Allison, Dorothy (1925-1999)

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Allison, Dorothy (1925-1999)

Dorothy Allison, a psychic most known for assisting police departments in the solving of criminal cases, was born in Jersey City, New Jersey, where she grew up in a Roman Catholic family. Her mother was a seer and Dorothy had visions as a child, though her first meaningful psychic experience did not occur until she was 14. She saw that her father, in spite of his seeming good health, would die in two weeks. He subsequently came down with pneumonia and passed away as she had envisioned it.

Allison lived quietly through the mid-twentieth century. She married and had three children, two sons and a daughter, and settled in Nutley, New Jersey. She sporadically had precognitive visions dealing with family and friends that led to her career as a professional psychic. She jumped out of obscurity in 1968 after approaching the local police concerning a missing child. Though the child's body was eventually found by accident, the facts of the case as they eventually came out fit her vision in many respects, including the boy having his shoes on the wrong feet.

Allison became involved in a number of homicide and missing persons cases that the police were having trouble solving. Among her many police supporters was Robert DeLitta, chief of police in Nutley. One of the high profile cases she dealt with was the Patty Hearst case. She predicted that Hearst would become involved in a bank robbery and eventually join forces with her kidnappers. She also gave information in the "Son of Sam" serial killer case. Among the accurate data was her description of David Berkowitz, the man eventually arrested, and the fact that a parking ticket would be a key item leading to his downfall.

As she became well known, Allison came under scrutiny by skeptics who questioned both the value that she (and other psychics) had in solving cases, and the accuracy of the information shared with police. Critics complained that after cases were solved, a few accurate predictions would be highlighted while a mass of inaccuracies would be suppressed and forgotten. Regardless of such criticisms, Allison continued to be called upon by police right to the end of her life. The last case in which she offered information was the murder of Jon Benet Ramsey, a child killed in her home in Boulder, Colorado, in 1996.

Allison died on December 1, 1999, in Nutley, New Jersey.