It was also apparent that tension existed between Lizzie and her parents. Her father was a wealthy shrewd who forced her to live in a means that she resented, for she constantly sought to be accepted by the wealthy Fall River society. Also, she rarely spoke to and purposely avoided her stepmother, whom she refused to call "mother." Lizzie stood to inherit a vast fortune from her father and rumors developed that he meant to alter his will, leaving his vast fortune to his wife instead of his two daughters. This alone could have been a likely motive for the murders.
Regardless of all these clues, the most striking facts about this case, and perhaps why it has continued to be a topic of debate over a hundred years later, is the mysterious lack of concrete evidence. When the police were called to the house, Lizzie was calm and perfectly groomed. If she did commit the murders, she took great care to clean every drop of blood off of her, even though she had only twenty minutes to do so from the time of her father's death to when she called her housekeeper for help. A friend who was visiting Lizzie three days after the murder testified that she saw Lizzie burn "an old dress covered with paint" in the kitchen stove, but the recovered remains of the dress were too badly charred to provide any solid evidence against Lizzie. No murder weapon was ever found except for an old broken axe in the basement which lacked any trace of the victims' blood, and although the murders were committed in broad daylight, not one of the neighbors saw or heard anything suspicious.
Many theories have evolved from the mystery of the Fall River murders. One is that Lizzie committed the murders in the nude, carefully sponging off and redressing before calling her housekeeper for help. Another is that she stood behind a door in the sitting room where her father was murdered, using the door for cover so as not to stain her dress with blood. And of course, other suspects have come into play such as the illegitimate son of Andrew Borden who was said to have been demanding an inheritance from his father who denied any relation, and a mysterious man whom Lizzie claimed to have seen prowling around the house the day of the murders.
Lizzie's testimony at the inquest was confused and contradictory, yet although her statements were questionable to say the least, with the ample inheritance from her father, she could afford to hire the best lawyers. She has even been referred to recently as the O.J. Simpson of her day, considering the similarities in the double murder, her impressive defense team, and the public's astonishment with the jury's not guilty verdict. If television existed at the time she probably would have been the breaking news story of the year. Her story HAS become the topic of numerous books, movies, and even a ballet!
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