Dennis D. Glawe

Viola's Hammer Dennis D. Glawe

Ray Cander was a simple, hard working 57-year-old general store owner/operator in small town Garber, Iowa. Why would a 25-year-old paraplegic named Viola Crutchfield, who only lived a block away from his store, have 47 used condoms with men's names on them - his included - in her possession? When she turned up dead in the middle of an Iowa blizzard, suspicions naturally turned to those 47 names. Ben Tucker, newest and youngest member ofthe Clayton County Sheriff's department was there with Ray when they found her. She was lying on the floor, face up, a pool of blood surrounding her head, and right next to her head lay animmense claw hammer- the apparent murder weapon. It would take almost three years for Ben and his assistant, Bonnie Newcombe- from Iowa's Department of Criminal Investigation, to solve it. Even then, they needed help from an old general practice doctor, a California nudist who grew up in the area, and a Christmas Eve miracle to get it done. It was the perfect ending to the mysterious case of 'Viola's Hammer'.