From the Archives: A look back at 150 years of Detroit News crime coverage

A toddler is gunned down by a jealous ex-boyfriend. An elderly woman is sexually assaulted. An arsonist sets fire to a house full of kids. Detroit News readers are shocked, outraged, saddened — and then those tragedies become yesterday's news, replaced by new, equally horrific crimes.

Long after the stories are filed away in the newspaper's archives, the victims and their families are left to deal with the fallout from the events that changed their lives.

This news cycle has repeated for 150 years, since The Detroit News began publishing in 1873. While the nature of our business requires that we literally move forward each day, we also archive every story we cover — every atrocity, every police response, every candlelight vigil — ensuring there's a record of what happened and who was impacted by it. These back issues are collected in what is sometimes called "the morgue."

More:'Thrown out': 6-year-old's murder a tragic blip in Detroit's most violent year

A trip through The Detroit News morgue provides an opportunity to see what's changed — and what hasn't — through the decades. As the old clippings show, many of the tensions and controversies that currently vex the criminal justice system aren't new, nor is the havoc and heartache a crime can wreak on a family or city.

For a century and a half, The News has chronicled the struggle to balance public safety with citizens' rights; the problems caused by understaffed, inept or corrupt police, prosecutors and courts; the good work those public officials often do under difficult conditions; and their responses to ever-changing attitudes and technologies.

Shifting societal attitudes over the past 15 decades are reflected in The News' crime coverage. Blatant racism and sexism, victim-shaming, and publicly fingering people as suspects based solely on reporters' hunches are verboten in modern journalism but were routine in yesteryear's papers, including The News.

Some of the crimes covered by The News, even those that were committed decades ago, continue to fascinate the public and remain popular subjects of discussion and analysis. In this look at 150 years of The News' crime coverage, however, the focus will be on stories that have largely been forgotten.

That's not to downplay the impact of the city's more infamous cases or the pain that, in many instances, is still felt by the victims of those crimes or their loved ones. But the goal here is to highlight The News' coverage of more obscure cases, and to remember victims whose stories also deserve to be retold.

For every Jimmy Hoffa, there's a Joseph A. Campbell, a Tangena Hussain, a Walter Langosch or a D'Wan Sims, all of whom were reported missing from Metro Detroit and who authorities believe met with foul play, but who, like Hoffa, were never found.

D'Wan's name still pops up occasionally in media reports recalling his Dec. 11, 1994, disappearance from a Livonia mall — but how long until his case is forgotten, like so many others that once captivated, enraged and saddened Detroit News readers?

For every Jerry Buckley, the popular Detroit radio personality whose 1930 shooting death in the lobby of a downtown hotel remains the subject of podcasts, book entries and true-crime tours, there's a Jimmie Craig.

Jimmie was a 6-year-old boy whose body was discovered the morning of March 11, 1881, in a muddy alley west of Woodward near Alexandrine in the neighborhood that would later become the city's red-light district, the Cass Corridor.

"He lay face downward, and in one hand held a stick of candy," The News reported in a Dec. 15, 1888, story about unsolved homicides. "The alley was muddy, yet the little fellow's shoes were perfectly clean, showing that he must have been carried to the place where he lay. No arrests have ever been made."

That brief mention, sixth on a list of 24 Detroit unsolved homicides, would be the last time The News printed Jimmie's name until now.

"The Detroit News Morgue" is dedicated to the memory of Jimmie — and Julia Gable, Barbara Gaca, Alphonse Welmes, Brison Christian, Miracle Murray, Amiracle Williams, Channell Berry, Abdul Accra, Felicia Patterson, Elizabeth Thomas, Henrietta Fisher, and all the other crime victims The News has covered during its 150 years.

Check this page on weekends for periodic new material involving long-lost cases and other interesting tidbits from the 150-year-old Detroit News archives.