie age 32, plus a live in maid. The Borden household was not a happy one. Both Emma and Lizzie were convinced that Abby was a gold digging bitch who was just after their father's money, and Abby thought the two girls should go out and find husbands, or at the very least, do something besides sit around and wait for their father to die. Of the two daughters, Lizzie was the most incensed over the whole thing, especially when Andrew started giving property to Abby's relatives, and then gave Abby some of this first wife's jewelry. But perhaps what really threw her over the edge was when Andrew killed all the pigeons in the barn with a hatchet, pigeons Lizzie had been treating as pets.
The investigation was of course fucked up from the get go. Lizzie claimed to have discovered the bodies, but upon the police arriving she changed her story several times until settling on she had been in the hayloft in the barn for over half an hour, despite the stifling heat, either searching for fishing line weights or eating pears. The police did a cursory search of the house, uncovering a freshly cleaned hatchet with a broken off handle, but decided it probably wasn't that important. They then, in an act of stupid gallantry, agreed to come back later since Lizzie was feeling unwell, leaving all of the evidence at the house. The overly chivalrous police returned two days later to find a suspiciously calm and well poised Lizzie ready to answer all of their questions. They also found a bucket of bloody rags in the basement, which none of them would get near because Lizzie claimed they were menstrual rags (tampons having not been invented yet), and a half burned dress in the stove, which Lizzie claimed she had burned because it got paint on it, as one does. The police, seeing nothing weird about any of this, went back on their merry way. Who knows what finally convinced them Lizzie might be a suspect, perhaps it was the local druggist telling them that Lizzie had tried to buy poison a few days before the murder, but they finally arrested her a week after the deed was done.
The trial was one of the first sensational trials of the century, watched by the entire nation, which is unfortunate given it made Massachusetts look like a state full of idiots. The judge, a stickler for obtuse rules, refused to let half of the evidence be seen; the police, under oath, admitted they were bungling idiots; and the prosecutor, aside from being a plain old nut, was a man prone to fits of rage and grandiose gestures. It probably didn't help any that the judge had been appointed to his position by one of Lizzie's attorneys, who had formerly been the governor. It definitely didn't help that the prosecutor thought it would a good idea to display Andrew and Abby's severed heads (the actual heads, not photographs), as evidence. Lizzie fainting did little to help his case. The jury, long on fancy mustaches and beards, but short on common sense, declared Lizzie not guilty after only 90 minutes of deliberation.
Most people acquitted of murder would leave town afterwards, especially if everyone in town thought they did it. Not Lizzie. She took her father's millions and bought a big house in the nicest part of town and then started throwing parties attended by famous actresses. She also changed her named to Lizbeth, because when you’re rich you can call yourself whatever the hell you want. The case to this day remains officially unsolved, though theories abound. The two best ones are that the maid did it, because Andrew forced her to wash windows when she was feeling unwell, and that Lizzie did it because she was caught in a lesbian tryst with the maid. This last one seems somewhat doubtful given that Lizzie, unable to remember the maid's name, just called her Maggie (her name was Brigid). The Borden house is now a murder themed bed and breakfast, so I guess there's that.
Image: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Lizzie_Borden_1890.jpg