Dark Downeast - The Murder of Elizabeth Sterling Seeley (Connecticut)

Episode Date: January 8, 2026

Every now and then I uncover a case buried deep in the archives with circumstances that prove truth is stranger than fiction. This story is one of them.When a prominent Bridgeport, Connecticut woman failed to show up for lunch with a friend, it led to a devastating discovery in her overflowing home that had become a sort of treasure trove of local history. The investigation stalled until months later when some of the woman’s treasures started showing up around town. With a suspect identified, the case was nearly closed until the accused killer quite literally slipped through investigators’ hands in one of the most bizarre escapes I’ve ever encountered.View source material and photos for this episode at: darkdowneast.com/elizabethsterlingseeley Dark Downeast is an Audiochuck and Kylie Media production hosted by Kylie Low.Follow @darkdowneast on Instagram, Facebook, and TikTokTo suggest a case visit darkdowneast.com/submit-case Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Every now and then, I uncover a case buried deep in the archives with circumstances that prove truth is stranger than fiction. This story is one of them. When a prominent Bridgeport, Connecticut woman failed to show up for lunch with a friend, it led to a devastating discovery in her overflowing home that had become sort of a treasure trove of local history. The investigation stalled until months later, when some of the woman's treasures started showing up around town. With a suspect identified, the case was nearly closed until the accused killer quite literally slipped through the investigator's hands

in one of the most bizarre escapes I've ever encountered. I'm Kylie Lowe, and this is the case of Elizabeth Sterling-Seeley on Dark Down East. Elizabeth Sterling-Seeley did not miss appointments. At 77 years old, her days followed familiar rhythms. She was routine, punctual, orderly. She kept her commitments. So when September 5th, 1974, came and went without word from her,

the absence registered immediately with her friend Marjorie Morris. According to reporting by R. Richard P. on deck for the Connecticut Post. Elizabeth was expected to have lunch with Marjorie that day. Elizabeth didn't drive, which meant Marjorie always picked her up when they had plans, so on that afternoon Marjorie pulled up outside one of Elizabeth's properties in Greenfield Hills and Fairfield, Connecticut, right on schedule. When Elizabeth didn't appear, Marjorie checked the house and realized her friend wasn't home. There was no sign of her at all. Puzzled but not yet Alarmed, Marjorie drove to Elizabeth's other property at 63 Brooklawn Avenue in Bridgeport,

which was just about four blocks from her own home. When she arrived, she noticed the porch light was on. It was a small detail, easy to rationalize. But rather than go inside, Marjorie assumed Elizabeth had simply forgotten their lunch plans. So she left. By the following day, the small details had begun to accumulate into something harder to dismiss. Marjorie once again passed Elizabeth. Elizabeth's Brooklawn Avenue home on Friday. This time, the porch light was off, and a bag of mail had piled up outside the house untouched. The site unsettled her.

Concerned, Marjorie contacted two men who knew Elizabeth well, her chauffeur and home caretaker Arthur Simmons and a friend, Edward Kearney. She asked them to check on her. Arthur arrived at the house with Edward around 3.35 p.m. Arthur had a key, so he let Edward inside. Elizabeth lived among her things, layers of a long life pressing in on narrow hallways and staircases. It was familiar, if overwhelming, but nothing about it explained her absence. Edward climbed the staircase toward the third floor where Elizabeth's bedroom was located.

That's when he found his friend. Elizabeth lay motionless in her bed. She was bound to the bedposts, her body partially covered by a blanket. Edward fled back down the stairs and told Arthur what he had seen. His words were brief and urgent. Something awful has happened to Miss Seeley. The pair asked Marjorie to immediately call local police in an ambulance. Soon, Elizabeth's stately home was flooded with detectives and first responders.

Outside, neighbors gathered to see what the fuss was all about, and the scene drew so much unusual attention that even the mayor arrived. What had begun as a missed lunch appointment ended with the discovery of Elizabeth's death, unnoticed for at least a day. When investigators began examining the scene inside Elizabeth's Brooklawn Avenue home, the immediate facts were stark. Elizabeth's hands and feet were tied to the bedposts with silk stockings. At first glance, there appeared to be little visible trauma. aside from a scratch on her neck, no obvious marks were apparent on her body at the scene. That initial impression changed during the autopsy, though.

The medical examiner documented bruising on Elizabeth's right cheek, left elbow, and the left side of her chest, along with scratches on her nose, neck, and above one ear. Frank W. DeSerbo reports for the Connecticut Post that the examination also revealed evidence consistent with sexual assault, occurring shortly before. death. Despite these findings, the autopsy report was cautious in its conclusions. The medical examiner wrote that there was no apparent cause of death. At the same time, the report raised the possibility that Elizabeth died as a result of suffocation. The examiner theorized that her killer may have held a hand, a piece of cloth, or a pillow over her mouth, noting the possibility

of homicide by suffocation possibly associated with criminal assault. Additional details supported that theory. Elizabeth had bruises on her lips, suggesting that an object had been pressed against her mouth with significant force. Investigators also noted dried blood inside her mouth. A pillow recovered from the scene, however, showed no traces of blood. The medical examiner estimated that Elizabeth had been dead for approximately 18 hours before her body was discovered. Investigators found no signs of forced entry into the home, yet determining how some of the someone might have entered or exited, was complicated by the state of the house itself.

Elizabeth was known to keep nearly everything, and her belongings were piled high around her doors and windows, obscuring potential points of access. The interior of the house presented significant challenges. Floors had become storage for decades' worth of magazines, newspapers, clothing, antiques, and assorted artifacts. In some places, piles rose as high as five feet. Detectives and crime scene technicians waited through narrow paths of accumulated possessions just to reach the staircase, which was also covered with Elizabeth's collections.

The condition of the home also made it difficult to establish a motive. Burglary was considered a possibility, but with so many items densely packed and largely undocumented, investigators struggled to determine whether anything of value had been there. taken. However, some reports, including a piece by Robert L. Sawyer for the Connecticut Post, noted that Elizabeth was known to wear a money belt beneath her clothing, carrying cash on her person. That belt was found empty. Among the items recovered during the investigation was a man's waist-length winter jacket. It was made of brown synthetic fabric with a zipper front and an alpaca-type lining. Subsequent testing revealed two stains that proved to be

seminal fluid, but no blood on the jacket. Immediately, investigators worked to establish Elizabeth's final known movements. The last person confirmed to have seen her alive was Elaine Griswold, who picked Elizabeth up at the Brooklawn Avenue House on Wednesday, September 4th, and drove her to a meeting. Afterward, Elaine drove Elizabeth home, dropping her off around 9.30 p.m. that night. Elizabeth missed that lunch date with Marjorie on the 5th, and her body was found on the 6th. According to Elaine, Elizabeth was in a good mood at the meeting on the night of the fourth. She described her as friendly, engaged, and showing no signs of distress. She did mention, however, that Elizabeth had been battling a virus for several weeks

and was still experiencing lingering symptoms. The picture that emerged was deeply unsettling. An elderly woman restrained in her own bed, signs of assault, no clear cause of death, and a crime scene buried beneath a lifetime of possessions. As word of the crime spread, authorities placed a guard outside Elizabeth's home around the clock to deter looters and preserve what remained at the scene. The answers investigators needed might be somewhere inside that house, but finding them would prove far from simple.

The contents of the house itself, Elizabeth's collection, told a story. The stacks of papers, objects, and artifacts were not random, nor were they new. They reflected a lifetime spent collecting and preserving. pieces of the past, work that sat at the very center of Elizabeth's life. Elizabeth Sterling-Seeley was a familiar presence in Bridgeport's civic and historical life. She was active in numerous local philanthropic organizations and was recognized for her instrumental role in the founding of the Bridgeport Historical Society. Over the years, her involvement extended well beyond a single institution. She belonged to the Antiquarian and Landmark's

Society of Connecticut, the National Trust for Historic Preservation in Washington, D.C., several local historical societies in other Connecticut towns, the American Association of Museums, the Circus Historical Society, and beyond. Historical preservation was not a hobby for Elizabeth. It was the central organizing principle of her life. Elizabeth was perhaps best known publicly for her purported relation to P.T. Barnum, the famed showman and former mayor of Bridgeport. Her connection to Barnum is a matter of record, as is her long tenure as curator of the Barnum Museum, a position she held for two decades between 1950 and 1970. What Elizabeth personally believed about Barnum's legacy is less clear. In the decades

before her death, Barnum was widely remembered as an entertainer and civic benefactor, a version of his life that minimized or completely ignored the exploitation and racism central to his success. The broader public reckoning with that history came later. Today, it is understood that much of Barnum's career depended on the dehumanization of people turned into spectacle. But this was not the dominant narrative during Elizabeth's lifetime. The Barnum she encountered through her own family history, public memory, and the museum she worked in was a carefully preserved figure framed around celebrating.

In a letter to the editor published after her death, Dora F. Brinsmaid wrote, quote, The real Elizabeth Seeley was refined and distinctive looking, and always well-dressed, generous to a fault, and never forgot a favor, especially when it concerned children, end quote. I spoke with the president of the Bridgeport Community Historical Society, Audrey Blair, as part of my reporting for this episode. I was just hoping Audrey could help me find more photos of Elizabeth. What I didn't expect was that Audrey had personal memories of Elizabeth. Audrey said when she was a child visiting the Barnum Museum, Elizabeth used to give her those old-fashioned candies that tasted like mint and root beer. Elizabeth frequently visited local

classrooms to speak about the history of Bridgeport. Elizabeth knew every street in the city and the origin of its name. One teacher mourning her loss spoke not only of Elizabeth as a person, but of the knowledge she carried, telling Pete Mastronardi of the Connecticut Post, quote, We don't realize all the history there is to Bridgeport, and she knew it all. Now this great information bank is gone, end quote. Amid Historical Society meetings and other civic events, Elizabeth's commitment to preservation extended to her immediate surroundings.

She was responsible for saving the Revolutionary Era Cemetery that abutted her Brooklawn Avenue property. At one point, the city of Bridgeport expressed interest in purchasing the Brooklawn home, which was also adjacent to Clinton Park. The Board of Park Commissioners entered negotiations to acquire the 14-room house and its lot as an extension of the park. Elizabeth was reportedly tentatively interested in the city's offer of $70,000 and the provision that she could live in the house tax-free for the rest of her life. On the condition that Clinton Park be renamed Elizabeth Seeley Park. Negotiations were ongoing at the time of her death. Elizabeth actually divided her time between two homes. She lived only part-time at the Brooklawn Avenue House where she was

found. The rest of her time was spent at the former home of Robert Shelton in Greenfield Hills, a property she was granted lifetime access to after his passing, and she was in the process of slowly renovating and restoring the home. Elizabeth and Robert, who was a retired advertising executive, had grown close over the years of working together on various historical societies. Elizabeth had many friends that, like Robert, became family. At the time of her death, Elizabeth's only closest living relatives were first cousins. Her legacy in Bridgeport, however, extended far beyond family ties. It lived on in the institutions she helped build, the histories she preserved,

and the city she spent a lifetime trying to remember. For months after Elizabeth's murder, the investigation, appeared to stall. There were no public signs that police were close to identifying a suspect or making an arrest. During that time, Elizabeth's estate was gradually dismantled and sold at auction. A lifetime of collecting and curation was dispersed piece by piece, its contents passing quietly into private hands. One of those auctions took place in December of 1974. Among the attendees were members of the public, as well as local antiques and jewelry dealers. August Al Bessinger, who owned August antiques in Fairfield,

noticed the glint of a sterling-handled knife among the items up for bid. It felt familiar. As he examined it more closely, he realized why. Months earlier, he had purchased nine nearly identical knives from a man who had come into his shop. The man had identified himself as Bill Royko. According to August, Bill first appeared out of his shop on August 31, 1974. On that visit, he sold three sterling bracelets, two watch chains, and a watch on a chain.

He told August, the items belong to a sick. aunt who needed money more than she needed her jewelry. At the time, there was nothing obviously unusual about the transaction. On September 6th, the same man called again. This time, he offered additional items for sale, including a gold watch on a chain and nine sterling-handled knives. August purchased the items without any red flags. The guy's story seemed sound enough, and he'd made a substantial profit off the items bill had previously sold him, so it felt like a wise business move. But then, on February 25, 1975, months after the auction where August purchased the single sterling knife to complete the set, August's wife reportedly received a phone call from an

unidentified person asking for help posting bond for a man named Bela Crager. Shortly afterward, she read a newspaper article reporting that the man in question, had been arrested on February 20th by Stratford police on charges of burglary, larceny, possession of stolen checks, and escaped from custody. The name was unfamiliar in that article, but his face was not. The couple revisited their records and the items they had purchased from the man who called himself Bill Royko, but who looked a lot like Bela Crager. At that point, they suspected the goods might have been stolen and contacted police. Investigators asked August to view a photographic lineup.

He identified 42-year-old Bela Crager as the man who had sold him the jewelry and knives. Now, by that point, as part of the investigation into burglary and larceny and other crimes, Stratford Police had already searched a residence on Gregory Circle where Bala was known to be staying with a woman. With her consent, officers seized two boxes. Inside were several watches and pins engraved with the initials E-S-S. Items later identified as belonging to Elizabeth. The search was conducted in connection with Bala's burglary arrest, but the recovered property quickly drew the attention of investigators working Elizabeth's case in Bridgeport.

The Hartford Current reports that Bala was already known to police in the area. His criminal history included a 1961 convention. for theft of motor vehicles and breaking and entering, for which he received a sentence of two to seven years. In 1971, he was sentenced to one year in the state correctional center for aggravated assault. His record also included charges for breach of the peace and assault with a deadly weapon. According to reporting by the Record Journal in Connecticut Post, Bridgeport Police questioned Bela while he remained in Stratford's custody. During an informal exchange, an officer held up the brown waist-length winter jacket that had been recovered

near Elizabeth's home. The officer did not disclose where the jacket had been found, telling Bela instead that it had been previously left at the police headquarters. Bala responded without specifically being asked, quote, yes, that's my jacket, end quote. With that, Bala was asked to give a formal recorded statement regarding Elizabeth's murder. He notably contradicted himself several times during that long interview with police, including his earlier claim that the jacket was his. He reversed himself and denied that the jacket belonged to him. Bala initially claimed he had never been inside Elizabeth's home,

then changed his account, saying he had been inside three or four times, though not on the night she was killed. He told police that he had known Elizabeth for approximately 10 years and that he had performed odd jobs for her at the Brooklyn Avenue house. What's more, Bela admitted to burglarizing Elizabeth's house before. He told police that he had entered the house twice while Elizabeth was home and claimed that on another occasion he had spent the night inside without her knowing. He also claimed that two friends had previously taken valuables from the house

and had given them to him to sell on their behalf, including items he admitted selling to an antiques dealer on September 6, 1974. Interestingly, he also told police he was in Elizabeth's yard when police showed up on the day her murder was discovered, but he said he took off in a cab shortly after. Despite all this, he firmly denied that he was in the house

on the night of her death and insisted he had nothing to do with the murder. By then, Bayla's story was already shifting under its own weight. He denied the murder, but he had placed himself inside Elizabeth's house in possession of her belongings and near the property on the day her death was discovered. What's more, further interviews with witnesses revealed that Elizabeth was wearing a gold watch on a chain the night she was last seen alive. That same watch, with its unique and recognizable engravings, ended up in Bayla's possession in the day the murder was discovered.

We know this because he sold it to August the jewelry dealer that day. The gaps and reversals in Baila's account stood in contrast to the growing body of evidence. On February 28, 1975, Bridgeport Police issued a warrant charging Bala Crager with the murder of Elizabeth Sterling Seeley. Daniel Tepfer reports in the Connecticut Post that after Baila's arrest, investigators returned to the Brooklawn Avenue House with a narrower focus. A detective removed a window panel and examined it at police headquarters. A latent fingerprint lifted from the inside of the window was identified as a match to Bela's right ring finger. In April of

1975, a Fairfield County grand jury formally indicted Bela for Elizabeth's murder. He was held at the Bridgeport Correctional Center while awaiting trial by jury. That is, until May 29th, 1975, when the suspect slipped out of custody altogether. Emphasis on slip. At approximately 5.45 a.m. on May 29, 1975, attendance at the Bridgeport Correctional Center were making their morning rounds distributing medication to inmates. When they reached the cell of Bela Crager, they expected to administer a dose of opioid pain medication prescribed for a tooth infection. Record showed he had been present during an earlier check at approximately 5 a.m. But this time, Bela appeared to be asleep. When he didn't respond to calls from outside to

cell, a correctional officer entered and pulled back the covers on the bed. Underneath was not Bela, but a pile of rolled-up towels arranged to resemble a body. The kind of cliche trick you might expect to see in stories of teenagers slipping out after curfew, not a prison escape. A search of the prison grounds began immediately, and just before 6 a.m., the facility reported Baila Crager missing. An inspection of the cell revealed hints of how he managed to get out. A security screen on a window had been picked open, apparently using a fingernail clipper and a paper clip. The metal bars, reinforcing a set of louvered windows, had been bent just enough to widen the opening. But there was something else completely out of place. Along the edges of the edges of

of the window frame was a greasy residue that investigators soon identified as butter. Outside the window, more butter was smeared along a five-foot ledge on the second level of the building and across the roof line of the first floor. Now Bela's prison-issued clothing was found in a pile on the floor, so based on the evidence, investigators concluded that the five-foot-seven and 130-pound man had stockpiled butter from meals, coated his body with it, and squeezed himself through the bent bars of the narrow louvered window opening. From there, he dropped down from the second-story window and scaled an outer wall to freedom. Because his prison clothing was left behind, it remains unclear whether he was wearing anything at all when he escaped. It is entirely

possible that a man charged with murder fled the facility naked and covered in butter. Prison record showed that Bela had lost weight in the period leading up to his escape. Afterward, officials concluded the weight loss had likely been intentional, part of his preparation to fit through the window opening. Now, in the years since, the escape has taken on a life of its own in local memory. Forget the boogeyman, during research for this case, I encountered references in online discussions to Bridgeport's so-called Butterman, a figure whose story was reportedly used to frighten children into behaving. The details are extraordinary, but they are real.

An Associated Press Report published in the journal notes that police deployed bloodhounds in an attempt to track Bayless scent, but the trail went cold during those crucial early hours. Initial report suggested that he may have been picked up by a passing driver on the Connecticut at Turnpike and was believed to be heading towards New York City. Another lead soon emerged closer to home, though. A witness reported seeing a man matching Bala's description hiding in the tower of the United Church of Christ later that same day. Talk about returning to the scene of the crime, the church was only two blocks from

Elizabeth's home. Police flooded the surrounding streets and neighborhoods searching for the suspect. Inside the tower, they found clothing, believed to have been taken. from donation bins in the church basement, two bottles of wine, soda, and a Bible with Bala's name written in it, but no Bala. Days later, another incident pointed to his whereabouts once again. A car was reported stolen from a garage near Our Lady of the Assumption Roman Catholic Church in Fairfield. The church kitchen appeared to have been rated for food, too. An interstate alert was issued for a vehicle bearing the license plate O-L-A-S. Although, police

believe the plates may have been swapped, as another car in the same garage was also missing its plates. Trying as he might to escape the grasp of Connecticut law enforcement, Bayla's life on the run lasted less than a week. According to reporting by James Asher for the Connecticut Post, around 10 p.m. on June 4, 1975, an emergency vehicle traveling on Interstate 95 in Dunn, North Carolina, was sideswiped by a car that fled the scene. Police quickly, located the vehicle and arrested the driver who identified himself as John Roscoe. He was taken into custody for leaving the scene of an accident. The driver complained of an injured leg or ankle and was transported to a nearby hospital for treatment. While an officer stepped out of the hospital room to make

phone calls related to the crash, he learned that the car involved had been reported stolen out of Connecticut. That information conflicted sharply with the story the man calling himself John Roscoe had given. He claimed a nun had lent him the car so he could visit family in Florida. And as it turns out, the suspect in the stolen vehicle case was not John Roscoe, but Baila Craker. A man also wanted in connection with a murder. As the officer was still on the phone, a nurse alerted him that the patient had just fled out the back door of the hospital. Apparently his injuries were not severe and the pain medication he had been given had taken effect quickly enough to allow him to run, but Not fast enough. Hospital security apprehended him shortly after.

Investigators later determined that during his days on the lamb, Bela had broken into an importing company in Danbury, Connecticut, stealing checks and cash to fund his trip south. So, once returned to Connecticut, he faced additional charges related to his escape, on top of the murder charge in Elizabeth's case. Funny enough, Bela returned to the Bridgeport Community Correctional Center, the same facility from which he had escaped. This time, officials reported that stricter security measures were in place to ensure he would not leave again.

I'm guessing the guy had to eat his toast dry for the rest of his days in custody. Before the case ever, reached a jury, Bala Crager's defense attempted to have it dismissed outright. His attorney filed a pretrial motion arguing that Elizabeth Sterling Seeley's cause of death had not been conclusively identified as the result of a criminal act. While the medical examiner determined that Elizabeth died from a lack of oxygen, the defense contended that the report did not definitively state that the oxygen deprivation was caused by another person and therefore did not meet the legal threshold for homicide. A superior court judge ultimately rejected that argument and denied the motion to dismiss.

Bela's murder trial opened in March of 1977 before a superior court judge in a 12-member jury. From the outset, the defense framed the case as circumstantial and speculative. In opening statements, Bayla's attorney told jurors that the prosecution's case was built on surmise, conjecture, speculation, and assumptions, and that the state could not prove beyond a reasonable doubt that a murder had even occurred, much less that Bela was responsible for it. Throughout the trial, the defense repeatedly urged jurors to consider the possibility that Elizabeth had died of natural causes. But this argument required minimizing or dismissing several facts that the prosecution emphasized, that Elizabeth had been tied to her bed, that her body showed bruising and injuries consistent

with restraint and struggle, and that the medical examiner had identified signs pointing toward suffocation. The prosecution argued that the evidence could not be viewed in isolation. Quote, when you put all the injuries she suffered in all the surrounding circumstances together, you must find she met an unnatural homicidal death, end quote. To establish Bayla's access, motive, and intent, the prosecution presented testimony from one of Bayla's friends. She told the jury that she had once asked Bella about, quote, the lady with all the antiques, end quote,

and that he responded something like. like, I had to hurt the bitch. When she later tried to revisit the subject, Bayla refused to talk about it. The same witness testified that in August of 1974, Bayla spoke about wanting to make some money. On one occasion, the friend dropped him off near Elizabeth's Brooklawn Avenue home. He returned just minutes later and told her Elizabeth was home, so he was not going to do it that day, whatever it was. She also testified that on the day Elizabeth's body was discovered, she saw Bela in possession of coins, watches, jewelry, and furs,

items he wasn't necessarily known to have otherwise. Other witnesses supported the state's case circumstantially. Several people identified the brown jacket recovered near Elizabeth's home as being similar to one Bala was known to wear. A neighbor who lived across the street from Elizabeth testified that she had seen a man matching Bayla's description at a nearby bus stop two or three times in early September of 74, just days before the murder. That same neighbor, however, also testified that she saw a different person,

a black man which did not match Bayla's description, in Elizabeth's yard around 10 p.m. on September 5, 1974. The defense seized on that testimony to suggest an alternate suspect and to undermine the state's timeline. Baila's attorney argued that the medical examiner's earliest estimated time of death aligned more closely with the late evening citing rather than earlier in the day. The attorney further suggested that investigators may have adjusted their interpretation of the timeline under pressure to resolve the case and fit the evidence to the suspect they had in custody rather than an unidentified individual seen by one witness.

The prosecution countered that argument with a simple but powerful fact. Elizabeth had failed to appear for her scheduled lunch with Marjorie earlier that day, suggesting she was already dead well before 10 p.m. After approximately six hours of deliberation, the jury returned with a verdict. Bala Crager, guilty. When the verdict was read, Bala addressed the judge directly with an unusual request. I believe in God, he said, and the Bible says an eye for an eye and teeth for teeth, and because the jury found me guilty, I wish to die, and I wish you to sentence me to death.

Judge Kenneth J. Zerrilli responded that the request was beyond his authority, though he noted it for the record. On March 31, 1977, the judge sentenced Bala to 25 years to life in prison. He specifically requested that Bela not be granted any furlough privileges, stating that he represents a menace to society. The murder trial concluded, but Bela's legal troubles did not. He still faced charges related to his escape from custody. In that case, Bela was permitted to represent himself,

despite repeated warnings from the court that doing so was unwise. During the escape trial, Bela again asserted his innocence in Elizabeth's murder and told the jury that he fled, because he needed to fight for his freedom. In making that argument, he effectively acknowledged that he had escaped. The jury quickly found him guilty. In July of 1977, Baylor was sentenced to four to nine years for the escape to be served consecutively to his murder sentence. He later pleaded guilty and received an additional five-to-tenure sentence served concurrently for second-degree

larceny related to the theft of a car from a church while he was on the run, as well as a second escape charge connected to the Stratford burglary following Elizabeth's death. By the end of 1977, Bela Crager was serving multiple sentences across several convictions. But the legal process was not over. Not yet. In 1980, after a series of appeals, the Connecticut Supreme Court unanimously overturned his murder conviction and ordered a new trial. The court's decision centered on a court's decision centered on a pivotal moment early in the investigation. Remember how, while Bayla was in custody on unrelated charges, a detective brought the brown jacket into the room and suggested that it belonged to him?

Although the officer did not pose a direct question, the court found that the act itself was reasonably likely to elicit an incriminating response. Bayla's reply, acknowledging the jacket as his, came before he had been informed of his Miranda rights. The Supreme Court ruled that the Superior Court judge had erred by allowing testimony related to that interaction to be introduced at trial. Because the jacket identification played a significant role in the state's case, the justices determined that the error was not harmless. The conviction was vacated and a new trial was ordered. This ruling, by the way, underscores how critical strict adherence to procedure is in criminal investigations. Safeguards like properly advising a suspect of

their rights are not technical formalities, but foundational protections. And even a single misstep can jeopardize an entire case, forcing courts to weigh questions of process alongside questions of guilt. The second trial opened in March of 1982. This time, the prosecution was barred from introducing Bayla's pre-Miranda statements about the jacket. Even so, the state moved forward with much of the same circumstantial framework. Multiple witnesses testified that the jacket found near Elizabeth's home either belonged to Bela or closely matched one he was known to wear around the time of the murder. One witness told the jury that her father had loaned the jacket to Bela and that she recognized it for that reason. Though he still did not testify

in his own defense, testimony regarding his statements revealed to the second jury that Bala did not deny that he had been inside Elizabeth's home, nor did he deny burglarizing it on previous occasions. Those admissions may have offered alternate explanations for several pieces of evidence, his fingerprint on a window, the jacket outside the house, and his possession of Elizabeth's jewelry, silverware, and other belongings. But what they still did not establish, the defense argued, was murder. Despite the arguments the jury deliberated for just one hour. On April 5, 1982, Bala was found guilty of Elizabeth Sterling Seeley's murder or a second time. He indicated that he planned to file a motion for acquittal and, if necessary, pursue another appeal,

but he never had the chance. On September 29, 1982, just months after his second conviction, Bela Crager died in prison. Officially, his cause of death was a heart attack. However, according to Andy P. A.S.ick's story about this case written for the Bridgeport Library, unsubstantiated rumors circulated that he had been stabbed by another inmate. With Baylis' death, the case effectively ended. There would be no further appeals, no additional trials, and no new testimony.

The courts had spoken twice, and whatever questions lingered about the evidence or the process would remain unanswered, bound up with the life and death of the man convicted of killing Elizabeth Sterling-Sely. Two juries, five years apart, reached the same conclusion. Bela Crager was found guilty of murder without a confession, an eyewitness, or a single piece of evidence that clearly explained how she died. The case succeeded not because of a figurative smoking gun, but because the cumulative weight of the evidence convinced jurors beyond a reasonable doubt. What remains unsettled, for me, is not the verdict, but the gaps around it.

Bayla's own admissions help explain how his fingerprint could have been on a window, or why Elizabeth's belongings ended up in his possession, but they do not themselves explain a killing. As I was examining this case, something that stuck out to me and the most striking silence in the case surrounds the evidence of possible sexual assault. That finding suggested an intimate and violent encounter, one that might have clarified motive or narrowed the field of suspects. Yet as the case moved through trial and appeal,

the evidence receded from view and at least according to the documents I have access to, it was never fully conclusively tied to any individual. In the 1970s, that absence was not unusual. Forensic science was limited, DNA testing did not exist, evidence that might today be definitive could only then be suggestive. 50 years later, it's not hard to wonder what that evidence might have revealed if modern forensic tools had been available. Not as speculation and not to reopen accusations, but as a recognition of how much context, clarity, and certainty were beyond reach at the time. But Bayla's death ended the legal process.

The verdicts stand, but they account for only a fraction of Elizabeth Sterling-Sely's story and legacy. Long before her name appeared in court transcripts or newspaper headlines, Elizabeth had already shaped how Bridgeport understood itself. In the weeks following her death, as the investigation continued and her murder remained unsolved, attention turned quietly back to the contents of her home. What had once complicated the search for answers became instead a map of Elizabeth's life's work. Reginald C. Johnson reports for the Bridgeport Telegram that, with the help of the local library, the piles of material she had accumulated over decades were carefully sorted and examined. Librarians identified more than 300 books, 100 pamphlets, countless research

papers, and hundreds of photographs related to P.T. Barnum and to 19th and 20th century Bridgeport. What emerged was not disorder, but intention. Elizabeth had been preserving a record of the city she loved, often in ways that were informal, unrecognized, and deeply personal. Much of what she saved might have been lost entirely without her. Even in death, her quiet, curatorial work continued to inform historians, researchers, and institutions she had supported during her lifetime. Elizabeth had spent years advocating for preservation, teaching local history and classrooms, saving historic spaces, and donating time,

money and materials to civic causes. She understood history not as something distant or abstract, but as something embedded in neighborhoods, street names, cemeteries, and everyday objects. Her legacy lives on in the organizations she helped build, the students she taught, and the stories of Bridgeport that might otherwise have disappeared. Thank you for listening to Darkdowneast. You can find all source material for this case at darkdowneast.com. Be sure to follow the show on Instagram at Darkdowneast.

This platform is for the families and friends who have lost their loved ones and for those who are still searching for answers. I'm not about to let those names or their stories get lost with time. I'm Kylie Lowe and this. is Dark Down East. Dark Down East is a production of Kylie Media and Audio Check. I think Chuck would approve.