Inside American socialite Barbara Daly Baekeland's horror incest plot 'to seduce her son' before he

May 2024 ยท 3 minute read

AN American socialite was infamously murdered by her gay son after her sick plot to seduce him in order to "cure" him.

During her days as a model, Barbara Daly Baekeland appeared on the pages of magazines such as Vogue, but it was her gruesome murder at the age of 51 that cemented her story in the public's minds.

Barbara ended up marrying the wealthy Baekeland Plastics heir, Brooks Baekeland, after her career as an actress in Hollywood failed to take off.

The couple, known for their hedonistic lifestyle, had only one child, a son named Anthony.

The family of three spent their days traveling around the world, with the boy going largely ignored by his parents, as reported by History Collection.

That was until Barbara discovered he was gay and had been experimenting with other men since he was a teen, and the mother began a mission to "cure" her son.

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During their time living in Spain in the late 1960s, a 20-year-old Anthony began an affair with the Australian Jake Cooper, who reportedly taught him all about drugs and the occult.

Horrified by the relationship, Barbara tried to distract Anthony with prostitutes and to marry him off to a French girl named Sylvie, who ended up running off with her own husband.

After these plans failed, Barbara allegedly told her husband before their separation: "You know, I could get Tony over his homosexuality if I just took him to bed."

Barbara apparently tried her strategy in 1969 in Majorca, where she is said to have seduced her son, who was drunk and high, before bragging about it to friends.

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After the Majorca incident, Anthony's mental health began declining and he was even diagnosed with schizophrenia after becoming angry and paranoid and telling friends he was having sex with his mother and didn't know what to do.

Anthony's therapist even warned Barbara that her son was going to kill her after he began to threaten her during arguments.

The therapist's warnings became true in 1972, when Anthony stabbed his mother to death with a kitchen knife in their London home.

The troubled young man eventually confessed to the murder and served his time in Broadmoor psychiatric hospital.

He was released in 1980 and went back to the US, where he tried to kill Barbara's mother.

Anthony was jailed again and died by suicide at Rikers Island in New York in 1981.

The horrifying story was eventually turned into a film starring Julianne Moore - Savage Grace released in 2007.

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