day she disappeared. A few minutes after 7:00 p.m., she was seen in an apparently heated discussion with Durrant in front of the church. The argument was loud enough to alert a passerby, named Hodgkins, to stop and intervene. Hodgkins later testified that Durrant's manner was not becoming to a gentleman, and that the pair did calm down and enter the church door together. At 9:00 p.m., Durrant arrived at the church elder's house for the scheduled meeting. Trial and conviction On Saturday April 13, the women of the church were decorating the church for Easter Sunday. One of the ladies went to a cabinet to get cups and when she opened the door she found a mutilated female body inside. The police were called and the body was identified as Minnie Williams. The church and grounds were searched for any clues and for Blanche Lamont, whom police now suspected to be there. Nothing was found until a church member remembered that they had not searched the belfry. Police went up into the belfry and found Blanche Lamont. She was badly mutilated and nude with her head wedged between two boards. Police immediately began a search for Theodore Durrant, who was the last one seen with both murdered women. Durrant had left town to join his Signal Corps unit, where he was apprehended the next day, Easter Sunday. He was charged with the murders of Blanche Lamont and Minnie Williams. The trial was covered by major newspapers across the United States. A primary witness against Durrant was Blanche Lamont's sister, Maud Lamont. She gave an account of her sister's life before her disappearance. She testified that Durrant often came to pick Lamont up to escort her to church and then home and that he came to her house offering to search for Lamont after her disappearance. The defense challenged her testimony about Lamont's weight, which she stated was approximately 122 pounds, with their claim that she weighed 140 and that it would impossible for Durrant to carry her up to the belltower. She also identified a diamond chip ring she had given Lamont that a man who was supposedly Durrant had tried to sell. His attorney defended him by citing lack of blood on him or his clothes and shifting blame to the church pastor, but Durrant was convicted and sentenced to be hanged by Judge Carroll Cook. Durrant never