Pockets Full Awry: The Obrist Murder Case

The moment he emerged from the shadowy darkness into the glow of the dimly lit back porch, the doctor was a dead man. Late on the night of Aug. 1, 1947, Dr. George E. Obrist, Sr., a Portsmouth, Ohio, physician, was shot to death at the back porch steps of his home. The case has never been solved. Author Dick Burdette, who as a boy delivered newspapers to Dr. Obrist’s office the summer he was murdered, has revisited this unsolved case. What follows is a three-year investigation of the original investigation. Including a search for confidential police files as well as those of the sheriff’s department, prosecuting attorney’s office, coroner’s office and fire department. In order to verify and reconstruct events preceeding and following Dr. Obrist’s death.