The Death of Police Officer Charles S. Ford 1907
Preface
The decision of the heirs of James Hegney’s estate to transfer management of the Albany Hotel to others may have been prompted by the publicity surrounding the shooting of a police officer by bandits who held up the Albany Saloon in December 1907. The death of Police Officer Charles S. Ford shocked Salt Lake City and reinforced the belief that West Second South had become a dangerous section of the city.
Sensational
newspaper accounts detailed that three men named Joe Garcia, John Owen, and
Joseph Sullivan were involved in the robbery and shooting of Policeman Ford. However,
only two of these men were actually in the Albany saloon and associated with
the killing of the officer. The official version nonetheless was that the two
“hardened criminals” Garcia and Sullivan, known to the police, were responsible
for the robbery and shooting while Owen was merely a lookout. That was John
Owen stated version that he told to the police shortly after he was captured
yet circumstantial evidence placed Owen within the Saloon.
Eyewitnesses, who
were within, the saloon during the “hold-up” also gave conflicting statements
on the physical characteristic of the robbers and ethnic prejudice may have
been a part of the confusion to who really was the actual shooter of Officer
Ford.
Additionally the police were under immense pressure to solve the crime involving the death of a fellow officer and in their haste may have pinned the murder on the wrong suspect. Once the “official” version was decided on all evidence was made to conform to the official version. The public demanded an accountability for the killing of a police officer no matter who. Whatever may be the true story of who actually participated in the Albany Saloon hold-up and was involved in the shooting of Policeman Ford may never be known.
PART ONE
Chapter One
Charles S Ford was a native of Vermont, married in New York State, and moved from Kansas to Salt Lake City in 1889. The first mention of him in Salt Lake City newspaper accounts was in 1890. He was mentioned as a drummer in the Liberal Military Band and Orchestra as part of the Drum Corps. The Liberal Band was formed in 1889 to support candidates and positions of the Liberal Party which was formed to oppose Mormon domination of Utah politics.
In 1890 Ford also became a partner
with C.L Crane and Charles F Reynolds in a “variety theater” enterprise called
C F Reynolds and Company. The variety theater was located on Franklin Avenue,
today’s’ Edison Street; a narrow street cutting north-south through City Block
56.
A variety theater in Nineteenth
Century’s jargon was a type of venue where various performances and events
occurred ranging from theatrical plays to boxing events. The theater was
constructed just north of Hattie Wilson's brothel at 53 Franklin Avenue, at the
cost of $20,000. The building still stands today after servings stints as the
“Salvation Army's Workingman's Hotel, a brothel, and a print shop, among other
uses.” It is now numbered 231 South Edison Street.
Franklin Avenue in 1890 had not yet
become the location of many of the city’s brothels and the home to the African
American population. It was a narrow street occupied almost exclusively by
residences. However in 1890 Franklin Avenue was “notorious” for having a
"variety theater" just a few
feet north of Hattie Wilson's Brothel at 53 Franklin. The theater, besides
vaudeville shows, was rumored to hold illegal prize fights, and there were
claims that prostitutes solicited men there and even performed sex acts in the
booths. .
Charles Ford’s business partner,
Charles F Reynolds was issued a theater license in 1890 with the express
understanding that “no intoxicating liquor should be retailed in the building”.
Objection to granting a liquor license was that the theater was within 330 feet
of a public school and two churches. Additionally there was a saloon opposite
to the theater already which was deemed “to be sufficient to supplies all
reason demands.”
However, almost immediately
Reynolds applied for a liquor license to sell beer in a saloon in the basement
at performances “attended almost exclusively by males.” Thus the businessmen
wanted to serve beer especially when boxing ring fights in the theater
occurred. Several well promoted major boxing matches were held at the Franklin
Avenue Theater during 1891.
Newspapers reported several plays
and other vaudeville acts being performed at the Franklin Avenue Theatre as
that the company had a stage manager and an orchestra leader. It advertised
itself as “Open every night with a strictly First Class Entertainment- The
place to spend a Pleasant Evening- Admission 25 and 50 cent.”
The business partners of the
theater fought and lost a long battle for a saloon license. Those opposed to
granting the theater said their intentions were “to preserve the morals and
happiness of the people of the neighborhood.” After the city council denied the
owners a license several times they appealed to the Utah Supreme Court which
ordered the council to grant them one.
The Franklin Avenue Theater’s legal
issues acquiring a liquor license eventually caused the enterprise to fail in
late 1891. The business owed outstanding debts to gas and electric utilities as
well as to local businesses. In August 1891, the building was even padlocked
for a month after being sued by the gas and light companies. The theater
reopened but by 1892 Charles Ford had left being the proprietor.
The 1892 Polk Directory for Salt
Lake City listed Ford as a policeman residing at 139 Second East when he was 36
years old. His daughter later recalled that he served a year without
experiencing any trouble. Angry over the death of her father, a daughter said,
“He was a policeman fourteen years ago [1894] and was on the force for more
than a year without having any sort of trouble. And now only a few days after
his return to the police force he is shot down. It was wrong to place him in
such a dangerous neighborhood just as soon as he returned to the police force.”
Ford only remained on the police
force a year and in order to support his family he changed careers and became a
builder and contractor by 1893. He also moved into a home at 531 South Second
East which was his residence for the remainder of his life. While his
occupation, in the Polk Directory, was listed as a carpenter and a contractor
from 1893 until 1907, newspaper accounts referred to Ford as a “well known
millwright and builder” and a “successful and veteran mill builder” for various
mining operations.
During the time Ford worked as a
contractor he became a member of the Fraternal Orders of Benevolent and
Protective Order of Elks, the Knights of Pythias, and the Woodsmen of the
World, a large privately held insurance company.
Ford was also extremely interested
in music and for years had been a member of the Liberal Party Band and the Held
Military Band, as a “snare and trap drummer.” He was a drum major for these
bands and “was a familiar figure as he led in marches in the streets.”
Ford must never have given up his
thoughts of being a law officer as that in 1905 at the age of 49 he became a
“special United States deputy” working on the Native American Reservation near
Vernal, Utah for a month. Again in 1906 he was a deputy United States Marshal
given the task of trying to locate a wanted polygamist named Thomas
Chamberlain. He tried but failed to serve Chamberlain with a subpoena as that the
polygamist had been ordered to appear before the United States Senate Committee
on Privileges and Elections in relation to the Reed Smoot hearings to determine
whether polygamy was still being practice in Utah after the Mormon 1890
Manifesto.
Charles Ford only appeared twice to
have his own run in with the law; both times in 1891 and 1898 and both times
having to do with assault. In 1898 a brief mention in the newspapers reported
that he paid a fine of $15 for assaulting Peter A Bergquist. The 60 year old
Swede stonecutter was a neighbor of Ford but what lead up to the altercation
was not reported.
A more serious assault occurred
seven years earlier in August 1891; which made newspapers detailing the event
that occurred during a political rally and parade. Ford assaulted an electric
car motorman for failing to stop his trolley while a procession of the Liberal
Band crossed the railroad tracks on Main Street and Second South.
A motorman named George R. Crow was
operating car No. 34 on the Twenty-First Ward line in the evening of
altercation. Charles Ford was in charge of the Liberal band that night and was
at the head of the procession “about five feet ahead of the fifers.”
As the marching band was crossing
the street he saw the electric trolley coming towards the intersection where
the band members were crossing. He said later that he “would have halted the
procession if he had observed the danger sooner.”
He said he called out to the
motorman to stop the car and when the trolley kept approaching Ford jumped on
the car twice saying he “would have averted the danger if he had not been
pushed off” so he “had to use force with his baton.”
Crow stated he was coming down Main
Street on 9:30 that night at a “very slow rate” at a speed of 5 miles an hour
when he noticed eight members of the drum corps in front of the car and
dangerously close to it when the car broke through the line as the Liberal drum
corps crossed the tracks. He rang his bell and slowed up as much as possible
but came so close to one that a “drum was twisted from the drummer.”
A man named Clark Lowry who was on the trolley car with Crow, said
they were moving slowly up Main Street when Ford jumped on to the car and said,
“you son of a bitch stop this car.” Ford insisted that he never used such language.
Ford twisting the trolley brake was then pushed off the car by Lowry to prevent
Ford from shutting off the electric power. However Ford jumped back on to the
platform and struck Crow a “terrible blow” on the left temple with the heavy
end of the drum major staff. It left Crow a “lump as big as a hen’s egg.
Crow recovering from the blow
stopped his Trolley car and left it to
find the identity of the man who struck him. He followed the “drum beaters”
down Second South and around the Union National Bank Corner. Here the corps
broke ranks.
Ford was walking along “with the
boys, his coat on his arm and his baton in hand when a friend said, be on your
guard there’s a fellow following you.” Ford turned around and stood face to
face with the motorman. He asked, “ Are you looking for me and Crow replied, “Yes I want to know the son of a
bitch who struck me.” Crow denied using
those words. When Ford heard Crow confront him, he “landed a blow on his face”
followed by a “succession of right hands which knock Crow over a bicycle into
the gutter.”
Crow seeing he had no friends in
the crowd retreated up town followed by a howling mob yelling “jump him” and
“kill him.” The motorman hurried away, with the crowd hurling at him anything
they could lay their hands on.
Eventually someone assisted Crow
and helped him reach the Deseret Bank corner where the Salt Lake City Rail Road
street car company Superintendent Walter P. Read ”took a hold of the motorman
and hurried him into the company’s office in the Hooper Building .” The angry
mob now increase to about fifty and threatened to take Crow away from Read who
summoned three other company personnel to help keep the crowd back.
Superintendent Read ordered the doors to the company closed and told the crowd
they could not enter.
A moment later a police officer
appeared with Ford, who was under arrest, taking him to the sheriff office in
the same building. Superintendent Read asked the police officer to assist him
and his men at keeping the crowd out of the building. The mob pushed,
threatened, and swore to be let in until the police office drew his pistol and
commanded them to fall back.
Ford was charged with assault and
immediately bailed out. Upon his reappearance The “sentiment of the mob changed
with his release.”
At Ford’s police court
hearing, there was “standing room only”
by his supporters. George Crow testified that he stopped the electric current
to the trolley “as soon as he could.” The judge then ruled that Ford had “no
right, no matter the provocation, to
strike a man with such a weapon as the baton he held in his hand.” The court
fined him $50 which Ford appealed. In March 1892, he went before the Third District Court which
found Ford guilty of assault also and he was fined $50 plus court costs.
Charles S. Ford pursued his
ambition to become a city police officer again and in November, 1907, Salt Lake
City Chief of Police Thomas Pitt announced his appointment to the police force
along with others. It was noted that none of the new hires were known to be
affiliated with the Mormon Church, including Ford who was hired to fill the
vacancy caused by the resignation of Officer C.M. Evans.
However Ford’s confirmation was
held up by the head of the Police and Prison Committee for political reasons
because the head of the committee had not been consulted. As that the city was
dominated by the progressive American Party the chairs of the districts to
which the officers were to be assigned needed their approval.
The Police and Prison committee
finally approved of Police Chief Pitt’s hires ,and the Salt Lake City Council
confirmed the hires on Monday December 9, 1907. Policeman Ford’s first day on
the job was early Tuesday Morning after midnight having been assigned as a
night watchman for a beat in Greek Town.
Chapter Two
The Fencers; Tip and Sadie Belchers and Sneak Thief Joe Garcia
George “Tip” Belcher [1882-1940]
was born in Jefferson County Colorado. His father had been the Sheriff of
Golden, Colorado and in 1882 when “Tip” Belcher was born his father was
employed as the United States Marshal for Denver. When his father left being a
law officer, he became a detective for the Rocky Mountain Detective Agency.
However “Tip” did not follow in his father’s peace officer footsteps but rather
became a career criminal.
Tip Belcher stated he had been a
bartender since he was 18 years old beginning in Denver, Colorado. In 1902 George Belcher, and
22 years old Eddie Condon, were wanted in Denver on a charge of burglarizing a
drug store. They had escaped from the city jail by crawling up some steam pipes
and cutting their way out through the ceiling. “They were assisted in this by
the fact plumbers at work in the jail had left some loose boards in the
ceilings.”
After three days on the run the
young men were captured in Colorado Springs when they were seen leaving the
Produce lodging house on Huerfano Street. Belcher was sentenced to five years
in the Colorado State Reformatory at Buena Vista. If he served his entire
sentence Belcher would have been in prison until 1907. However Belcher stated
he had “been in prison many times.”
Sometime by 1907 “Tip” Belcher was
living with a woman identified only as “Mrs. Sadie Belcher”. Whether they were
actually married or not is not clear, as that prostitutes often used the
respectable title of “Mrs.” While there’s no evidence to suggest Sadie Belcher was
a “demi-mode” she certainly would have been known as a “loose” or “lewd” woman.
Sadie Belcher was described by
reporters as “pretty” and as a “trim
little woman with a mass of blond hair” but not much else is known about her.
She was most likely in her early twenties. Sadie may have been a pseudonym as
no information has been located to indicate when or where she was born.
After “Tip” and Sadie Belcher relocated to Salt Lake City from Denver, Colorado in 1907, he was employed as a night bartender at the Jubilee Saloon at 28 Commercial Street. He and Sadie rented quarters at 150 North Main Street in a portion of the old Heber C Kimball house. Kimball had been a counselor to Brigham Young in the Nineteenth Century and a Mormon Apostle.
 |
| Kimball Lodgings |
Tip Belcher stated that he came to
Utah in October 1907 from Denver but perhaps earlier as that a longtime friend
and ex-convict named Joe Garcia had been rooming at his place before the
December 14 robbery and shooting. The police believed that Garcia had been
operating in Salt Lake City since August.
“Tip” Belcher was known as Joe Garcia’s
“fence” or receiver of stolen items. He also acted as a middleman between a
series of thieves in Denver to whom he sold jewelry stolen in Salt Lake City.
Items stolen in Denver were sent to Utah to be pawned in the many unlicensed
pawn shops in Salt Lake City. Belcher admitted to having received watches that
had been stolen in Denver and sent to Salt Lake City to be sold.
 |
| Joe Garcia |
Garcia’s physical appearance may
have been why Garcia was described as “swarthy” and his “complexion so dark
that he was thought to be an African America.” However, the newspapers of the
period consistently referred to him as a “half breed” Chinese-Mexican.
Garcia was tall, for men of the
times, about five feet and nine inches in height and he was called clever and
intelligent by those acquainted with him. Joe Garcia was also rumored to have
been Sadie Belcher’s lover and she his mistress.
In court testimony given in 1908,
Tip Belcher said he became acquainted with Garcia when they both in jail in
Denver. Belcher testified that he had known Garcia for about 8 years which
would have been in 1900 when Belcher was 18 and Garcia 20 years old. probably
that was not accurate.
In the first few years of the
Twentieth Century, Joe Garcia, known then as “Cuaz Cordova” was arrested and
sentenced to a term of two to four years in the Colorado state prison at Canyon
City. He had been convicted of a “felonious assault with the intent to commit
murder.”
In June, 1903, Garcia “made a
sensational break for liberty” at Canyon City along with five other convicts.
The six convicts made their daring escape by taking two prison workers and the
warden’s wife as hostages, “holding the woman as a shield.” The convicts blew
up the prison gate with dynamite to make their getaway but when guards fired
upon them from the prison walls one of the inmate who was the ring leader was
killed and another was seriously wounded.
Garcia along with another convict
managed to make it into town and stole some horses. The pair made it a
“distance of three miles from the prison before he was shot in the foot,
captured and brought back to the prison.”
Garcia was whipped as a punishment for trying to escape and then
confined to the prison dungeon for sixty days consisting only on bread and
water.
When Garcia actually came to Salt
Lake City is not clear. Some accounts stated he was in the city as early as
August 1907 while Tip Belcher said Garcia
only stayed with him since November. The Belchers nevertheless
“sheltered him” at their Kimball residence allowing him to sleep on the floor
during the day. He “would lurk there in the day and prowl at night.” Garcia
slept fully dressed with a gun at his side while residing at the old Kimball
place.
During Garcia’s stay in Salt Lake
City, he was burglarizing homes of wealthy residents of the Capital Hill area
and in the nearby “Avenues” section of northeast Salt Lake. He would climbing
onto porches and enter residences through unlocked widows. As that this was his
main “modus operandi” Garcia was referred over and over again as “the Porch
Climber.”
In the months that Garcia was in
Salt Lake City, he was “making a success of carrying off thousands of dollars’
worth of jewels from Salt Lake Residences. Garcia operated extensively robbing
the homes of wealthy Salt Lakers at night while hiding out at the Belcher’s
residence during the day. He “looted the residence of Richard H. Millett, the
mining man, of 559 Brigham Street [ now South Temple],” J.J. Daley, of the
Daly-Judge mining company, at 319 Brigham Street and many other well know men.
He had even taken a watch from the home of Mrs. L.A. Evans of 139 A Street, who
was the daughter of Salt Lake City Mayor John S. Bransford. Garcia gave the
stolen loot, mainly watches and jewelry,
to Tip Belcher who would send the items
off to Denver to be sold by his underworld associates there.
Chapter Three
Joseph Sullivan [1879-1918]
Joseph Sullivan was a
native of Washington State probably of Irish parentage. He was described as
having an “athletic build; full of strength and vitality” and his inmate photograph taken in 1903 at the
age of 24 showed the likeness of a handsome young man.
Sullivan’s prison booking description
from 1903 stated was that he was five feet and 9 ½ inches tall, weighted 147
pounds, his shoe size was 7 ½, and hat size was 7 ¼. His eyes were listed as
“blue gray” and he had brown hair. Identification marks were that he had a
large vaccination mark and a wart upon his upper right arm. There was also a
scar on his left eyebrow and his teeth were described as bad.
After he had been in the Utah state
prison between 1903 and 1907 he had a snake tattoo inked on the underside of
his right wrist. This tattoo mark would puzzle the Portland Police when
Sullivan was arrested there in 1908 as it had not been included in the
description of the man when incarcerated in 1903.
Sullivan said that as a young man,
around 1898 when he was about 18 years old, he traveled to Panama where he
worked on the construction of some inland bridges. From there he went to the
city of Manzanillo on the Pacific coast of Mexico from where he went to
California.
In San Francisco Sullivan worked on
the vessels plying the coast trade for a couple of years. Sullivan testified “I am a sailor but have never been
in the navy. All my voyages have been aboard ships of the merchant marines.”
Sullivan having been a seaman was said that he could “easily be recognized by
his walk.” He was still known as a “sailor” by Utah penitentiary guards who
knew him well long after he left the sea.
After leaving working on merchant
ships, Joseph Sullivan, like thousands of other unemployed men, ended up in
gangs of “hoboes” stealing rides on freight trains crisscrossing the west,
looking for work or simply begging for handouts. Sullivan was identified as
being a member of a youthful “yegg gang” whose operations extended for San
Francisco, California to Ogden, Utah by riding the freight box cars along the
railroad route.
The term Yegg or Yeggman originated
in New York City and was a Yiddish word for a “clever thief. The word came to
be applied to hoboes who originally were beggars but later became thieves. A
Utah newspaper account described a Yeggman or hobo “as a rule” to be “a
wanderer, along out of the way paths and crossroad, camping in unfrequented
woods and swinging on and off of freight and passenger trains at sidings and
water tanks along the principal lines of railways. This class of criminals
operates singularly, in threes, fours or even in greater numbers” however ‘Four
men are usually selected out of some yegg or hobo camp.”
These hoboes or Yeggmen were said
to have caused the Southern Pacific company “considerable trouble by numerous
depredations along the line between Ogden and Oakland.”
From San Francisco Sullivan made
his way to Utah where he got into some trouble in 1901 when he was 22 years
old. He and a man named John Moffatt were arrested on a charge of
“drunkenness.” After appearing in a Brigham City Court, they “were escorted to
the county jail to serve twenty days.”
After spending time in a Brigham
County jail, Joe Sullivan led the life of a “tramp vagabond” living in hobo
camps along Ogden and Weber Rivers and coming into Ogden to primarily beg for
money. In 1902 Sullivan was arrested again and charged with “mendicancy”, a
legal term used to mean the practice of begging. Sullivan pleaded guilty to the
charge as that he had been begging in the streets of Ogden and had even knocked
a man down who refused to give him money. He “received the limit- a sentence of
30 days on the rock pile.”
In July 1903 Sullivan was listed as
one of several “hoboes” rounded up by the Ogden River and told to leave town.
He was found next in the railroad town of Terrace, Utah in west-central Box
Elder County. Terrace is now a ghost town in the Great Salt Lake Desert United
States but was once an important operation base for the Southern Pacific
railroad.
There he was using the alias Joe
Harrington and was in the company of Ed Walker, Jack McMann, and a young 25 year old man
named John Furey but nicknamed “Dago.” Furey may have been of Italian or
Spanish descent as "dago" is a derisive term for people of that
ethnicity. Under the name Joseph Harrington, Sullivan considered the ring
leader of this gang of hoboes as he may have been the oldest at the age of 24.
In the middle of August the Box
County Sheriff was summoned to Terrace because of the report of a “tramp” being
shot and robbed. In some reports he was simply named as a laborer or a
transient. The initial story was the John Furey, in some accounts named “John
Shurey,” was robbed of $75 in gold and $12 in silver and the shot in the leg
below the knee. It would have been suspicious that a so called tramp would
possess that much currency.
“John Furey, a transient, was shot
at Terrace and robbed of over $80. Shooting took place in the railroad yards
and believed to have been done by three hobos with whom he had been in company
that day. He was shot in the knee and fainted from the pain and was robbed in
that condition and therefore unable to say who shot and robbed him.”
The story should have been suspect
when it was revealed that Furey had been seen in the company of the hobos said
to have robbed him and that he could not identify his assailants even though
“Harrington,” Walker, and McMann were captured after the shooting by rail yard
workers and held in a box car until the Box County sheriff arrived.
Furey was transported to a hospital
in Brigham City to have his leg treated
while the three men, locked in the box car, were transported to the
Brigham County jail. This was not what was expected by the youthful hobos. The
story of Furey being robbed and shot as it turned out was fabricated in order
for Furey to receive medical treatment when he had accidently shot himself in
the leg while in the railroad yards.
“It now appears they were all in
the same gang and while waiting for a freight train at Terrace on which they
intended to ride to Ogden, Furey accidently shot himself. In order to get
sympathy and medical attention. It was decided by the gang that the wounded man
should tell the story of the shooting and robbery. This part worked all right
but the others did not calculate on being arrested themselves for the crime.”
In the Brigham City court room
Furey would not testify against his compatriots who were charged with assault
and because of insufficient evidence, “Harrington,” McMann, and Walker were
released after the charges dropped. Sullivan must have gone back to Ogden along
with John Furey, Ed Walker, and Ed McCann as they began a crime spree there.
In September 1903, Joseph Sullivan
along with an unnamed partner began begging again in Ogden, this time armed
with a stolen pistol. He encountered three “Baggage men,” railroad employees in
charge of the checked baggage of passengers. The trio were walking along the
Twenty-Fifth street and Sullivan accosted them for money. When the men refused
him, Sullivan “whipped out a revolver and flourished it in a threatening
manner.” The baggage men however subdued Sullivan and a police officer was
summoned to arrest him. Sullivan was charged with “assault with a deadly
weapon,” against the three “Baggage men,” named Renford Hart, Joseph Hall, and
Henry McLaughlin.
Joseph Sullivan was arraigned in
the Ogden Municipal court and his bond was set by the court at $1000 which of
course he could not raise so he remained in jail until his trial in October. It
was reported by all of the Ogden law officers that Sullivan was “considered one
of the worst crooks the jail has held for some time.”
While Joseph Sullivan was in the Ogden jail, a Box Elder county
Sheriff was visiting and he recognized
Sullivan, as the same man he had arrested in Terrace, Utah calling himself
Joseph Harrington. When the Sheriff “walked into the jail corridor, Sullivan
spoke to him, and the Sheriff said, “Hello Harington,” and Sullivan greeted him
in return.
In early October, Sullivan finally
appeared in the district court before Judge Henry H. Rolapp charged with
assault with a deadly weapon. As that he plead not guilty, his case was heard
before a jury which listened to the testimony of a number of witnesses
including that of Hart, J Hall, and McLaughlin, the three baggagemen who
Sullivan attempted to hold-up on September 6th at the corner of Twenty Fifth
street and Lincoln avenue.
The prosecutor remarked “It was
shown that Sullivan stopped the men and asked them for some money which the men
said they did not have any, he then drew a revolver and flourished it around
saying he was going to have some money anyhow.”
After the case went to the jury,
they brought in a verdict of guilty. Sullivan was the taken back to his jail
cell to await his sentence which was to be passed the next morning. Unknown to
the jailer, Sullivan had been working on an escape plan by sawing through the
iron bars and fashioning a key to unlock his cell.
When Sullivan was arrested in Ogden
newspapers reported that he had been the first prisoner in the new Ogden jail
and was the first person to make an attempt to escape from it.
While during the month he was in
the jail waiting for his trial, Sullivan managed to acquire three long brass
printer’s rulers. After securing the ruler, he “kept his eye upon the jailers
and when they locked and unlocked the cell doors, he carefully studied the key
used. Sullivan made two keys “created only from him seeing the jail key that
was kept in the hand of the sheriff or the jailor when Sullivan’s meals were
brought to him.” In this way he gained a
general idea of the size of the key and the manner in which it had been made.”
Sullivan filed one of the rulers as nearly to the
proportion s of what he had seen, afterwards “smeared soap upon the end of the
ruler and reaching through the bars of his cell inserted the soap covered end
into the lock. When he withdrew the ruler, it bore the marks of the interior of
the lock.
His first key was not a success but
was “of a great assistance to him making his second.” Sullivan’s second key was
able to unlock the cell door. Watching for an opportunity, he opened the cell
door and gained the jail corridor where it was necessary for him to “file
through some steel bars before gaining liberty.” He had nearly sawed through
the bars of his widow when he was discovered.
That night, after his conviction
and while waiting for his sentencing, Sullivan was back in his jail cell, a
deputy sheriff, making his midnight rounds, noticed that Sullivan’s cell was
unlocked and the widow bars had been cut . He confronted Sullivan who then
admitted hiding the tools he had used in his jail toilet. He handed the key he
made to the guard and when tried the key was found to work perfectly.
The sheriff was dumbfounded by
Sullivan’s skill and even informed him that the Yale Lock manufacturer
reportedly had offered $5000 to anyone “who could make a key that would unlock
the jail locks without having a model to go by.” Sullivan laughed and
reportedly said, “Why any baby could unlock ‘em.”
Sullivan later even offered to show
the committee, appointed to investigate the attempted jail break, some
“valuable pointers as to the flaws in the jail bars and in the cell door
locks,” hoping the information might reduce his sentence. It didn’t but so
remarkable was his skill in fashioning the key that he was called “one of the
cleverest lock pickers the country has known for a long time.” That key and several others made by the
ex-convict became the possession of Salt Lake Police Chief Thomas Pitt in 1908 as proof of Sullivan’s ability to
mastermind an escape .
After “his work was discovered,”
Sullivan had an “Oregon boot” placed on his ankle and shackled with handcuffs.
An Oregon Boot was a heavy iron shackle place around the ankle which made it
difficult and painful to walk. It was reported that Sullivan walked back to his
cell “like one used to carrying the iron boot.”
So concerned over Sullivan’s escape
abilities, Ogden authorities sent his photograph out to other law jurisdictions
to be placed in the “Rogue Gallery” so
as to have his likeness on file.
The next day, Judge Rolapp, having
been made aware of Sullivan’s escape attempt, said, upon pronouncing
sentencing, that he had at first
considered and thought Sullivan simply “a drunken tramp” but “since his attempt
to break jail last night the court was more than convinced that he was a
hardened criminal.” The court sentenced him to
three years in the state prison for the charge of assault and an
additional two years for attempted escape.
While Sullivan was languishing in
an Ogden jail cell waiting to be transferred to the state penitentiary in Sugar
House, his pals Ed Walker and Jack McCann were arrested at the end of September
1903 for stealing a watch from a shoemaker shop. They were described in reports
as “youthful desperadoes” and “apparently under 25 year of age.” They were arrested
at the Hot Springs in North Ogden and sentenced to sixty days in the county
jail.
Chapter Four
John Joseph Furey [1877-1922]
While Sullivan was being
incarcerated in the Sugar House Penitentiary in October 1903, John Furey was
involved in the robbing of the Ogden Zang Saloon. While some of the hold-up men
were caught, Furey managed to escape to California where in November 1903 he
was involved in an incident in Oakland. There he was shot in the arm and first
taken to the Oakland Receiving Hospital. To show that he was not a vagrant,
Furey gave to the police as his occupation that of a “boiler maker helper” and
his address was 312 York Street in San Francisco’s Mission District where his
mother “Mrs. Wieland” lived.
When questioned by the police about
his being shot, he told a story that he had been heading back to San Francisco from Los
Angeles where he had tried to find work. He explained that he and a friend,
named Alexander Kinney, were riding on the top of a freight train box car
heading into Oakland when at the Sixteenth Street depot rail road yard he was
shot in the arm by another man who had been hitching a ride on the same train.
He claimed he did not know why he was shot and who the man was that shot him at
close range was. The “unexplained shooting” of Furey caused the “rounding up”
by the police of “tramps at the yards in Oakland.”
“When day dawned, nine hobos were
taken in the dragnet” but Furey was “unable to identify his assailant” among
them. More than likely, Furey was unwilling to identify the man who shot him.
The police were skeptical of Furey inability to help them find his assailant;
therefore the officers were “satisfied” that Furey was actually shot by another
member of the gang of hobos who had come in with him.
By some means or another, Furey
learned that a detective from Salt Lake City was looking for him and “he
quietly disappeared from the hospital.” He must have made another foray into
Utah as that in December 1903, while using the alias of “John Sullivan”, Furey
returned to Ogden during Christmas week.
There his gang was breaking into
freight box cars in the Ogden rail yards to steal merchandize when they were
discovered by two Southern Pacific Railroad special agents. A gun battle
insured and the special agents were shot and killed.
A Southern Pacific Detective named
William Sullivan was assigned to the case and traced Furey “an alleged
desperate criminal” back to San Francisco where Sullivan contacted railroad
agents there to be on the lookout for him.
In March 1904 John Furey still
using the alias Sullivan “was arrested at the home of his parents on York
street in San Francisco.” Southern Pacific Secret Service Agents had been
tracking him as that he “was the leader
of a gang of vicious robbers operating in and around Ogden Utah.” Furey was also
accused of being the head of a “Yegg gang” of 25 men who were committing
robberies in Utah and train hold-ups in Nevada. Besides common robbery, Furey’s
gang gave the railroad company a “great deal of trouble by breaking into
Southern Pacific freight cars and carrying off valuable merchandize.”
However John Furey was mainly
wanted by Ogden authorities for his involvement in the Zang Saloon robbery and
for the murder of Roy Wells, a young man found on the banks of the Weber River
with a bullet hole in his head. Furey was implicated in the murder of Wells as
Wells was believed to have been murdered for having given police officers
information about the Zang Saloon Robbery. Furey denied having anything to do
with the killing.
Furey was extradited to Utah and
convicted in April for robbery. He was sentenced to the state prison where he
served time along with Joseph Sullivan who was also incarcerated there.
Chapter Five
The Most Dangerous Man in Prison
When Sullivan was sent to the Utah
state penitentiary at the age of 24 years, he immediately won the reputation of
being one of the most dangerous men in the prison. In the Utah State
Penitentiary Joseph Sullivan was not a “model prisoner” as per a litany of
offenses committed by him that were kept on file.
In 1904 he was “found with a knife
in his possession”, “was punished for violating the rules continually,” “making
unnecessary noise in cell after lock up”, “found in the hospital making keys to
get poison which he was going to use on the guards”, and “punished for
neglecting his work and for violation of rules, for stealing food, and abusive
language.”
In 1905 Sullivan seemed to have
settled down and his only infraction was again being caught with “keys in his
possession” It seems his most serious infraction was on 25 September 1906 when
he assaulted another inmate with a two inch pocket knife.
Although Joe Sullivan seemed to
value the “evil reputation” he had won, his acts of rebellion against prison
rule were due to a desire to “excite the admiration and wonder of his fellow
convicts.” He was “savage and brutal to the men who imprisoned him, and they
“feared him and while taking a lively interest in his movements were careful to
keep out of his way as much as possible.”
In September 1906 Joseph Sullivan
made the news again by stabbing two prison inmates. It seems that 25 year old
William Taylor Lewis [1881-1961] was the main target of the assault and as the
“corridor was crowded and in the mix up another inmate” named Newton was
“slightly wounded in the arm by one of Sullivan’s wild stabs.”
The
assault on Lewis occurred in the washroom just before supper and was said to
have been entirely unprovoked.” Sullivan was placed in solitary confinement for
the attack. An investigation held stated that Sullivan was entirely to blame
and reported that he and the Newton the bystander who was also stabbed belonged
to the “hobo” class and were bent on making trouble for Lewis “whose
“ante-penitentiary associations were of a different sort.”
Why Sullivan lashed out William
Taylor Lewis [1881-1961] is not indicated in the newspaper accounts but
probably had to do with Taylor being a fundamentalist Mormon. Taylor had only
just been sentenced to prison on September 13, two weeks before the attack so
the assault was not due to a long standing feud
between them.
Taylor was from Richmond, Cache
County, Utah and was referred to as a “young man of good family connections.”
His father was a Mormon polygamist siring 22 children and Taylor also practiced
plural marriage. Lewis was convicted on a felony charge for committing adultery
with a young woman named Edna Phillips in April 1906 who he probably seduced
into polygamy. In July she was the one who swore out a complaint against him
when he was charged with adultery and unlawful cohabitation.
“Cache Man Is Arrested- William T
Lewis, Formerly of Salt Lake, Charged with Criminal Offence- William T Lewis,
formerly of this city, for an offense committed with Edna Phillips, a young
Salt Lake Woman. Lewis is married and took Miss Phillips to his home, it is
said, under the promise of marriage, even if it should be necessary for him to
take her to Mexico to have the ceremony solemnized. Lewis is a grandson of the
late W.H. Lewis, president of Benson Stake. He is ill with spotted fever.
[Spinal meningitis]”
A newspaper reported of the affair.
“The case is unusually revolting, criminal relations have been maintained
continuously since in Salt Lake, San Francisco and other places, the guilty
couple flaunting their adulterous life before the very eyes of Lewis’ wife.”
Taylor had taken Phillips to San
Francisco and was there at the time of the great 1906 earthquake and then
returned to Utah afterwards. Taylor was sentenced to serve one year in prison
but was pardoned nine months later in June 1907 after a letter writing campaign
by Logan people.
Due to the assault on Lewis, Joseph
Sullivan forfeited his credit for good behavior which would have reduced his
five year sentences by three months. Because of his violent and rebellious
conduct, Sullivan lost nine months and 11 days of “good time” which was the
usual deduction from a five-year sentence.
Because of his revolts against the
authority of the guards, Sullivan spent much of his time in solitary
confinement and had lost all of the “good time” allowed to convicts who display
a “disposition to reform, or, at least in inclination to serve out their
sentence quietly and submissively.” Had he obeyed the prison rules and
refrained from his frequent revolts he would have been released from prison in
February, 1907. As it was “he did not doff the stripes” until when he “came
forth branded as a dangerous man and his movements were watched.”
Joe Sullivan achieved the
reputation of being “one of the most desperate unruly convicts in the Utah
State Penitentiary. Many of convicts
“brutal and harden as most of them were,” became afraid of Sullivan and during
the entire time of his confinement none dared cross him in anything.”
While being confined to solitary
confinement, Joseph Sullivan, along with thirteen other prisoners confined for
serious infractions, was involved in a riotous protest against prison rules and
was “severely punished.” The offenders who had been placed in solitary
confinement were mostly “housebreakers and highway robbers, but they were
considered “the most troublesome thugs with which the prison authorities have
to deal. They rejoice in the distinction of being hardened bad men.”
Newspaper headlines from the
November 1906 reporting on a “prisoner mutiny” read “Prison Convicts In
Insurrection-Drastic Measures Necessary to Quell Uprising in Penitentiary-
Punish Fourteen leaders- Governor Cutler gives the rebels cold comfort.”
Joseph Sullivan, as one of
“fourteen tough convicts” was punished with the others for the “offense of
creating a disturbance and making themselves generally obnoxious.” While he and
the others had been in solitary confinement, they “indulged in profanity and
boisterous conduct.” The men “hooted and yelled” and stamped “on the metal
floors with their heavy shoes.” They did a “War dance, pounded on bars with tin
bucket covers,” and gave out “blood curdling yells.”
The fifty-three year old Prison
Warden, Arthur Pratt, decided that stern measures were necessary to
 |
| Arthur Pratt |
control the men and teach them a lesson. Arthur Pratt, [1853-1919] the son of Mormon Apostle Orson Pratt, had been appointed warden just two and half year before when he now had to deal with this uprising. Actually it was his second time as head of the prison as that he had been appointed warden of Utah Territorial Penitentiary in 1888 and served for a year. During his second role he served as warden for 13 years and was head of the prison when labor organizer Joe Hill was executed in 1915.
Warden Pratt ordered the frustrated prison guards to seized eight of the worst offenders and marched them to a gloomy building called “The Tombs,” so named because of the executions which had occurred there. “The place was regarded by the prisoners with superstitious dread.”
At the Tombs, the prisoners were
stripped of “the clothing from their bodies” then they were “trussed up in two
stone cells with arms outstretched in opposite directions at full length and
hands manacled to rings in the wall.” The men remained standing in that
position for twenty-two hours with only a brief interval “when the convicts
were given a slice of dry bread and a cup of water.” This punishment was meant
to bring the men “into a spirit of obedience to prison rules.”
The “mutinous offenders” were
visited by prison guards every half hour, after being trussed, to check on
their conditions. On those occasions the guards were met with a “volley of
dreadful curses and obscene abuse.” It was noted that the convicts “had a
disposition not to be conquered. They profane at nearly every breath and
threaten dire vengeance upon the heads of the officers for the punishment
inflicted.”
After
being chained for twenty-two hours, and fearing “physical collapse,” the
prisoners were released at night and “ thrust into absolutely bare cells” where
they laid naked and “groaned on the bare floor, with tongues parched and joints
wracked by pain.”
The next day the men underwent a
repetition of the “tombs discipline” and were to stay there until it was
“apparent that the insurgents have had enough to insure obedience.”
The Board of Corrections, along with Governor John C Cutler, [1848-1926] met at the Sugar
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| Gov. J C Cutler |
House prison during the chaining of the inmates to the Tombs stone walls. They went to witness the inmates undergoing their punishment. Governor Cutler, not the least bit sympathetic, was said to have “read the riot act to them” and made it plain that Warden Pratt had “his full support in maintaining discipline.”
Warden Arthur Pratt explained to
reporters why he resorted to this Draconian form of punishment. He said, “I am
placed here to take care of these men. I must not let them get away, nor must I
allow them to do bodily harm to each other, and if our rules were as strict as
the rules in other prisons, I believe that I would not have so much trouble as
I am having at the present time.” He noted that “whipping posts” were not allowed
under Utah law and reasoned saying, “The only punishment that I am subjecting
the men to, is to chain their hands against a cement wall where it will be
impossible for them to sit down.” He also said he feared that a rebellion at
the prison could spill over to the dining room setting “where two hundred
inmates were bunched together at meal time and he feared riot there would mean
a loss of life.”
A year after the “insurrection”
Sullivan left the prison on 9 December 1907. He was 28 years old and “was in an ugly mood”. Both the Salt Lake
City police and County sheriff offices were warned “that a particularly
dangerous man was about to be turned out of the penitentiary.”
The prison guards who had watched
over Sullivan for the term of his incarnation felt convinced that he would
return to his life of crime. “Sullivan entered the prison a wolf of society and
came out more wolfish than before.”
Chapter Six
John William Owen [1873-1942]
John W. Owen was
born according to birth records 3 January 1873 in the town of Canton, Starke
County, Ohio, although he claimed the date 22 January 1872 and 22 January 1874
when he applied for Social Security as an adult. His father, who was a brick
mason, died when he was 9 years old leaving his widow to raise five minor
children. He was the middle child among two older brothers, and a younger
sister and brother. His mother never remarried so John Owen would have been
raised in near poverty.
While there is no physical
description of John Owen, a military draft record showed that his younger brother
had brown eyes and black hair. Physically Owen was about 2 inches shorter than
either Joseph Sullivan or Joe Garcia who were about the same size. He was said
to be 5 feet 7 ¼ inches and a reporter described him as “a dark, insignificant
looking man, with an impudent, evil face.”
While there was little information
about his physical appearance, his character was impugned in most accounts
written about him. He was called a “jackal” and another reporter described him
as a “sulking cowardly creature evil at heart.” Still another wrote that Owen
was “a cruel, wicked, and criminal man,” and “Owen lacks every element of
manhood.”
In October 1897 a grand jury in
Canton, Ohio indicted 24-year-old John Owen for burglary, robbery, and larceny.
He pled not guilty but was convicted in November and sentenced to three years
in the Ohio State Penitentiary located in Columbus, Ohio. As that he was
not located in the 1900 federal census as being an inmate of the prison, he may
have been paroled by then.
Owen left Canton, Ohio behind and
went west. His older brother had worked as a conductor for a railroad and he
probably went west to work where no one would know his criminal background.
When Owen came out west, he stated
he found work upon the railroads as a “brakeman.” As a brakeman, he was a
member of railroad train crew. He was employed by the Western Pacific Railway
Company, which was formed in 1903. While working for the Western Pacific, he
lost his three fingers on his right hand on 18 Jan 1905. After his accident he
no longer could work as a brakeman.
Owen then found work as
“switchman,” operating the “track switches” for the San Pedro, Los Angeles, and
Salt Lake Railroad’s “Salt Lake Route.” As part of his job he was responsible
to inspecting important parts of the trains and attaching and detaching freight
cars.
It was reported that in this
position he “levied tribute upon the tramps and impecunious workmen who rode
from place to place upon the freight trains.” He was said to have forced
“wretched wanderers to yield to his portions of their meager sums which stood
between them and starvation. His spirit fed upon the submission of the poor
outcast whom he bullied and terrorized.”
Owen claimed he came up to Salt
Lake from “Lynn, Utah” after he lost his position with the “Salt Lake Route.”
However Lynn is in Box Elder County, Utah located in the northwestern corner of
the state, close to Utah's border with Idaho. He actually probably came from
Lynndyl 120 miles to the south in Millard County. Lynndyl was a railroad town
and the location of a fork in the San Pedro Los Angeles and Salt Lake Railroad
where one branch proceeded to Provo “via Nephi and Santaquin and the other to
Salt Lake City via Tooele.”
Owen stated that he had spent all
his money when he met Joseph Sullivan in December 1907, soon after the Sugar
House convict was release from prison. As that most of the information Owen
offered up to law officers was self-serving, it is hard to rely on his version
of his coming to Salt Lake. He claimed he was in Salt Lake only four days
before the Albany Saloon robbery in the early hours of December 14, but Salt
Lake detectives did “not give much weight to that story” as he seemed to have
been an associate of Joe Garcia, “one of the most dangerous criminals that ever
invaded Salt Lake.” They could “not believe he could have won the confidence of
the wily half breed in so short a time.”
Also a daytime Albany Saloon
bartender believed that he saw Owen in the bar a good week before the robbery.
Whatever actually was the case when he came to Salt Lake City, he “immediately
fell in with a gang of criminals” and within days Owen was used by Garcia “as a
scout or spy to study the opportunities offered for robbing houses.”
PART TWO
Chapter Seven
Paroled
On Monday December 9, Joseph Sullivan
was released from the Sugar House state penitentiary at 9 in the morning. He
was given a gray suit by the prison and $27. He then took a street car down
town and sometime that afternoon he bought a .38 caliber Smith and Wesson
revolver “paying $3 for it.” He was being closely watched by law officers as
that he had won the reputation of being the “most dangerous criminal in
prison.”
The next day Tuesday December 10,
John Owen said that when he arrived in Salt Lake City he was “begging upon the
street being hungry and without money. He accosted Sullivan for the price of a
meal and Sullivan gave him 15 cents. Two or three policemen, watching the
transaction, ordered Owen to leave Salt Lake threatening him to arrest him for
vagrancy.
After the police departed, Sullivan
walked away with Owen and told him “not to take any notice of the officers.”
Instead Sullivan “took his newly found friend” to various saloons” namely the
Continental saloon of the Southwest corner of West Temple and First South and
the Jubilee at 26 Commercial Street,
“where plans for obtaining money by robbery were incubated.”
The saloons of Salt Lake City were
seen as moral cesspools of alcoholism, illegal gambling and of course
prostitution A reporter described a visit to Commercial Street and the
surrounding district in August 1907 writing; “Women old, fat, broken down hags,
standing brazenly at the bars leering in time to the supposed music of an
orchestra or mechanical played piano or soliciting trade in the wine rooms in
the rear were common in almost every saloon.”
Salt Lake City ordinances ordered
these “dives” emptied of women between 7 in the evening until 7 in the morning
however the law was generally not enforced and the wine rooms in the rear of
the saloons, partitioned off private spaces, were used for intrigue and sex.
The same writer described Salt Lake
City Commercial street saloons as “dirty and disgusting premises” and
especially suggested that the “wine rooms” were particularly dens of iniquity.
In most of the downtown and Commercial street saloons had cubicles in the rear of the bar, forming small booths
often called “wine room,” in which all sorts of disreputable characters could
congregate “safe from the scrutiny of patrons of the bar rooms and from the
streets. These areas were known to police as “retreats for men and women of
questionable character.
A newspaper reporter described such
wines rooms as “fitted out with tables chairs and a couch, the purpose of which
is only too apparent. Apparatus for the whole gamut of bestiality and crime, in
its lowest form, are there with them who lend body and soul to such horrible
practices plying their trade.”
The Saloon’s “wine rooms” were the
cause of “a great deal of annoyance to the police.” Drunken and “horny” men
frequented these booths to meet “disputable women” who would often be found in
them; but as often as not, crooks robbed
the inebriated in these secreted places.
The Jubilee Saloon was particular
portrayed as a dismal place. An old red sign hung above the entrance to the
bar, where men entered who were “strange wayfarers who floated into Salt Lake
and then out again; all the odds and ends of western humanity, some merely hard
drinkers, who were wifeless, childless, homeless, without hope and ambition,
others with shifty eyes and pasts which they dared not bare to the gaze of the
world.” Certainly, Owen and Sullivan were a little of both.
These two favorite “haunts” of Sullivan and Owen
were probably chosen because Owen knew the bartenders at each place. Both the
Continental Saloon and the Jubilee also contained back rooms used where
Sullivan and Owen could plot and plan without being noticed or seen.
Tip Belcher was the night bartender
at the Jubilee and James “Jim” L McGivern was a bartender at the Continental.
Both these men had rooms at old Kimball house on North Main street. Belcher was
also providing a hiding place for Joe Garcia of which undoubtedly McGivern
knew.
Chapter Eight
Rolling a Drunk
In the late afternoon, prison guard
William Irving was ordered by Warden Arthur Pratt to go into town to check up
on Joe Sullivan and see what he was doing, in the company of Henry C Taggart,
another prison guard. Between 5 and 6 in the evening, Irving located Sullivan
who was still wearing his gray suit. He was in the Continental Saloon in the
company of a man they did not recognize. Sullivan introduced Owen by the name
of “Johnson” to the guards.
Irving was suspicious of the pair and he
warned Sullivan “not to get into trouble.” Sullivan just laughed and said to
Irving “If you bulls want to take me for anything you will get a fight;” bull
being a prison term for a guard.
At the Continental saloon, Sullivan
may have suggested to Owen that they could “roll a drunk” to make some easy
cash. A day laborer Swede named Pete Peterson
was there completely intoxicated in one of wine rooms, partitioned off
from view from the rest of the bar room.
Pete Peterson had been drinking in
the saloon, “considerably,” for the past two of three days it was reported.
During that time he was “singing and dancing for the curious customer” and so
intoxicated he could hardly walk.
In the evening Peterson was last
seen by customers walking towards the rear of the saloon where the wine rooms
were located after drinking another glass of beer. Passing through, he went
outside the rear of the saloon into a little passage way where Sullivan seized
“the drunken man around the neck and although the man was powerless to resist,
he beat him on the head with the butt of his revolver.”
However as he struck Peterson the
weapon accidently discharged which frightening the two hold-up men, causing
Sullivan to release the Swede and he and Owen fled in panic.
At the same time it was reported to
the police headquarters that “three shots were heard in the vicinity of the
“old Continental barroom” at First South and West Temple. “With clanging of the
bell and the urging of horses the patrol wagon with officers on board made a
rapid run to the scene of the allege shooting.”
After a stranger had told him of a
shooting, John Ingram, a livery stable laborer, stepped out of the back door of
the Continental saloon and found Peterson in a little passageway stretched upon
the ground. Peterson was unconscious and bleeding from wounds upon his head.
Ingram then carried the Swede inside.
“For a time there was great
excitement about the saloon” as people at first supposed that Peterson had been
attacked and rob or even had tried to commit suicide.
The police who were in the area
looking for some shooter were summoned. They questioned John Seren, the
saloon’s proprietor, and the bartender both who claimed they hadn’t heard
any shots. There was a large crowd in
the bar at the time, but there were no music or loud talk according to the
police.
Pete Peterson was taken to the
emergency hospital where it was stated that his head injury was not from a
gunshot wound but “had apparently been caused by a fall.”
Peterson was unable to make a
statement and in his pocket the police found $1.80. The police were informed
earlier that when the Swede had entered the saloon he only had $2 so robbery
was ruled out for his injury. The police thus “were not disposed to credit to
the general belief that he had been knocked down by thieves.”
The police assumed that because
Peterson was so inebriated, he simply had fallen down and injured himself.
After his wounds were treated, as that Peterson was clearly “under the
influence of liquor,” he was arrested and charged with drunkenness. After
sobering up in the “drunk tank,” however Peterson then told the police that he
had been attacked and an attempt to rob him was made by two men.
After the revolver discharged,
Sullivan and Owen quickly made their way back to Commercial street. Two Salt
Lake police detectives who had been watching out for Sullivan for some time
spotted him with Owen, who was unknown to them. They were seen rushing about on
Commercial Street and after having heard shots a block away, the police
detectives suspected that Sullivan might have shot someone in an attempt at
highway robbery. They suspected he was hurrying into the heart of the city to
hide himself in the crowd.
On Commercial Street, the two
police detectives stopped the men as suspicious characters and as the
detectives could smell burnt gun powder on Sullivan, they frisked the pair.
Sullivan and Owen had loaded concealed weapons in their pockets. The handle of
the weapon belonging to Sullivan was covered with blood and one of the
cartridges showed it “had been discharged within a short time before they were
taken into custody.”
When asked to explain why the men
carried loaded revolvers and how the blood came to be on the handle of
Sullivan’s gun, both Sullivan and Owen refused to talk. “They had no
explanation whatever to make.” The detectives then took Sullivan and Owen to
police headquarters, just about a half hour after Peterson had been found
wounded.
The arrest of Sullivan and Owens
was actually part of a “round trip up of numerous vags and loafers” that night
on Commercial Street as that the police had been investigating a series of hold-up
men “who have been operating in Salt Lake for some time.” Still the police
suspected that Sullivan and Owen had committed some crime and had hurried to
Commercial Street to thinking they might “hide in one of the cheap lodging
houses there.”
Charles Ford, one of the new
policemen appointed on Tuesday, was patrolling his beat in Greek Town.
Chapter Nine
Sullivan and Owen Arrested
As that the police department had
been warned about Joe Sullivan’s release from prison, Chief of Police Thomas D
Pitt, after being informed of his arrest, told newspaper reporters working the
“Police Beat” why Sullivan was taken into custody. He said that there was
“reason to believe Sullivan has been connected with some of the recent thefts
and robberies” and that the reason for the roundup of Salt Lake’s vagrants was
that “last night three pistol shots were heard in the vicinity of First South
and West Temple and the police at once made an investigation.”
Sullivan and Owen were interrogated
by the police “up to an early hour” on December 11 Wednesday morning. The
police however “were not able to learn of any shooting affair with which they
could connect Sullivan,” but suspected he had assaulted Pete Peterson.
During a police lineup at
headquarters, the Swede was not able to identify Sullivan and Owen as his
assailants, however when others in the Continental Saloon were questioned
customers said the pair had been seen “hanging about.”
As that Sullivan and Owen were
unable to post bail, they were lodged in the city jail on Wednesday remained there waiting
a hearing on Friday.
That Friday December 13, in the
morning, Joseph Sullivan and John Owen appeared before Police Court Judge C.B .
Diehl. The police however failed to secure sufficient evidence to connect them
to the assault on Peter Peterson, and they were released. Nevertheless,
Sullivan and Owen were given by the Judge Diehl “two hours in which to leave
town” as they were suspicious characters.
It was a common practice to allow
vagrants to leave the city and they were
often referred to as “floaters.” Instead
of leveling a fine or incarcerating them, these vagrants were allowed to
“float” out of town. Sullivan and Owen were such “floaters” however they did
not leave Salt Lake City.
Police Detective Richard “Dick” L
Shannon released Sullivan and told him he was an “undesirable citizen. The
police confiscated his revolver but returned $4 to Sullivan which was all he
had left of the $27 he had when he left prison.
After leaving jail, the Sullivan
and Owen went to the Oregon Short Line
depot to inquire when the next train was going south on the San Pedro Railroad.
They were told that the Los Angeles limited would not leave until eleven
o’clock that night. Sullivan and Owen then walked back towards the center of
town stopping at the Sindar’s Saloon at 51 West First South Street “for a few
glasses of beer.”
As “floaters,” Joseph Sullivan and
John Owen were “trailed by police detectives to make sure they were leaving
town. The detectives followed the two men during the afternoon into the night
“as they skulked from saloon to saloon” until their track was finally lost.
After leaving the Sindar saloon,
the men went to the old St. Mary’s Catholic Church at 50 South Second East
where they met up with “short and stout and round about” Father W. K. Ryan.
Sullivan went to see Father Ryan to ask for help getting to Garfield and the
priest gave him fifty cents. Afterwards the pair went back to Sindar’s to drink
some more.
In the late afternoon they
“strolled to the Albany Saloon” at 597 [579] West Second South where John Owen
“sold a ring to the day bartender.” With the money from the sale of the ring,
they walked up to the Hurry Back Saloon at 502 West First South. After a few
beers there, the men then went to The Court
Saloon at third South and State Street where Sullivan encounter a recently
release fellow prison inmate named “Doc Gibson,” with whom Sullivan had been
acquainted in prison .
John Owen and Joe Sullivan were
last seen by the police detectives “late on Friday night wandering on South
State Street.” They had until then dodged through the city to “escape vigilance
of the police and deputy sheriffs.”
Doc Gibson was an ex-convict from
the Idaho State prison, who had arrived in Salt lake City in November 1906. His
real name was probably “Henry” or Harry L Gibson but he had also used many
aliases like “H.D. Kendall” and “Coleman’ as well as “a few more.”
Shortly after arriving in Salt Lake
City, Doc Gibson was arrested for passing a forged $30 check at the Lyric Bar
at 331 South State Street. He was convicted on the forgery charge and sent to
the Sugar House Penitentiary in February 1907. He was sentenced for only a year
because he had made “restitution” before being arrested and so he was “let off
with a light sentence.” He did not serve his full sentence but was paroled just
a months prior to when Jose Sullivan was release from prison.
After leaving the Court Saloon,
Gibson, Owen, and Sullivan walked back to the Continental Saloon about eight
o’clock in the evening. There is the bartender James “Jim” McGivern, said to
John Owen that “a party was here asking
for you and Sullivan and called himself Chink.” Joe Garcia who was known as
“Chink” evidently must have known John Owen if he was asking for him. Sullivan
and Owen had been in jail since Tuesday night therefore Owen most likely had to
have known Garcia prior to when he said he came into town on the day he said he
met Sullivan.
If Owen knew Joe Garcia, then he
may have known also that Tip Belcher, the Jubilee bartender, was harboring
Garcia and would have known how to reach him. After leaving the Continental the
men walked back to the Jubilee Saloon where Belcher was bartending. Evidently
Joe Sullivan did not know of the connection between the bartender and Garcia
for he asked Belcher if he knew “Chink.”
Owen and Sullivan told Belcher that
they were about to leave town and they wanted to know if Garcia wanted to leave
town with them. This was another indication that Owen was acquainted with
Garcia more than he admitted. Belcher told the pair that he thought Garcia
might want to get out of town. Sometime later Belcher contacted Garcia and made
an appointment for the two men to meet up with Garcia in front of the
Continental saloon at midnight.
Chapter Ten
Garcia Meets Sullivan an Owen
Tip Belcher did not know Sullivan all that well, as that he later testified that he could not be certain that he had ever seen Sullivan before December 13 but believed that he had seen a man with John Owen that night who “represent himself as Joe Sullivan”. Belcher said that Sullivan and Owen were in the Jubilee drinking about ten o’clock that night.
Doc Gibson showed up at the Jubilee
Saloon about that time and he went with Joe Sullivan into a rear “wine
room.” Alone with Sullivan, Doc Gibson
listened to Sullivan’s need for cash relating as that he had been ordered out
of town. Sullivan believed that since Gibson was an ex-convict that he was
trust worthy. He had no idea that Gibson was actually acting as an informant or
“stool pigeon” for the sheriff office and would later report what he had heard
of Sullivan’s plans to hold-up a saloon. Gibson told Sheriff Frank Emery that Sullivan “talked freely” of his plans of
holding up a saloon to get the money necessary in order to leave the city.
As Sullivan and Owen were low on
funds from drinking all day, Doc Gibson
suggested that they come to where
he was lodging, to pass the time and have a pitcher of beer while waiting for
“Chink” to show up. They agreed and stayed in Gibson’s room drinking until
nearly 11:30, when Owen and Sullivan to return to the Jubilee saloon.
There they began drinking again in
one of the back wine rooms as to be out of sight. Shortly Tip Belcher came in and told the two men that
Joe Garcia was waiting for them over at the Continental Saloon. Sullivan and Owen
got up and left to meet up with Garcia, evidently someone Owen would have
recognized.
At the Continental, Jim McGivern
“the bartender” said he had seen Owen and Sullivan in his place several times
during the evening of December 13 when near midnight they met up with a “dark
complexioned man.”
In the meanwhile Doc Gibson went to
the police headquarters as a “stool pigeon for Sheriff Frank Emery. Gibson informed him that
“mischief was afoot.” Sheriff Emery sent out a detail to locate Sullivan and
Owen and followed them.
About a week later, Doc Gibson,
“after having made himself useful to the authorities,” attempted to rob of a
young, inebriated Swede at the
Darlington Rooming house on East Second South Street by impersonating being a
deputy sheriff. Gibson was arrested, tried, and sentenced to jail for the
crime. However while incarcerated he escaped and disappeared from this
narrative.
It was after midnight Saturday
December 14, when Sullivan and Owen agreed to accompany Garcia back to the
Kimball house to get something to eat and make plans get money on which they
could get out of town.. They left the Continental Saloon after midnight and
walked up Main Street past the Salt Lake Temple towards the old Kimball
property. After entering the house, Sadie Belcher admitted them into the
“humble little room,” where Garcia had been hiding out.
The three desperadoes were hungry
from drinking all day and having only eating bar food. Sadie Belcher cooked a
meal for them and set the kitchen table with a “repast of eggs, coffee, and
pie.” While the men were eating, Garcia produced two revolvers which he placed
on the table. They belonged to Tip Belcher who allowed Garcia the use of them.
Sullivan noticed that bullets for
one of the cartridges was too large and he whittled a bullet down as to fit the
gun, then he “slipped it into his pocket.” Garcia was said to have kept the
other weapon.
Over their meal, the men discussed
ways to get money on which to leave town. Sullivan related his plan to hold-up
a saloon, however Garcia objected to “highway robbery as too dangerous and
unprofitable.”
Sadie Belcher said they were only gone ten or fifteen minutes before returning to Kimball rooming house but would later change this story to say she did not see them again for several hours.
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| McCornick Mansion |
Chapter Eleven
The Albany Saloon
Whether after leaving the Kimball
place or the McCornick house, Sullivan, Owen, and Garcia walked back down the
hill towards the Continental saloon. There Sullivan asked Owen where the Albany
bar was again, evidently only having been there once earlier on December 13.
Owen told him that the saloon was down near the Denver and Rio Grande depot and
Sullivan according to Owen said he was going to “hold-up the place.”
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| Sanborn Fire Insurance Map 1898 |
Who robbed the Albany Saloon and
was involved in the shooting of Officer Ford now depended on which convict one
choses to believe. John Owen claimed that the three of them went to the Albany
saloon, with him only being a look out, never actually going into the bar, and
having run away after he heard a gunshot. Owen maintained that it was Garcia
and Sullivan who had robbed the saloon while he only went along as a look out.
The facts were that both of the thieves who held up the Albany Saloon had
revolvers but only Sullivan and Garcia were reported to have had weapons
according to Sadie Belcher’s testimony.
Joe Sullivan however claimed that
he left Garcia and Owen shortly after leaving the Continental saloon and went
to the Oregon Short Line rail yards to try and catch a empty box car out of
town towards Ogden. Although Sullivan had only but one set of clothing, the
gray suit given to him at the time of his release from prison, neither of the
bandits were identified as wearing such an outfit.
Initially the Albany bartender who
was held up reported that one of the bandits was “swarthy” and seemed to be a
“foreigner” and also so stated that one of the robbers was shorter than the
other and had a right bad hand.
Garcia and Sullivan were nearly the
same height while Owen was shorter than the others by nearly two inches. Also
Owen had three fingers missing from his right hand. Additionally Police officer
Ford, from his deathbed, said that it was the shorter of the two men who shot
him.
Joe Garcia who was shot and on his death bed
admitted to neither being at the Albany Saloon nor having participated in the
shooting of Ford. Holding up people and places was not his manner of operation,
as he was a notorious “porch climber.” Others thought John Owen claiming that
Joe Garcia was involved in the robbery was only to mitigate his own involvement
in the crime and the death of a police officer.
As that both Joe Sullivan and Joe
Garcia had extensive criminal histories known to the police, and were
considered dangerous and desperate men, investigators of the robbery and
killing accepted John Owens version of events that he was a lookout not knowing
of his own criminal past.
What is known for certain is that
after drinking a beer or two at the Continental saloon, Sullivan and Owen left
the place together. The Sheriff’s officers who were sent to find them, trailed
Sullivan, and Owen “on West Second South street going towards the Albany” but
lost trace of them in the dark. They reported that they did not see three
individuals but only the two men.
Chapter Twelve
The Albany Saloon Holdup
At 2:30 in the morning, on December
14, two masked highwaymen held up the Albany Saloon at 579 West Second South. The bar was nearly empty
except for four men, 29 year old Andrew Jackson Buckley, the bartender, and
three other men, one who was a deaf mute, another mostly passed out, and an
Italian “without a good grasp of the English language.”
In some reports the Italian George
Costello was referred to as “Warren or even Walter Costello.” Whatever his
first name was, it was reported consistently that he spoke and understood very
little English.
The man named John Burns, was in
barroom parlance a “sleeper,” someone who used a saloon as a place to sleep. He
was evidently passed out in the saloon when the robbery took place. The third
man, John “Jack” Dempsey was described as “a deaf mute old man.”
When the saloon’ swinging doors
were swung opened the bartender was in front of the bar counter, with his back
to the pool table, standing near the saloon’s stove in order to stay warm. He had just finished
serving drinks to Costello and Dempsey. Burns was asleep on a table and did not
see a man wearing a blue handkerchief covering his lower half of his face enter
through the swinging doors holding a revolver in his hand and shouting, “Throw up your hands everybody.”
As they did so, a smaller man
wearing a red handkerchief, “crowded to the taller man’s side pushing open the
other swinging doors.” The two “rough looking fellows” came into the bar in a
stooped position.
Turning
and seeing the ‘”menacing weapons in the hands of the intruders,” the bartender
and the four customers were taken by surprise by the intrusion. Although the
two men’s faces were covered, the bartender recalled that while he could tell
little about their appearance except they were roughly dressed, he said “one
was dark and swarthy.” He thought that one of the men seemed to be a “Mexican
or some other foreigner of dark complexion. The other was lighter.”
Costello, the Italian, could not
understand what was being demanded, and Burns having woken from his stupor when
he saw Buckley raise his hands and the weapons being drawn on them all obeyed
the command to put their hands up except Jack Dempsey. He did not hear the
bandits enter the saloon and did not hear the command to raise his hands. The
red-masked bandit quickly leapt upon the deaf mute and “knocked him down with
the butt of his weapon,” while the blue-masked man stood at the end of the bar,
near the door, and kept the other men “covered with his revolver.”
The shorter thug then went behind
the bar counter and searched first for a revolver that bartenders usually kept
hidden. Not finding it, the red masked man ordered Buckley to tell him where it
was hidden, threatening to shoot him if he refused to tell him. The taller
masked man guarding the entrance, impatient told the desperado behind the bar
to just “hurry up and get the money, to not bother about the gun, and leave the
bartender alone.”
Andrew Buckley was in front of the
counter and was watched by the blue masked man, standing at the front end of
the bar. He stood there so he could
watch his partner behind the bar and at the same time “keep the men in the room
covered.” He was annoyed with the man with the red handkerchief mask who was
constantly pointing his weapon at the four men “so as to force his victims to
tremble and cringe.”
At one point the one guarding the
door told the bartender that he might let his hands down. The bandit behind the
bar, who was busy with the cash
register, faced a large saloon mirror by which he was able to keep a “watch
upon the captives.” Thinking the bartender was going to lower his hands, he
“whirled around” leveling his gun at him and “yelled with a curse” for Buckley
to keep them elevated or he would kill him.
The blue masked man, “who was cool”
told his agitated partner not to bother about the four men as he was keeping an
eye upon what they were doing. Buckley stated the robber behind the bar seemed
excited and nervous. He also observed
that the red masked man’s right hands seemed to have been injured as he kept it
in his pocket while holding the revolver in his left.
When opening the cash register, the
shorter man set his revolver on the “shelf at the side of the cash register”
and used his left hand “which had held the weapon” to take the money from the cash drawer and
stuff it in his pocket.
Because of this observation of
seeing the robber using only one hand, Buckley later upon learning that John
Owen had missing fingers on his right hand came to believe that it was John
Owen who had opened the cash register and had on that occasion “threatened his life.”
The red-masked man who robbing the
cash register, was so nervous and excited that he did not open the till drawer
fully. He only looked in the front of the cash drawer and saw the $18 in the
front part. There was $27 more in the cash register, however the bandit failing
to examine the back part of the drawer did not steal the entire $45.
After making “quick work with the
contents of the cash register” and slipping
the money into his pocket, the man behind the bar began opening drawers
behind bar counter, “examining their contents.” At last he reached a drawer
which was locked.
According to the Albany Saloon’s
day bartender John Owen had spent a considerable amount of time about the bar
“after he was discharged from the employ of the Western Pacific railroad.” The
day bartender remembered his visits to the place and Owen had just sold him a
ring the previous afternoon.
The day bartender recalled that Owen
had “been about the bar during the day for about a week previous to the holdup
and may have known that a particular locked drawer behind ten bar counter
contained large amounts of money. This knowledge may have been the reason why
the Albany Saloon was chosen for the hold-up.
The Albany Saloon sometimes kept as
high as $5,000 on hand with which to cash the payroll checks of laborers who
worked at the Denver and Rio Grande rail yard, many of whom spent their
salaries back in the saloons drinking. The railroad’s pay day was on the tenth
day of every month and Andrew Buckley believed that John Owen may have known
that considerable amounts of money was kept on hand for cashing pay checks.
The holdup was committed on
December 14, only four days after the rail road’s pay day and therefore Owen
would have had reasons to suspect there would still be “large sums of money in
the Saloon.”
The bandit behind the bar counter
demanded Andrew Buckley give him the key to the locked drawer in the sideboard.
Buckley said he didn’t have access to the key and the masked man unwilling to
believe the bartender became frustrated and threatened to kill the barkeep. The
smaller man, who could only use one hand, was eager to use his revolver while
the taller man was said to have not displayed any “murderous inclinations.”
Again the cool headed blue masked man interfered and told his partner to be
quick about it.
Then the red masked man hopped over
the bar counter, stopped at the cigar display, and stole a package of “Turkish
Trophies cigarettes.” The blue masked man held the swinging door open and kept
the men in the bar covered with this gun, while his partner backed out the doors. Before disappearing through the swing
door himself, the highway man warned the men that if “anyone attempted to
follow he would be shot.” After his
small partner “had gained the street he too back out.”
The entire robbery took less than
fifteen minutes and as soon as the “highway men” were out in the street they
made a dash through the falling snow towards the north side of Second
South intending to run northward in
Fifth West.
From the actions of the blue masked
robber, while in the saloon guarding the door, Andrew Buckley felt confident
that the highway men didn’t have a companion crook acting as a lookout on the
outside. In fact the bartender recalled that at one point when the swinging
door made a noise, the guard at the front of the saloon turned and paid “strict
attention to watching the door.
As soon as it was apparent that the
highway men were gone Andrew Buckley immediately hurried into the office of the
Albany hotel and telephoned police headquarters. He recalled that probably only
two minutes had elapsed between the time the bandits left the saloon and when
he was connected to the police. He related that just as the police headquarters
answered their telephone, he heard a shot.
Chapter Thirteen
Ford Encounters the Robbers
When Police Officer Charles S. Ford
was shot in the early hours of the morning of December 14, he was not expecting
an attack. It was snowing, all the businesses except for the saloons were
closed, and few people were expected to be out on the street at that hour.
The holdup men had entered the
Albany Saloon while Ford was on First
South, in another part of his beat,
walking towards Second South on Fifth [Sixth] West. The time it took the
highway men to have held up the Albany Saloon, ten or fifteen minutes, Ford had
reached the northeast corner of Fifth [Sixth] West and Second South Streets.
After the bandits backed out of the
front door of the Albany Saloon, located
on the Southwest corner of today’s Sixth West and Second South, they made a
dash across the street towards the north west side intending to run northward
on Sixth West.
It was dark and snowing outside on
Second South preventing the highway men from seeing Policeman Ford standing on
the opposite side of the street.” Only as the bandits ran across the street in
making their getaway, did they catch sight of Ford’s blue uniform and “the
flash of his star.”
Before Officer Ford could draw his
revolver, the shorter highwayman robber, “who had remained silent” opened fire
making one shot that struck the patrolman in the left breast “in the region of
the heart.”
“Stunned
and reeling,” Officer Ford “gamely drew his weapon and made an effort to bring
down his assailants before the fainting in the street.” The policeman fired two
shots at the bandits before he collapsed. His “bullets went wild and the two
highwaymen disappeared.”
At the same two other police
officers, Emil Johnson, and Fred Clough, had just entered the National Saloon
at 592 West Second Street across the street from the Albany Saloon to make a
report to police headquarters. They had been detailed “to look for burglars”
when they heard three shots fired from
the corner of Sixth West and Second South.
The officers ran out of the saloon
just in time to see Patrolman Ford sink to the sidewalk. Policeman Emil Johnson
was one of the first to reach Ford’s side after he was shot and when he reached
Ford, he “saw that fallen officer had been shot and appeared to be near death.”
At the same instant as that the two
officer ran towards Ford, a crowd of men, from in the surrounding saloons,
emptied into the street after hearing the shots. They quickly assisted in
carrying the mortally wounded officer into the National Bar, “where he was
cared for until the patrol wagon arrived” which
took him to the emergency hospital at police headquarters .
Officers Johnson and Clough, just
as soon as Ford was carried into the National saloon, they took up the hunt for
the shooters. They ran out the National Saloon and “made an effort to head off
the fugitives thinking that they would turn eastward and try to gain the center
of the city.”
The policemen gave chase to the
highwaymen “but both of the fugitives got away in the darkness, although their
tracks for a time were plainly visible in the freshly-fallen snow.”
Unable to get sight of the
culprits, the two officers “at last returned to meet the police patrol wagon
and “furnished information to those who were to aid in the search.” The patrol
wagon had sped to the scene of the shooting with more policemen who “at once
took up the hunt for the robbers.” They divided into teams and scoured
throughout Greek Town but “nothing came of this hunt.”
Patrolman Ford was taken to the
emergency hospital at police headquarters then transferred to St. Mark’s
Hospital where doctors “found that he was bleeding internally and that there
was no hope of saving his life.” Ford was lucid enough at times to say he was
said shot by the shorter of the two men whom he had encountered.
Ford’s wife and grown daughters
were summoned to be at his side and Ford “lingered for nearly twelve hours
before dying of his wound at 1:50 in the afternoon on December 14. He was 51
years old.
When news of Ford’s death was
received at police headquarters that afternoon, the flag in front was lowered
to half-mast in token of honoring “the brave, but unfortunate member of the
force.”
When news of the death of Charles S
Ford reached the office of the Governor of Utah, John C. Cutler offered a $500
reward for the arrest and conviction of the person who shot him.
Chapter Fourteen
The Hunt for Ford’s Shooter
Immediately after the shooting of
Patrolman Ford, in the early morning hours of December 14, an intensive manhunt
for the killers commenced at once. John Owen, Joe Sullivan, and Joe Garcia
however were in separate places hours after the robbery and shooting. According
to Sadie Belcher, Sullivan and Garcia made their way back at Tip Belcher’s
rooms on North Main Street while John Owen had run eastward on Second South and
then turned northward to reach the Oregon Short Line yards where he hoped “to board
a freight train and escape out of the city.”
The hunt for Ford’s shooters
involved searching all the saloons of the downtown district in the early
morning also. Sadie Belcher who had gone
downtown with Joe Garcia to buy some beer noticed the flurry of blue clad
officers scouring the “dives that harbored criminals at that time of night.”
An hour after Patrolman Ford was
shot, some unknown citizen telephoned police headquarters saying that “two men”
had been seen running through Fifth North Street. Two police officers were
dispatched in a buggy in the direction of Fifth North Street and between today’s
Fifth West and Sixth West Streets, they came upon John Owen at 3:15 in the
morning. He was breathless and covered with mud from apparently having fallen
down several times as he “fled blindly away from the scene of the crime, wildly
dashing through mud and water until he was splattered from head to foot.”
Thirty five year old Owen was so
exhausted from running that he made no resistance when the policemen ordered
him to halt.
When the police questioned as to
what his business was being out at that early hour, Owen’s excuse was he was
“just trying to get out of town” as Judge C. B. Diehl had ordered. Although
Owen was found a little over a mile from the scene of the shooting, the
policemen suspected that Owen may have had a connection to Ford’s shooting, due
to his excitable demeanor and being out near the time of the incident on Second
West.
When the officers searched Owen for
a weapon he was not armed but he did have a pack of “Turkish Trophies”
cigarettes in his possession. Owen was taken down to the police headquarters,
as a suspicious character, and far as the police knew at the time, he had no
criminal record, other than that he had
been in city jail earlier in the week along with Joe Sullivan. His association
with Joe Sullivan was enough for the police to detain him.
The detectives who questioned him
at the police station “placed little reliance” on Owen’s story that he had
“simply been trying to get out of town.” They knew he had been before the
police court the previous morning and had had plenty of time to “float” out of
town. They suspected that he may have been one of the two men who held up the
saloon and shot Officer Ford or knew who did.
When asked what he knew about the
Albany Saloon robbery and sequential shooting, Owen became “frightened to be
associated with the shooting of an officer of the law.” At first Owen denied
that he had anything to do with the robbery and the shooting of Patrolman Ford.
The fear of “facing the hangman or the five masked riflemen groped at his
heart” and may have been the motivation for his “distancing himself from the
crime” committed hours earlier.
However, soon after realizing the
“gravity of his situation” and from the relentless police interrogation, Owen
broke. He made a confession of his involvement in the robbery of the Albany
Saloon but not of the shooting of Officer Ford. Owen claimed Joe Sullivan and
Joe Garcia, a name unfamiliar to the police, had planned the hold-up. He said
that they “were to do the real work” and he merely went along to act as the
look-out.” Owen insisted that he was outside the saloon the entire time the
robbery took place and after seeing Sullivan and Garcia flee, he ran away.
John Owen’s trying to place Garcia
at the Albany Saloon was a challenge for the detectives. They had no
information on any Joe Garcia and at first thought they felt Garcia was Owen’s
invention made up to distance him from being identified as one of the robbers.
However later in the afternoon, when it was discovered that Garcia actually
existed, weight was added to the confession of John Owen and the police became
convinced that Owen was telling the truth of who all was involved in the robbery and shooting.
John Owen continually denied that
he had “taken a hand” in the Albany hold-up but confessed that he was present
at the Jubilee Saloon when the “job” to rob the Albany was planned by Joe
Sullivan. Besides Joe Garcia, Owen also named “Tip” Belcher, the Jubilee Saloon’s
bartender as being “privy” to the scheme. According to Owens, the “highway men”
were to meet back in the Belcher’s rooms at the old Heber Kimball residence, at
150 North Main Street, in afternoon after the robbery.
Owens most treacherous admission
was in naming Joe Sullivan as the man who shot the police officer. How he could
have known that it was Sullivan if he was running away when Ford was shot was
not questioned. The police did not follow up on that bit of conflicting
information, eager to accept that Sullivan was the perpetrator. The police, as
far as was known, “made no effort to verify Owen’s confession.”
Also the police felt that the
possibility “was very remote” that Owen, having only a minor infraction, “could
ever be directly convicted of the crime” of shooting Officer Ford and felt that
Sullivan was a “bigger fish to fry.”
With Owen’s statement that Sullivan
was the culprit, police were detached in the early hours to search for him and
by noon every available officer in Salt Lake City was also hunting for Garcia.
While the police accepted Owen’s
version of events, nevertheless, newspaper skeptics believed that John Owen had
made his confession, “moved by a desire to save himself from the charge of
having been one of the robbers who murdered the policeman.”
Chapter Fifteen
At the Kimball Lodgings
While Owen was “singing” to the
police Joe Sullivan and Joe Garcia were hiding out in Sadie Belcher’s rooms.
During the March trial of Joe Sullivan, Belcher related her version of the
sequence of events in the early hours of December 14. She claimed that before
the three criminals left her rooms after midnight, she had noticed that Garcia
had changed out of his leather shoes into a soft pair of rubber sole slipper
like tennis shoes. As to why he did this Belcher did not explained but the
implication was that Garcia probably knew the rubber soles gave him better
traction for porch climbing which was the original intention of the criminals
when they went out into the night.
After the three left, Sadie Belcher
said she went to bed until she said she was woken by Garcia and Sullivan
several hours later between three and four in the morning. This bit of
testimony refuted Sullivan’s claim that instead of being with Garcia and Owen
at the Albany Saloon, he had tried to flee the city before the 2:20 robbery.
According to Sade Belcher Sullivan was with Garcia at her place an hour after
the robbery.
Once
inside the Belcher’s quarters, Joe Garcia took off his “tennis shoes,” changed
his soil socks, then put on a pair of “common walking shoes.” He probably
changed shoes due to the snowy conditions as it had been snowing.
Sadie Belcher said that Garcia and
Sullivan “acquainted” to her what they had done. Garcia was thirsty and wanted
Sadie Belcher to buy some beer but also may have wanted to hear any news of the
shooting.
“Sadie Belcher, the pretty little
fence of whom Garcia was enamored, and the murderous greaser made their way
down town , leaving Sullivan behind at the Belcher rendezvous to learn the
extent of Ford’s wound.”
Joe Garcia accompanied Sadie to a
saloon at First South and Main Street in order to buy some bottles of beer to
bring back home. Garcia remained outside on the corner as not to be noticed as
she went inside. Sadie recalled that at that time every policeman in Salt Lake
was searching for the men who shot Officer Ford and Garcia had been “passed and
re-passed by hurrying blue coats” but as he was not yet a wanted man, he was
unmolested.
While in the saloon, the “clever
little fence” telephoned the police station and inquired about the policeman’s
condition. She was told that the officer “could not live.” After hearing the
gloomy prognosis, “Mrs. Belcher and the greaser hastily made their way back to
the Belcher rendezvous and told Sullivan.”
After returning to rooms at the old
Kimball residence, Garcia told Sadie Belcher that he wanted Sullivan to stay
the night as it was too cold to be outside. She told Garcia that she didn’t
believe that her husband would approve of it. As it was getting near dawn,
Sullivan and Garcia then left sometime before daylight. Sadie Belcher said she
never saw Joe Garcia again after that morning and only saw Sullivan a month
later when he was captured and brought back to Salt Lake City.
Joe Sullivan was thought by police
to have left with Joe Garcia. Sullivan claimed he left by him and unable to
find a train going north out of town, he
walked along the Oregon Short line the tracks to Wood Cross in Davis County
where he was then able to catch a freight train going to Ogden where he spent
the day until catching a freight train out of the city.
At the time of the Albany Saloon
robbery and the shooting of Charles Ford, Tip Belcher was tending bar at the
Jubilee Saloon while his wife Sadie was in their rooms sleeping at the former
Heber C. Kimball house at 150 North Main Street.
Due to the “confession” of John
Owen, “Tip “and Sadie Belcher were implicated in the West Second South Street
crime for having “lodged” Joe Garcia in
their room and being associated with Joe Sullivan. By the afternoon of December
14, the police raided the old Kimball house and arrested Tip and Sadie Belcher
along with Jim McGiverns, also referred to in some accounts as Jack McGibbons.
All the three who were arrested were residents of 150 North Main Street
although they lived in separate quarters.
They were all suspected of having
something to do with the planning of the robbery of the Albany Saloon. James
McGivern was arrested and brought in for questioning as he was the bartender at
the Continental Saloon.
While raiding the Belcher’s living
quarters the police found numerous trunks and suit cases filled with letters,
connecting Tip Belcher to other robberies committed in Salt Lake City by Joe
Garcia and by others in Denver, Colorado. At the time, the police believed
Owen’s statement that it was “Tip” Belcher who gave the revolvers to Garcia and
Sullivan that was used to shoot Officer Ford.
Chapter Sixteen
The Jubilee Saloon
One of the immediately effects of Owen’s confession to the police was that on Sunday 15 December 1907 Chief of Police Thomas Pitt issued orders for the destruction of the Wine Room partition booths in an effort to clean out some “the worse Commercial Street saloons and resorts at once.” The action was “stirred by facts brought forth in the investigation of the death of Policeman Ford showing that the hold-up at the Albany saloon was plotted in one of the Commercial Street bar rooms” one which was the Jubilee Saloon.
Commercial Street saloon keepers
were notified of the Chief of Police’s order and soon afterwards that the
proprietors of the Jubilee Saloon, Clyde L Frost and Charles E Field, even
changed the name of the bar to the Alamo Saloon. The change was prompted
by the notoriety of the saloon being
associated with the place from where the robbery of the Albany Saloon was
planned and the subsequent shooting of Charles Ford.
A newspaper article from 30 December
1907 reported on the name change. “Oblivion has claimed the Jubilee Saloon at
26 Commercial Street it was an old and notorious landmark in the cluster of
resorts in that thoroughfare but on 29 December the gleaming familiar red sign
was replaced with two signs one green and the other red to tell of the change.”
“Tip Belcher the man who found a
hiding place for Joe Garcia the porch climber and one of the men wanted for the
murder of Policeman Ford was a bartender at the Jubilee. There Joe Sullivan fugitive,
robber, and murderer met Owen and planned the Continental saloon robbery the
night after Sullivan was released from prison. It was there that Sullivan met
Joe Garcia the skulking house robber and planned the campaign of roguery which
ended in the killing of Policeman Ford.”
“This dark story came out after Owen and Belcher were arrested the day following the shooting of the policeman and it resulted in the wiping out of the name of the Jubilee Saloon. The resort still exists. The change was merely to cast off the burden of unenviable notoriety and to give the place an opportunity to win a new reputation under a new name.”
Chapter Seventeen
The Funeral of Officer Ford
Officer Ford’s funeral was held on
Monday December 16 at the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks’ fraternal club
house on State Street. Ford had been a member in good standing with the Elks
since 1899. Three of his pallbearers were from the Elks fraternal order and
three from the Knights of Pythias of which he was also a member.
The Elks lodge room was filled to
overflowing where his casket in the center of the room was covered with
“beautiful floral pieces.” The main floor of the hall was reserved for Ford’s
family and for members of “the Musician Union, the Woodmen of the World, the
Knights of Pythias, and the Elks, all comrades of the dead police man.”
Ford was eulogized by a speaker who said, “no soldier who has
fallen at his post has died a braver death than Charles S. Ford who was
stricken while protecting life and property at night while the city slept. This
brave man for whom we grieve walked forth at night that life might be made
safe. He was slain. The law breaker who did this evil deed should not escape.”
Charles Ford’s funeral cortege was
made up of four mounted policemen who were in the lead, followed by members of the police force on
foot under the command of Salt Lake Police Chief Thomas Pitt and Captain Joseph
Burbidge. Additionally the city’s Fire Chief Charles Vail and a company of
firemen took the next place in line.
Behind the police officers and
firemen marched a band of fifty-eight musicians, all members of Musician Union
No. 104. “It was the largest band ever assembled in Salt Lake with the
exception of the band that greeted President Roosevelt on his visit to the city
which contained sixty musicians.”
After the musicians walked members
of the fraternal orders of the Woodmen of the World, who were in charge of the
graveside service, the Salt Lake lodge of Elks, and Knights of Pythias.
Following them were the carriages
containing Ford’s widow and daughters, other relatives, and Elk Lodge officers.
Back of these was the hearse, with a honorary guard of policemen, followed by
other carriages of mourners.
At the end of the procession was
the patrol wagon which contained “the many flora offerings” to be placed at the
grave site in Mount Olivet Cemetery. “The funeral cortege was one of the most
impressive ever witnessed in the streets of Salt Lake.”
Chapter Eighteen
Tip Belcher's Criminal Enterprise
Tip and Sadie Belcher were held in jail for ten days before their lawyer filed writ of Habeas Corpus on Tuesday December 24 saying they were being held without a warrant. They were released as there was no complaint against Sadie Belcher. Tip Belcher was also released after posting bail although the police claimed to have a good case against him for receiving stolen property. It was asserted also that he knew the dangerous character of Sullivan and he acted as a fence for the Garcia.
While the Belchers were being relased from jail, on Tuesday, Christmas Eve 1907, John Owen appeared in court after being locked up ten days. He pled guilty to burglary. It seemed suspicious to some that John Owens was said to have almost demanded that he be allowed to plead guilty to a burglary charge and sent to the penitentiary. The police and the court evidently were satisfied with his “confession” and permitted Owen to plead guilty probably in order to “save the expense of a long trial.”
He was sentenced to twenty years in the state penitentiary, thus he eluded being connected with the death of Charles Ford. He was sent to prison Friday December 27 less than two weeks after the killing of Officer Ford.
Some suspected that Owen was actually more involved in the hold-up and killing then what his confession led the law to believe. It was speculated by some that it was Owen who suggested the robbery as having known of the locked cash drawer behind the Albany Saloon’s bar counter.
Some speculated that it was Owen who lured Sullivan into the crime which he “fastened on two associates,” namely Sullivan and Garcia. Bartender Andrew Buckley believed he had observed Owen’s erratic behavior in the saloon and felt that if Owen was the one who shot Ford it “must have been that his trembling fingers pressed the trigger in the terror” at seeing an officer of the law.
Shortly after the killing of
Patrolman Ford, it was learned that Tip Belcher sent a package “ via Wells-Fargo and Company” to
Denver, Colorado. The police notified Colorado authorities to be on the look out for it
which they did. “Red” Hughes and Frank Goldman, ex-convicts and “former pals of
Belcher” retrieved the package and were arrested with “jewelry on their person
which corresponded in description with that stolen from Salt Lake
residences.”
Salt Lake Police Detective Richard
“Dick” L Shannon went to Denver Colorado to identify jewelry found in the
possession of the two men and then
returned to Salt Lake City with about “$1,000 worth of jewelry stolen in Salt
Lake by Garcia as a porch climber. On Tuesday New Year’s Eve, Belcher was
rearrested “as the police believe they
have evidence to convict him of being an accomplice of Joe Garcia in a number
of porch climbing tricks.” Belcher admitted that he concealed Garcia in his
house.
Two
of the charges against Tip Belcher was
that he was accused of receiving a stolen watch from Verne Peterson who lived
at the McVihie residence and a watch stolen from L.A. Adams, the daughter of
Salt Lake Mayor Bransford.
The extend of Tip Belcher’s
criminal enterprise came to light when on Thursday 2 January 1908, two Denver
Colorado bartenders, named James E Heath and Jack Goldman were arrested in “as
members of an organized gang of thieves of which Goldman is the leader. A large
quantity of jewelry was found in their room , “part of loot stolen from a Salt
Lake residence last October valued at $2000” sent to them by Tip Belcher.
Once Belcher was facing a charge of
active participation in the “robberies of Joe Garcia and Joe Sullivan” his
bondsmen decided that they had “no further desire to stand as sureties for his
appearance for trial” and Belcher remained in the city jail held as a material
witness and “charged with robbery.” Strong evidence against him, “tending to
show that he was concerned in some of the porch climbing stunts imputed to
Garcia having been unearthed by Detective Shannon in Denver.”
Chapter Nineteen
On the Run
Joe Sullivan was on the run for three weeks before he was arrested on a vagrancy charge under the assumed name of Thomas Howard. He was arrested in Portland, Oregon on Saturday 4 January 1908.
When Sullivan left Salt Lake City
in the early hours of December 14, he said he had only $1.50 to his name. It
was never explained what happened to the $18 that was robbed from the Albany
Saloon.
Sullivan related various stories of
his leaving Salt Lake City and his ending up in Portland; all the while still
claiming that he had left town before the robbery at the Albany Saloon took
place. He initially claimed in the early hours of December 14 he had gone with
Joe Garcia and John Owen as they were heading towards the Albany Hotel but had
parted with them at the corner of Fourth [Fifth] West on South Temple in front
of the Wellington Hotel near the Short Line Depot.
Unable to find a train going out
North out of town, Sullivan said he walked along the train tracks to Wood Cross
in Davis County where he then was able to catch a freight train heading
towards Ogden. Once in Ogden his story
changed depending on when and to whom he was relating it.
His first story was that in Ogden,
he changed over to a Central Pacific boxcar and kept on going until he reached
San Francisco where he said he stayed three day, penniless and having gone
“twenty-four hours at a stretch without food.” Sullivan claimed he couldn’t
find work in California so after “a rest of three days, he continued on to
Portland, Oregon. When he reached Portland he said he had $2 “hidden in his
shoe.”
This scenario did not account for
the three weeks between the time he left Salt Lake and was arrested in Portland
as the travel and stay in San Francisco would only have been a week. The truth
was that Sullivan probably never went to San Francisco at all.
He claimed in another statement ,
“Don’t remember the time I caught a freight to Ogden and beat my way north,
getting to some small town near the Idaho line at 9 o’clock the next morning,”
which would been December 15. He said he slept in a box car and then proceeded
north where his first stopped was in Pocatello, Idaho.
The distance between Pocatello and
Portland is approximately 670 miles and the average person can walk three miles
within an hour. As that it was winter when Sullivan left Salt Lake City, it’s
not probable that he made a little more than 20 miles a day so he had to have
ridden the rails for some of his trek.
However wary of being caught by
railroad agents and apprehended for “stealing rides,” Sullivan most likely
walked some of the way to Portland which would account for the three weeks between
the time of the robbery and his being arrested. Also it was noted by the police
after his arrest that Sullivan’s shoes were “badly worn” indicating that while
as a fugitive “he must have walked many days on rough roads.” The soles of his
shoes were worn “almost to the thinness of tissue paper” and were almost new
when he wore them out of prison.
From Portland Sullivan stated,
“After beating my way for several days I came to the Columbia River and
followed down along the tracks of the “Oregon Railway and Navigation Company.”
Sullivan stated he “tramped and beat my way until I reached Portland” where he
was “arrested an hour after arriving.” Sullivan used the term “beat my way”
when telling of his journeys which was slang for simply meaning making his way.
Sullivan said he traveled alone to
Portland however the police speculated that he had to have had helped from Joe
Garcia as it was their opinion he was not bright enough to make the journey
without some help. “His escape from the city after the murder could only have
been made possible through luck of a reckless criminal and the guidance of a
cunning companion and not because of an unusual display of intelligence on the
part of Sullivan.” Sullivan was not the only Salt Lake City fugitive highwayman
captured by Oregon authorities in January. A 28 year old man named Richard
Deming who had escaped from the Salt Lake County jail was caught in Huntington,
Oregon and held in a Baker City jail charged with robbery.
Chapter Twenty
Richard Deming
In October 1907, Richard Deming,
along with 27 year old Thomas “Tom” Parker, robbed a 31 year old African
American man named Daniel Webster. Parker was described as a tall good-looking
fellow, intelligent and “apparently springs from good stock.” Deming was
described as being much shorter than Parker.
Webster said he was on his way home
at 11:30 at night near Victoria Alley, when the two highwaymen ordered him to
“halt and stick up his hands.” Webster, who was a single man, was leaving
Victoria Alley which was a notorious location for brothels and a “club” for
African Americans.
Webster said that he stopped when
Parker pointed a gun in his face at which point Deming “roughly searched
Webster’s trouser pockets and only came up with $1.20.” Frustrated at the little amount and after “roughly handling Webster,” Tom Parker told
him, to “walk on.”
Webster walked away a few paces
before meeting a man to whom he told that he had just been robbed. The two
followed Parker and Deming to where the robbers stopped at the Red Onion Saloon
at 71 Commercial Street to use their stolen money to buy something to eat.
While the highway men were eating, Webster then contacted a nearby police
officer and the “big copper” napped Parker at the Red Onion. In the commotion
Deming escaped, passing through opium dens of Plum Alley out into State Street.
Webster followed Parker and the police officer to headquarters on First South Street and there he
positively identified Parker as the man who pointed a revolver at him. On
November 12, Tom Parker was sentenced to ten years in prison for armed robbery
. The sentence was imposed by Judge George Armstrong. Parker was listed in the
Federal Census of 1910 as still an inmate of the state prison. His age was
listed as 27 years [1883] a native of Texas and his occupation was given as a
bridge carpenter.
While Tom Parker was in jail,
Richard Deming was operating with a gang of prowlers, robbing rooms in lodging
house in downtown Salt Lake City. On the night of November 21, a little more
than a week after Parker was sent to prison, Richard Deming, along with Joseph
Donovan, Mike Lynch and Edward “Eddie” Olsen were arrested as a part of a gang
of lodging house burglars.
Salt Lake Police Detectives George
Chase and Richard L Shannon, along with two other detectives arrested Deming,
Olson, Lynch, and Donovan in the Angelus rooming house on First South Street,
identified the men as room prowlers.
In initial reports Richard Deming
was listed as being a 23 year old musician, and Eddie Olson a 17 year old
waiter. Actually Deming was 27 years old and Olson was a 16 year old runaway,
sharing a room at the Uintah Rooming House on Commercial Street.
In May 1907, a notice was posted
seeking information on “Eddie Olson, 15 year old son of Mrs. Joseph Stevens,
left home in Salt Lake over a year ago and has not been heard from since. The
Stevens family lived in Eureka until over a year ago.”
While Deming was sitting in the
city jail, on November 24, Daniel Webster identified him as the other man who
held him up in October. Deming after being identified “broke down and
confessed” and the charge of armed robbery was added to his arrest record.
Daniel Webster would die seven months later in June 1908 of dropsy and
peritonitis at the age of 32 years.
Some reporters speculated that Eddie Olson may have been Deming’s brother, without any evidence due to Deming’s affectionate relationship to the teen. Sheriff Frank E. Emery was of the opinion that Olson
and Deming were related “based on the intimacy between the two and other
circumstances.” There is no evidence that Deming’s relationship was anything
other than platonic, however affection between two males, not related, in 1907
was inconceivable, as that the act of sodomy was called the “unspeakable crime
against nature.
Nevertheless in
the world of tramps and hobos it was a common practice for an older man to form
an attachment to a younger male often referred to as a “gay cat” or “punk.”
After being arrested Richard Deming
and Eddie Olson shared the same jail cell and evidently Deming must have had
some strong affection for the 16 year old for when Olsen had his preliminary
hearing, “Deming in an effort to save the boy from prison, testified that he
had given Olsen the stolen articles found in his possession.”
On December 10, the day after Joe
Sullivan had walked out of prison, Deming appeared in a court room to testify
on behalf of Eddie Olson and “face the music” to save the “young boy’ from
prison. Deming said he had given the stolen articles, a match box, and a stick pin, to the Eddie
Olson as a gift not knowing they were stolen. “Deming claimed that he had
presented the stolen items from the Angelus rooming house, found in Olson’s
possession, to him.”
“In spite of a most earnest
attempt” on the part of Richard Deming, an alleged footpad, and crook now in the county jail awaiting
trial for burglary, to place the blame for the theft of a match box and stick
pin on his own shoulders and free Eddie Olson, a boy who is charged with having
stolen the articles, Justice of the Peace Judge Dane T Smith bound Olson over
to the Third District Court of Judge C.B. Diehl.” The term “footpad” referred
to a highwayman operating on foot rather than riding a horse.
Deming’s testimony was not fully
believed, and in January Judge Diehl
found the 16 year old guilty of possession the stolen items but convicted him
only of “petit larceny” which saved him from being sent to prison. Olson in
February 1908 was sentence to spend to two months in jail and then disappeared
from this narrative.
When Deming had his preliminary
trial for being one of the men who held up Webster, he was also identified by a
Rio Grande Railroad conductor as the man who held him in a lavatory, while Joe
Donovan searched his room and robbed him of $35.
While being held in the old County
jail on West Second South, Deming fell and feigned an epileptic seizure. “Two
physicians worked on him for four hours with electric batteries and other
medical appliances but could not faze him. While working with him the doctors
ran their fingers around his eyeballs but he never so much as twitched his eye.
Pins were stuck in his body, in his limbs and in the soles of his feet without
producing the slightest motion. The electric batteries were applied and he was
given severe shocks but there was not the slightest indication that he felt the
current. To all appearances, he was unconscious.”
At that point Deming was admitted
into Holy Cross hospital and placed in a room with a special deputy to guard
him. On December 20, Deming escaped
custody from the Holy Cross Hospital, “through a clever ruse.” While his guard
was not attending him thinking Deming still unconscious, Deming “drew on a pair
of trouser, and coatless and shoeless, slipped away.”
Deming who was known to embellish
any story later bragged that he had “tied three sheets together around a
radiator and escaped through a window.”
However as that he was housed on the fourth floor of the hospital “this
method could not have been used” and it was more likely “he simply walked down
stairs and out the door.”
Deming had to have found shelter
immediately as he was “barefoot and coatless,” and “could not have gone far
without being noticed.” Additionally Deming had left behind his false upper
teeth during in his escape from the hospital. Deming although considered a
“vicious character” in newspaper reports, stated he probably “fell in with
friends who helped him escape.
Upon being notified of Deming’s
escape, the ”sheriff’s office and police force of the city and a number of
special deputies were detailed to search for Deming who was “supposed to have
friends in both Butte and Seattle and “thought to have been a pal of Sullivan,
the man wanted for the killing of Officer Ford.”
Deming was said to have dyed his
red hair “raven black” upon leaving salt Lake. It was thought by the police
that Joe Sullivan and Joe Garcia “the fugitive murderers of Policeman Ford may
have resorted to some such method of disguising themselves. It is thought
probable that Sullivan has liked Deming dyed his hair black and in that way
eluded the watchfulness of those looking for him along the main lines out of
Salt Lake. Garcia might easily pass as a Negro.” When captured, Sullivan was
found to have dyed his auburn hair black.
Richard Deming made it as far as
Huntington, Oregon when a week after his escape he was in the custody of Baker
City, authorities. On December 27 1907 Salt Lake City Police Chief Tom Pitt
received a telegram from a Oregon Short Line Agent in Pocatello saying that a
man “clad mainly in a night shirt, had attempted to hold up a restaurant in
Huntington, Oregon and was in the custody of Baker City.”
The Police Chief then notified
County Sheriff Frank Emery who wired Baker City to “obtain the particulars.”
When it was reasonable to assumed that the man arrested was Deming by his
description, Deputy Sheriff John S.
Corliss was dispatched to Oregon to make
a positive identification.” Deming had been using various aliases such as “John
Murphy,” “John Sullivan,” “John Richards” and many others. In Utah he was known
as Richard Deming reportedly “one of the
most desperate criminals of the west.”
On 3 January 1908, Deputy Sheriff Corliss arrived in Baker City
to take Deming into custody. However the Oregon officials wanted to keep him
and try him for the hold up of a railroad man at Huntington Restaurant and Corliss
returned to Salt Lake empty handed.
A week later the Baker City
officials changed their mind about trying Deming and wired Salt Lake that they
would release him into their custody and once again Deputy Corliss went to
Oregon to retrieve Deming to bring him back to stand trial.
Chapter Twenty-One
Deming's Tale
During the journey back to Salt
Lake, Deming related a narrative to Deputy Corliss in which he bragged that he
avoid capture after escaping Holy Cross Hospital by disguising himself so well
“that my own mother would not have known me, had she met me on the
street.” He even boasted that “he took a
walk down Main Street and passing policemen who knew me did not recognize him.”
Then Deming said he “worked his way north and met Joe Sullivan in a saloon there
in Ogden.
Deming claimed he met Joe Sullivan in Ogden the day after his “sensational escape for Holy Cross.” While in a saloon in Og
den he said he saw Sullivan shooting craps and approached him.
While he and Sullivan were drinking, Deming claimed that Salt Lake Detective
Dick Shannon entered the saloon and that Sullivan escaped by the rear door and
concealed himself in a coal shed for the night. Deming said he was in a
disguise and walked right past Shannon boasting of his ability to deceive the
police.
Deming then said he and Sullivan
rejoined each other the next day on December 22 and made their way to
Huntington, Oregon together. “We caught a train out of Ogden riding all night
and getting off the train at daybreak to kindle a fire in out of the way place
where we spent the next day. In this way we made it as far as Huntington
Oregon.”
“Our traveling was done at night.
In the day time we would sleep at campfires and cook our meals. We were able to
obtain food at the stores in the towns along the railroad without attracting
attention as there were many men beating their way in both direction and
strangers who appeared to be out of luck attracted little attention.
Deming said while in a saloon in
Huntington, Sullivan was “shaking dice,” when four or five men rushed in to the
place and seized Deming “mistaking him for Sullivan in their excitement.”
Sullivan, he said, escaped and went on to Portland which was across the state
some 275 miles from Huntington.
Actually Deming was arrested for
holding up a railroad man having stolen “$20 and a gold watch” from him. Deming
was captured in a saloon in Huntington and brought to the county jail in Baker
City Oregon under the name of John Murphy. The fact that Deming was still
wearing the hospital nightshirt was the bit of information that eventually led
to his capture.
Demings story didn’t seem plausible
that Joe Sullivan would have stayed in Ogden for a week after the robbery at
the Albany saloon. Also the police were skeptical knowing that Deming was a
braggart and enjoyed notoriety. Later Sullivan would deny that he ever traveled
with Deming.
Salt Lake City authorities however
did believe that Sullivan had fled to the Northwest based on the fact that he
lived in Washington State for many years and was “more familiar with that
region than any other and could make his escape better through a known than an
unknown territory.” They were proved right when Sullivan was arrested on 4
January 1908 in Portland
Chapter Twenty-Two
Capture of Joe Sullivan
On the morning of January 4 1908,
Portland Patrolman James ‘Jim” Anderson was passing the corner of First and
Morrison Streets when he spotted an “unkempt individual walking slowly along
the opposite crosswalk.” The man was pointed out to him by someone who believed
he might be “one of the thugs wanted in Salt Lake.”
Anderson stopped the man, who was
“dirty disheveled” and had “his hat brim pulled well down over his eyes.” The
man gave his name as Thomas Howard.” A
“quick search brought to light a .41-caliber Colt big navy revolver which the
officer had been careful not to allow the fellow an opportunity to use should
he have had the inclination to do so. The man was arrested for having a
concealed weapon.
“Assuming the air of bravado when
taken to the police station” the
prisoner when led to a cell by Patrolman
Anderson, “was sullen and non-communicative though he muttered the words, Oh My
God as the prison steel door closed behind him.”
Searching through the “rogue
gallery” a catalog of wanted criminals photographs, at first glance, all the
detectives at police headquarters took
Howard to be the man wanted in Salt Lake City. Thomas Howard’s “general criminal appearance”
tallied with the description of Joe Sullivan, “the slayer of Policeman Ford”
but when confronted with the crime the “desperate prisoner denied being the
murderer.”
Sullivan
refuses to make a statement beyond the fact that he “beat his way into Portland
from the south last night,” claiming his name was Thomas Howard and declared
that he had arrived in town last night from the south, “having beat his way up
on one of the Southern Pacific passenger trains.’
When undressed, besides a rough
dirty suit, Sullivan was found to be “clothes in five sets of undergarments”
which were topped by a woman’s nightgown.”
Sullivan wore the “five pairs of long underwear” it was believed
“because he was compelled to sleep much in the open or in cold places during
his flight.” In this way he avoided
“carrying of blankets” to stay warm.
After being stripped, Sullivan was
examined and was found that he bore the same scars in the police description of
Sullivan. Although the physical description sent out by the Utah authorities of
Joe Sullivan was five years old, the description matched “the man under arrest
to the last detail except for a tattoo of a snake near the inside of his right
wrist.”
Sullivan’s police record
description stated; “Age 30 years, five feet nine and one fourth inches high,
weight 147 pounds, wears a seven and a half shoe size, hat size seven a
quarter, blue gray eyes, brown hair, slightly wavy, large vaccination scar on
upper right arm, decayed teeth, Roman nose, large Adam apple, stoop shoulders,
swinging walk.”
Portland’s Deputy Sheriff Archie
Leonard who was considered “to be the most expert officer in the northwest in
matters of identification,” “after
scanning the prisoner and comparing him with the rogue’ gallery picture” had “no hesitancy” in declaring Thomas Howard
to be Joe Sullivan the “wanted man in Salt Lake.” Leonard announced that the
rogue gallery photograph showed Howard to be “a dead ringer” for Sullivan.
The Portland Chief of Police then
wired a telegram to Salt Lake’s Chief of Police Tom Pitt that they had in
custody a man matching the description of the wanted Sullivan. He wrote “Will mail you photo of Howard tomorrow.
Answers description of Sullivan. In addition, has a snake tattooed inside right
hand, probably new. Has beard of three or four week’s growth.”
The snake tattoo puzzled the Salt
Lake authorities who remembered nothing of Sullivan bearing a snake tattoo; but
it was felt that it was quite possible that no attention had been paid to the additional mark of identification
upon Sullivan’s discharge from the Utah State prison. The absence of the mark
upon Sullivan being placed in his
initial description at the time of his incarceration suggested to authorities
that tattoo was made while in the Utah State Prison as was “common among
convicts.”
Police Chief Pitt wired Portland
back and also asked for a photo of Sullivan with his beard and then with a
photo of him “without his hirsute growth of weeks.” A photograph was sent by the Portland police but went “astray
in the mail” for several days. A frustrated police chief finally asked for
another which was sent out nearly a week after the first one. When it arrived
in Salt Lake City on Saturday January 11, 1908 “Thomas Howard” was identified
as Joe Sullivan ,wanted for the murderer Charles Ford. It was noted however
that the likeness showed that Sullivan’s face has changed considerable since
the day of the robbery a month prior. It was “thinner and the lips more tightly
pressed together.”
The Salt Lake City police, after
learning that when “Howard” was arrested
he was carrying an old .41 revolver, the “inference in favor of Howard and
Sullivan” being the same person was made as that Sullivan was said to have had
a “weapon corresponding to the same size in Utah”.
Although the fact that it was a
38-caliber bullet that ended Ford’s life made no difference with local
newspaper which continually called Sullivan the murderer of police officer
Ford, although some did not accept that Sullivan fired the “fatal shot but was
merely an accomplice.”
Sullivan was locked up in a Portland
cell “with a motley collection of drunks and “Vags” from January 4 until
January 16. He remained “sullen” and refused to talk about himself and
maintained “a stolid indifference, giving little concern to the prospects of a
return trip in irons to Salt Lake.”
On Wednesday 15 January 1908
Oregon’s governor honored the request of Utah’s Governor to expedite Sullivan
back to Utah and Police Chief Pitt sent Detectives Dick Shannon and George
Chase, the same men who had arrested Richard Deming as part of a gang of
lodging house lodgers in the previous November,
to Portland to retrieve Sullivan. Sullivan’s first words, upon seeing
the detectives, “were a confession of his identity by shouting ‘Hello’ and
calling then by their first names.” After the Salt Lake detectives took custody
of Sullivan, he dropped the pseudonym of Thomas Howard and admitted he was the
wanted man.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Back in Salt Lake City
On Thursday January 16, at eight in the morning, Joe Sullivan left
Portland, Oregon at in the custody of
Salt Lake detectives Shannon and Chase. He wore two pairs of heavy steel
handcuffs and was shackled with a ninety pound Oregon Boot on his feet to
ensure he could not escape.
As that the handcuffs forced
Sullivan into an uncomfortable sitting position the detectives, every three or
four hours, removed them so Sullivan could rest his hands and arms while still
be shackled to the Oregon Boot. Shannon reported that Sullivan seemed to be
grateful for the “kindness the detectives showed him” and he had a “mild manner
in strong contrast to his utter recklessness while in state prison.” The
detectives said the thirty-five hour trip with Sullivan was uneventful. “The
prisoner was calm all the time and did not give them the least particle of
trouble.” “Apparently the shadow of the
gallows had changed the nature of the desperado.
As Joe Sullivan was being jostled
on the Oregon Railway and Navigation train, traveling back to Salt Lake, the
Albany Saloon and Hotel, “at 595 [575] West Second South, was quietly sold that
evening . “Mrs. Eliza Hegney who holds the property interest in that part of
the city, amounting to thousands of dollars, transferred the realty to Gus
Colitchis and Company, a Greek concern for $5200. The bar and hotel belonged to
the Hegney Estate and descended to Mrs. Hegney at the death of her husband.
Heretofore the hotel has been known as an “Irish House.” Colitchis has been
running a saloon in that neighborhood.”
At seven in the evening, on Friday,
17 January 1908, the passenger train carrying Joseph Sullivan and his captors
pulled into Salt Lake City, stopping at the Oregon Short Line depot. A small
crowd of reporters and others had gathered at the depot, hoping to catch a
glimpse of the notorious fugitive. A carriage however was waiting on Fourth
West, a half a block away. Police Chief Pitt had instructed Detectives Shannon
and Chase upon arrival to take Sullivan out through the back of the train and
“hurry him into the carriage” to avoid a scene.
“Some of the more watchful” however
caught sight of the detectives and Sullivan and “made a rush after them,”
crowding around the carriage door. “The carriage door was hastily slammed shut
and the vehicle made all possible speed to the city jail.” After a ten minutes
dash Sullivan was standing shackled in the office of Police Chief Tom Pitt at
police headquarters.
Apparently Police Chief Pitt was
determined to pin the killing of Police officer Charles Ford on Sullivan rather
than admit that the police may have let the true shooter plead to a lesser
charge. While a fugitive Sullivan was referred to in the many newspaper accounts as the murderer
of Ford. This narrative came from the police department to those reporters
covering the “police beat.”
The Police Chief contradicted those
who heard Ford declared that it was the smaller man who had shot him. Instead
Pitt claimed that he “heard Ford’s dying statement declare that it was the
taller of the robbers who shot him.” Thomas Pitt’s statement was then used to
implicate Sullivan as the actual shooter as that he was “an half inch taller
than Garcia who was said to have been the other man involved.” Police Chief
Pitt’s insistence that Sullivan was the actual killer also conflicted with
evidence. When Sullivan was arrested in Portland he was carrying an old 41
revolver when it was a 38-caliber bullet that “ended Ford’s life”.
Newspaper reporters, covering the
“Police Beat” were on hand at the police station when Joe Sullivan was booked.
His physical description varied depending on the perception of the news
reporter. A sympathetic one stated “he is thin and worn after the hardships of
his long flight but is a man of athletic build and seems full of strength and
vitality.” However this was contradicted by another who stated that “At five
feet nine inches,” Sullivan was “not very strong or muscular in appearance.”
A different account stated “As he
sat behind bars, he made a most impressive appearance. His hair, dirty and
uncombed, was brushed back over his rather high forehead. On his face was three
days growth of beard. His cheeks were sunken and he showed the results of much
hardship. His hands were calloused and his clothes very dirty and ragged. His
shoes which were new when he was seen at the police station the day before the
alleged murder were almost worn out showing he has done a great deal of
tramping over railroad ties. He has a very peculiar expression in his eyes which
is very noticeable. They sparkle and when he is interested in anything, they
flash sharply. He has a very mean looking face.”
While some praised his “remarkable
achievements,” the more derogatory reporters questioned Sullivan’s
intelligence. “While Sullivan is looked upon as a desperate and dangerous man,
those who have come in contact with him have a low opinion of his intelligence.
It is considered remarkable that the man was able to make his way to Portland
without attracting attention as his disposition was so surly and sullen that it
is believed impossible for the man to wander nearly three weeks without
engaging in some sort of broil.”
“Guards, who knew him at the
penitentiary, and policemen, who have seen him, declare that Sullivan’s lack of
intelligence was shown not only in his rebellious conduct as a convict but in
his returning to a life of crime immediately after his release when he was
being watched.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
Sullivan Interogated
At police headquarters, Sullivan
denied knowing Joe Garcia and Tip Belcher and at first denied even knowing John
Owen. He claimed that he didn’t know anything about the Albany saloon holdup.
Sullivan said “I don’t remember the day I left Salt Lake whether it was day of
night. I got on board a freight train and rode out of Salt Lake. The story told
by Richard Deming that I traveled to Oregon with him was not true. I made the
journey alone. I had no companion.”
Sullivan stated he went straight to
Portland, taking trains whenever he got a chance. He said he “tramped and beat
my way until I reached Portland and lived by begging from farm houses along the
road.
When
asked by detectives if he had intended to go to the coast to try and get on
with a ship crew, Sullivan he said, “he did not have the least intention of
doing so.” He stated “Portland is not a good port for men who wish to go to
sea. There’s now 10,000 idle men there. The fact of the matter I had no clear
idea of what I would do when I got to Portland.”
Sullivan was questioned over and
over, and each time his story changed in the telling of details. He said he did
not remember John Owen by name, that his was a “chance acquaintance.” He
claimed he met the man the day he was released from the penitentiary and the
next night they were arrested on Commercial street. He said as that as no
offense other than that of carrying concealed weapons could be charged against
the two, both were released after a few days. He said that he was in police
court Friday afternoon on December 13 and was given until midnight to get out
of town. Sullivan claim that he parted with Owen on the afternoon of their
release from jail. He continued to deny to the police detectives that he knew
ever “Tip” Belcher or Joe Garcia.
However when confronted with having
been seen at various saloons that day, Sullivan admitted, “It is true I
sometimes went to the Jubilee saloon for a drink. I was drinking there one
night with a man named Doc Gibson. He was in the penitentiary when I was there
and we became acquainted. When I saw him in the saloon I talked with him because
we had been fellow convicts. I did not know at the time that he was a
stool-pigeon who was trying to get me into trouble.”
In anticipation of Sullivan’s return
to the Salt Lake City’s jail, the strongest upper floor cell, made of heavy
steel, was being prepared and thoroughly inspected by jailer William H
Wilkinson. This extreme caution was necessary “as during his criminal career he
made some remarkable achievements. At the state penitentiary while confined
there he was able to remove an Oregon boot from his foot.”
When Wilkinson searched the cell,
he discovered a small saw concealed beneath one of the steel slats of the
cell’s bunk. The tool, “made from a piece of steel taken from a woman’s
corset,” was believed to have been left by John Owen who had spent several days
in the same cell after his arrest. Owen probably didn’t have the opportunity to
remove it by his surprise removal to the county jail and, after his conviction,
to the Sugar House penitentiary.
As Sullivan “disrobed for the
night,” his clothes were taken and searched.’ The Police found “hidden in the
seams of his trousers” a bent horse shoe nail “apparently for the purpose of
picking locks ” and a small four 4 inch steel saw.
The small compartment, where
Sullivan was to be confined, contained “nothing but a bed and some covers.”
“Worn out from his long journey, Sullivan retired immediately after being taken
to jail cell.”
Nervous, restless, and anxious
Sullivan couldn’t sleep. Sullivan had not been in his cell for more than a
three hours, early Saturday morning, January 18, when jailer Frank Ripley found
him “busily engaged making a rope of his clothing and bed clothes.” Ripley had
been given strict instructions to watch him at frequent intervals. The 30 foot
rope was immediately confiscated and the police conjectured that Sullivan was
making a loop in the rope to lower in “hopes of getting tools from other
inmates.”
When questioned, Sullivan however
said his intention was merely “just to make a string to let down to the cell
below his to get some tobacco.” He claimed he was nervous and that his own
tobacco had been taken away. This was considered by the police as Sullivan’s
first escape attempt, nonetheless.
As
it was believed that Sullivan had attempted to escape, he was transferred to
the more secure county jail.
The Salt Lake County jail was built
as a double deck “rotary” that revolved on a large steel column in the center
with every cell being changed once a day. Every deck of the rotary contained
ten cells which accommodated two men. The entire rotary, with exception of the
doorway, was made of solid steel and was thought to be escape proof.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Sullivan Appears in Court
The morning of January 18, Sullivan was taken to the Third District Court, “jammed with spectators, to be arraigned on charges of first degree murder. He was guarded by five police officers. As that Sullivan appeared without legal representation, Judge Christopher B. Diehl reminded him that he need not make a plea of guilty or not guilty that morning. Sullivan said he preferred not to make a plea yet and Judge Diehl allowed Sullivan until Monday to make a plea.
The prisoner was hurried away “in a hack” from the court and taken back to the county jail where he was placed back in a cell with an inmate named George R Elliott. The man was charged with burglary of the first degree for having broken into the Court saloon early in December.
From Elliott, Sullivan learned that a lawyer named Frank E Vickery
had been appointed his attorney. Sullivan then asked that Elliot’s lawyer be sent
for to represent him in court. Frank E Vickery was partners with John Henry
Bailey Jr in the law firm of Bailey and Vickery.
In the county jail, just four cells
away from Sullivan was housed Richard Deming. Also in the county jail, had been
Doc Gibson, “the stool pigeon,” who was transferred to the women ward upon the
arrival of Sullivan, as that it was felt that Sullivan might attack and kill
him, for the “part he played in spying
on him and Owen, reporting their actions to the sheriff”
Tip Belcher who also had been in
the county jail was taken to the state prison upon Sullivan’s incarceration to
prevent Belcher and Sullivan from conversing. It was also speculated that
Belcher was transferred to the penitentiary “to worm a confession from John
Owen,” about his involvement with the death of Charles Ford. However after
Sullivan’s unsuccessful attempt to escape from the county jail and was
incarcerated in the more secured penitentiary, Belcher was taken back to be
lodged in the county jail.
On Sunday January 19, The Salt Lake
Telegram and the Salt Lake Herald published articles skeptical of John Owen’s
confession. Their opinions were that John Owen had been more involved in the
death of Office Ford, than he admitted because he “had good reason for pleading
guilty to a charge of robbery and accepting the 20 year sentence rather than be
implicated in the murder of a police officer.”
They postulated that Owen’s “panic,” when arrested by police officers an
hour after the shooting, was evidence “that Owen may have been the murderer and
not Sullivan.” The Salt Lake Herald even wrote, “The question arises, Was the
real murder Sullivan or John Owen the railroad switchman?”
The newspapers supported their
position, which placed Owen in the Albany Saloon, was based on bartender Andrew
Buckley’s statements which conflicted only “slightly with his statements” made
“a few minutes after the hold-up and murder.” The papers listed reasons
suggesting that Owen was in the saloon that December morning. The first was
that bartender Buckley said that neither of the highwaymen resembled
photographs of Joe Garcia. Second, was the fact that “one of the robbers could
only use one hand” and that three fingers were missing on Owen’s hand. The
third supposition that supported Buckley’s contention that Owen was the second
hold-up man was “that the small man seemed eager to use his revolver and
threatened twice to kill” the bartender while the taller man displayed no such
“murderous inclination” and at one time actually prevented the smaller man from
shooting Buckley. This made Buckley believe that it must have actually been
Owen who fired the fatal bullet that killed Office Ford.
The strongest piece of evidence
that placed John Owen in the bar was still the fact “that the man with the
injured hand took a package of a certain brand of cigarettes from behind the
bar before leaving” and after the arrest of Owen that specific package of
cigarettes was found in Owen’s possession.
These papers even argued that Joe
Garcia, “the porch climber,” whom Owen identified as being involved with Joe
Sullivan at the Albany Saloon, might have “had nothing to do with the robbery
and murder.” It was suggested that “the fact that the half-breed prowler was
placed by the side of Sullivan in Owen’s confession” was “to save the switchman
from prosecution on the charge of murder.”
Actually the newspapers
suppositions of Owen being more involved in the December crime, was the
hypothesis of the police at the time of the initial arrest of Owen. However
that “idea was abandoned when it was discovered that Garcia was not an
imaginary person but had really operated extensively in Salt Lake and had been
sheltered by Tip Belcher in the old Jubilee Saloon in Commercial Street where
Sullivan, Owen and other crooks made a sort of rendezvous.”
While the police believed that Joe
Sullivan met Joe Garcia through John Owen at the Continental Saloon, they were
not inclined to believe Andrew Buckley’s statement that Owen had frequented the
Albany saloon. Nor did they believe that Owen planned the holdup as he knew a
great sum of money was kept locked in the bar.
Because of “strong prejudice”
against Sullivan and Garcia, the “half breed porch climber” due to their
criminal record,” the police were inclined to disregard Owen’s involvement and
they became determined to convict Joe Sullivan of first degree murder of one of
their own.
The law enforcers became fixated in
the belief that only two hardened criminals such as Joe Sullivan and Joe Garcia
were capable of the murder of a police officer rather than Owen, who they
thought had an insignificant role in the robbery. Once Chief Police Pitt and
police detectives chose to accept Owen’s version of events, his account also
became the state’s official version of events.
Nevertheless, even the state’s
prosecuting attorney came to doubt that Owen was telling the truth regarding
his participation of the Albany Saloon robbery. He told jurors at Sullivan’s
trial, “John Owen preferred to plead guilty to robbery rather than take any
chances of being tangles up with a jury that would try him for murder. The
statement that Owen went with Sullivan and Garcia up to the Albany bar and then
“reneged” is, if be a fact, one that is hard to reconcile with the
circumstances of the case. Only the fact that this story is corroborated on
part by other witnesses gives it any standing.” The other witnesses, the
Belchers who were supporting the state’s case against Sullivan, testified for
the state simply as a hedge against their own prosecution for dealing in stolen
property.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Sullivan and Deming in Jail
Joe Sullivan was moved to Richard
Deming’s cell as they were both considered mastermind escape artists. However
with the help of Deming, Sullivan made another attempt to escape by sawing his
way through the jail’s steel bars with a short steel saw “commonly known as a
hack saw” given to him by Deming. He had sawed seven eighth of the way through
a “chilled steel bar before discovery.” Deming’s cell was searched and two more
saws, similar to the one Sullivan used, were found.
When discovered, Sheriff Frank
Emery ordered Joe Sullivan removed to the State penitentiary for “safe
keeping.” There Sullivan was placed in solitary confinement. Only allowed out
to attend court hearings.
In solitary confinement Sullivan
became obsessed came that a German county jail trustee named Nicholas Pruessing
was the one responsible for turning him in. Pruessing, alias Martin Brown, was
in the county jail, charged with forgery ,waiting to be tried. For some reason,
Sullivan concluded that it was Pruessing who “snitched” on Deming and him,
regarding the plans to escape jail and he “made up his mind to kill him if ever
he had the opportunity.”
However actually it was Richard
Deming who had informed on Sullivan. Deming would later claim that Sheriff
Frank Emery had tried to “induce Deming to lure Sullivan into breaking jail” so
that the “desperado could be shot down in his flight.” Sheriff Emery would
vigorously deny the allegation. Frank Emery asserted that Deming had warned the
authorities that Sullivan was trying to saw his way out of jail and said that
Deming had asked that the “warning be kept secret as he feared that Sullivan
would kill him if the truth became known.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Crack Down on Commercial Street
On Monday, January 20. Police Chief Thomas Pitt appeared
before the Salt Lake City council asking for some reformations to city
ordinances to prevent crimes. Thomas Pitt was a member of Utah’s “American
Party” whose platform proposed “progressive measures” and reforms within the
city. The Police Chief asked that the city to provide better street lighting to
“help with the suppression of crime” and also a moratorium on granting saloon
licenses.
Chief Pitt argued ,“there are
enough saloons at the present time and there is no need for more” as that
“crime is plotted there.” There were one hundred and thirty-seven saloons
throughout the city, “three to every regular patrolman.” He claimed that
saloons and restaurants that had enclosed booths and salon were “nothing more
or less than places in which to debauch girls and women.” Pitt suggested it
would improve the city, “very much,” if saloons were ordered closed at midnight
or 1 a.m., to weed out those who harbor criminals. He was probably referring to
the killing of Officer Ford.
He also recommended that the city’s
pawn shops’ licenses be increased to $1200 “so as to exclude small shops” from
operating “where stolen property is
received.” This too may have been in reference to the Belchers being at the
head of a “fencing” operation.
Regarding prostitution within the
city, Chief Pitt said that the only way in which to control this “evil” was to
set aside a tract of ground, build houses on it, and erect a stockade “inside
which the prostitutes shall be compelled to live” directly under the
supervision of the police department.
Additionally Pitt asked the council
for a new ordinance to drive out many of the Commercial Street’s messenger
houses so that underage boys could no longer be employed in the “red light
district.” He wanted these businesses “cut down to one or two.” He suggested
that the council raise the age of messenger service employees to twenty-one
which he said would “stamp out the employment of children” by the Commercial
Street messenger houses “in the red-light district.”
He also urged the city to provide a
detention home for boys and girls as “there was not any place to put a boy or a
girl except in jail whether they come committed, or homeless, or destitute.”
This would have the effect of protecting minors from being incarcerated with
adults as had been the case of John Olson with Richard Deming.
In May 1908 Chief Pitt’s suggestion
of removing Salt Lake City’s red light district to a “Stockade” began to be
realized but not until December did the City Council decide to consider any of
Chief Pitt’s recommendations regarding messenger houses and detention homes for
minors.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Sullivan's Arraignment
Joe Sullivan’s arraignment was to
be held Monday January 20. It was reported that between “five hundred and six
hundred people crowded into the courtroom” to get a “glimpse” of Sullivan.
Among them were Mrs. Lulu B Ford, the widow of the murdered policeman, and her
two daughters. The women were “heavily veiled” which “added a pathetic touch to
the scene.”
However Joe Sullivan had said he
was not ready to make a plea as that he had barely been appointed legal
counsel. Judge Christopher B. Diehl then agreed to postpone the arraignment
against until Wednesday.
When the court told the crowd in the court
room that Sullivan would not be appearing and the widow and her daughters “left
immediately.”
When newspapers reported that Joe
Sullivan’s arraignment was to be held on Wednesday, January 22, “fifteen
hundred men and women tried to force their way” into Judge Christopher B.
Diehl’s courtroom. “Scores more jostled and crowded into the hallways and on
the stairs all eager to get a glimpse of Joe Sullivan.” Hundreds of others
“packed the sidewalk from the YMCA building” on the South East corner of State
Street “to the police station.
However as a precaution Joe
Sullivan was instead brought to Judge Joseph Whitaker’s civil court room in the
city and county building with Sullivan being represented by the law firm of
Bailey and Vickery. The move was done to not to take chances with the “mob” at
Judge Christopher B. Diehl’s court. In the presence of only thirty
persons, Sullivan was “charged with
premeditatedly and with malice of aforethought” that he “did kill and murder
Charles S. Ford.”
Sullivan stood, “folded his hands
behind him,” and “gazed languidly out the window.” When Judge Whitaker asked
Sullivan to enter a plea, he answered “not guilty.” The defendant’s lawyer,
John H. Bailey, then stated he and his client were “ready to proceed tomorrow
at 10 o’clock.”
When it was finally announced to
the waiting throng, assembled at the Third District court house at 120 East
First South, that Sullivan had been taken to Judge Whitaker’s court and had
been “whirled” away back to the state prison, “there were groans” of
frustration” and disappointment.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
The Preliminary Trial
Joe Sullivan, to his legal defense team, claimed that he had nothing to do with the robbery and shooting that “occurred at Sixth West and Second South.” Defense Attorneys John Bailey and Frank Vickery would use that argument as his defense during his preliminary hearing.
The defense attorneys had Joe
Sullivan cleaned up for his court appearance. A reporter remarked, ““Sullivan
at first glance seems a clean-cut manly young man not repulsed by his
appearance. But for the occasional wild, strange look which leaps into his
eyes, he, Sullivan, would pass as an intelligent, good-looking young fellow,
not out of the ordinary either in good or bad qualities.”
The preliminary hearing was held
January 22 and John Owen was brought from the Sugar House Prison to testify
against Sullivan. He was the state’s main witness. While incarcerated in the
Sugar House prison Owen had been assigned as a prison cook. Even though
Sullivan had been placed in solitary confinement at the prison, it was reported
that Owen often spent hours at night in deep study, fearful of retribution.
During much of time ,when Owen was
called to testify in court between January and April, he was also placed in
solitary confinement in the State Penitentiary for his own safety. “He was kept
from the other prisoners as precaution against intimidation or violence by
convicts who have sympathies with Sullivan.”
Some of the prison inmates were
“bitter in their hatred of Owen” for being a witness for the state. It was even
the opinion of some of the prison guards that Owen would be killed by fellow
convicts” if he was kept in the regular section of the penitentiary for any
length of time. Most of the prison guards felt that “sooner or later” Owen
would find himself in a position in which he can be swiftly and silently
attacked, as that some prisoners hated Owen with the ferocity of wild animals.”
Prison Warden Arthur Pratt even
warned Owen to be careful that he might be murdered by other convicts, “having
heard from the prison guards that they believed that Owen’s end will be swift
if Sullivan is found guilty and executed mainly on the testimony of Owen.” “The
terrible strain under which he had been living showed in his physical
appearance” whenever he was summoned to testify.”
At the Preliminary Hearing, while
Owen was testifying, “Sullivan gazed at the witness with eyes gleaming with
fear and malice and white lips pressed together as though to suppress a cry of
alarm and despair at the treachery of his associate in crime.” As for Owen he
was said to have been “cringing and terrified of the accused Sullivan.”
Tip and Sadie Belcher, husband, and
wife, were also witnesses for the state. Sadie Belcher said that seeing
Sullivan in court was the first she had laid eyes on him since he had spent the
night in her room in the prior December. She claimed that Garcia and Sullivan
had only been away ten or fifteen minutes before returning to the Belcher’s
rooms. She also contradicted herself saying that after midnight she never saw
Garcia and Sullivan again.
Sadie Belcher’s testimony during
the preliminary trial was very damaging to Joe Sullivan, repeating that she
witnessed Joe Garcia give him one of the guns that was said to have been used
in the shooting. She however was “hesitant to say anything that might
incriminate herself or her husband.”
The defense team asked whether she
was told by her husband’s attorney, that if she testified against Sullivan “it
would be made easier for her husband.” She denied the suggestion and said she
was being truthful. It was then she also admitted that Joe Garcia was a “friend
of hers.”
Jim McGivern, the bartender at the
Continental Saloon, was also called as a witness. He, like the Belchers, was
suspected of knowing more than what he had told police about Garcia, Sullivan,
and Owen.
He had lived in the “old Kimball House on
North Main Street occupying quarters near the rooms of the Belchers,” and it
was believed that he may have known Garcia was hiding out with the Belchers.
Sadie Belcher and McGivern both gave damaging testimony at the preliminary
hearing and enough evidence was presented to try Sullivan in March on a charge
of first degree murder.
Fearing that Jim McGivern and Sadie
Belcher might leave the state “after giving damning testimony at the
preliminary hearing,” they were held under a $1000 bond as two of the state’s
most important witnesses. The pair were “remanded to the county jail,” where
Tip Belcher was already incarcerated having been charged with receiving stolen
property.
In February, the bail for Jim
McGivern and Sadie Belcher was reduced from $1000 to $250. McGivern managed to
raise the cash bond to insure his attendance at the trial of Joe Sullivan and
he was released from custody, but Sadie Belcher remained in jail unable to post
bail.
While an “involuntary guest of
Sheriff Emery” Sadie Belcher became ill “from an over indulgence in bananas.”
She and another jail inmate “Mrs. Mamie Elder,” “a woman of the streets” became
so “gorged with the fruit that Elder’s husband had brought to the jail” that
“they grew sick.” The women thought that the bananas might have been poisoned
but the county physician, who attended the women, said nothing indicated
poison. The doctor’s opinion was that the “two women having too little exercise
were made sick from over eating.”
Chapter Thirty
The Murder Trial of Joe Sullivan Commences
During all of February, 1908, Joe
Sullivan was held in solitary confinement at the state penitentiary while
waiting for his trial although he “changed cell during the day and night” in
order to prevent him planning ways of escape.
The murder trial of the accused Joe
Sullivan began on Monday March 9 in the Third District Court of Judge George G.
Armstrong. Frederick Loofbourow, the District Attorney for the Third Judicial
District and County Attorney Willard Hanson represented the state while the law
firm of Bailey and Vickery acted as the defense team pro bono. The star witness
for the prosecution was John Owen.
The Defense would argue that Joe
Sullivan had left the city before the robbery took place while the Prosecution
tried to prove that Sullivan had not. The trial lasted fifteen days with only
Sunday being when the Court not in session.
During the entire time of the
trial, the court was packed with reporters and spectators; among them was a
“group of figures clad in black.” They were Mrs. Charles S Ford and her two
daughters,” who attended throughout most of the trial. The widow fainted after
her husband’s “blood stained clothes were introduced as evidence” and she had
to be carried out of the court room, “past the jury box” and made rare
appearances after that. However Ford’s daughters remained in the courtroom for
most of the trial.
Only one person among the
spectators was present “every day during the trial,” an unknown young woman.
The young woman’s appearance in court was so regular that “even Sullivan
noticed her but found no opportunity to speak to her.” There was much curiosity
by reporters “concerning her interest in the desperado.” “It was the general
opinion that she was some sentimental young person who had endowed Sullivan
with imaginary qualities of heart and head and that then had fallen in love
with the creature of her imagination.”
The state presented witnesses
including the Portland police officer, James Anderson, whose “expenses in Salt
Lake and his return” were “guaranteed by Salt Lake Authorities.”
Deputy
Sheriff Axel H Steel testified he saw Sullivan and Owen together in the Jubilee
Saloon at 15 or 10 minutes before midnight.
The two witnesses who were present
during the Saloon robbery, Andrew Buckley and George Costello were also called
to testify. Buckley was the saloon bartender and Costello said he was a miner
who lived at the Albany hotel. In differencing newspapers, Costello’s first
name was given as either “Warren” or “Walter.”
The gist of their testimony only varied slightly. Costello “swore that the darker man of the two, upon entering the saloon, first rifled the cash register then went through Buckley’s pockets and returned to the register.” Andrew Buckley was equally positive that he was searched by the man standing outside the counter while the cash register was being robbed. Costello recalled the handkerchiefs worn by the bandits as “dirty white ones” while Buckley had said they were blue and red.
Andrew Buckley’s was a credible
witness who placed Sullivan in the saloon. The defense tried to discredit him
by asking whether Buckley had ever been accused of robbing “an old man” named
Mike Glenn. That line of questioning was ruled irrelevant by Judge Armstrong.
When Jim McGivern, the Continental
Saloon Bartender, was called to the witness stand, he was the only one of the
prosecuting attorney’s witnesses who gave testimony “favorable” to Sullivan.”
McGivern said that while he served drinks and cigars to the accused when he was
with Garcia, however he did hear Sullivan tell Garcia that “he was in a hurry
to catch a train on which to leave Salt Lake.”
On Wednesday March 18, Sadie
Belcher was in court to testify for the prosecution. Her appearance in the
court room however may have swayed the jurors as much as any of her
inconsistent testimony. A reporter commented “Although Mrs. Belcher had been
confined in the county jail since January; she looked like a fashion model. She
was wearing a cream colored satin opera coat with large pearl button. Her shirt
waist was of white and her skirt a light colored cloth.”
During the March trial, when Sadie
Belcher was “compelled to testify,” she provided the strongest testimony
brought against Sullivan. She told a story “full of darkness of the night
world” and “gave damaging testimony” when she claimed that Garcia and Sullivan
had returned “two hours after they originally left after midnight” refuting
Sullivan’s claim that he had left Salt Lake City before the robbery.
Sadie
Belcher proceeded to give a series of conflicting stories differing in details
from to what she had said at Sullivan’s preliminary trial in January. At the
preliminary hearing she had claimed that Garcia and Sullivan had only been away
ten or fifteen minutes before returning to the rooms in the Kimball House. She
had said originally that after midnight she had never saw Garcia and Sullivan
again but she also contradicted herself by saying Sullivan and Garcia had
returned in the early hours of the morning of December 14.
Additionally Sadie Belcher made a
“startling addition to her original story saying that Doc Gibson was in her
room, with Sullivan, Garcia, and Owen in the old Kimball House that midnight
hour.
When the Defense pointed out the
“discrepancy in her testimonies Sadie Belcher resorted to crying” but
maintained that the events related at the March trial “were accurate.” It was
noted by the Defense as well as reporters that “since her testimony helped
secure the dropping of charges against her husband she had every reason to
perjure herself.”
Actually Sadie Belcher hardly knew
Joe Sullivan, having just met him when her lover Joe Garcia brought him to her
rooms in the early hours of December 14. Therefore she had no reason to protect
Sullivan. Indeed both her husband Tip Belcher and she admitted on the witness
stand that “when pressed, they turned upon Sullivan in the hope of saving
themselves.”
Even as inconsistent as was her
testimony, nevertheless Belcher’s story that Sullivan had returned with Garcia
hours after they initially had left, damaged Sullivan’s claim that he had left
the city after parting ways with Joe Garcia and John Owen before the robbery at
the Albany Saloon.
The most damaging testimony was
given by Harry W. Logan a freight conductor and Brakeman William H Harrison
employees of the Oregon Short Line. Logan said their Ogden bound train was
searched before leaving the Short Line yards by police officers but when
searched no body was found.
However Logan said that he saw
Sullivan board the train at the switch “about a mile outside of the Salt Lake
Yards after the train had left the Salt Lake Station. He said it was after 5:25
a.m.. He then testified that the Freight train arrived in Ogden at about 7:30
and there he saw Sullivan get off his train by the Weber bridge before reaching
the city. He said he saw Sullivan “near enough to lay his hand on him.”
Brakeman Harrison backed up Logan’s account.
The team of Bailey and Vickery had
convicts Richard Deming, John Furey and John “Little Jack” Monroe, taken from
the state penitentiary, to testify on behalf of Joseph Sullivan. Both Furey and
Monroe declared that John Owen had confessed to them that his version of the
hold-up was “to shield himself.”
John Furey also claimed that Owen
had told him that Sullivan had left him and Garcia prior to the robbery at the
Albany Saloon. When cross examined, Furey admitted that he had served five
years in California’s San Quinton Penitentiary under the name John Kelly and
that in the last ten years, 1898 to 1908, he had only seen two years of
freedom.
“Little Jack” Monroe claimed that
Owen was the man who shot Officer Ford and “had expressed fear” to Monroe “that
the police would find the revolver he had hidden after the Ford shooting.
As for Richard Deming, he was
initially brought in to testify for the defense, but the prosecution brought
out that it was he who betrayed Sullivan to authorities when Sullivan was
trying to saw out of the county jail. Deming admitted he lied when he said
Sullivan had traveled to Oregon with him.
Richard Deming then perjured
himself saying that the sheriff office had wanted him to help Sullivan escape
while incarcerated so they could shoot him while trying to flee.
Sheriff Frank Emery was called to
the stand to refute Deming’s allegations. He said Deming was placed in Sullivan
cell to obtain information to the whereabouts of Garcia but nothing further. He
stated that Deming’s “information to Sullivan sawing was all voluntary and was
made because Deming was afraid Sullivan would “bump him off” if he found that
Deming was there to spy on him. When the sheriff was questioned by the Defense,
he admitted that he had left the prisoners in the cell with saws without
removing them due to neglect.
A man named George Homer Jepson was
called to testified for the defense regarding the Belcher’s statements’ Jepson
claimed that Tip Belcher told him that for his testimony against Sullivan that
he was to be “let off light” by the officers. The prosecution denied the
allegation and through cross examination stated that Jepson was known in town
as “Young Fighting Nelson” and that he had another alias of “George McCann.” It
is possible that Jepson was the same man known as Ed McCann who had once been
part of Furey’s Yeggman gang. He had just been sentenced in February to fifty
days in jail for beating his wife and was arrested under the name George
McCann.
Joseph Sullivan testified in his
own defense and did not waiver from his alibi that he left Salt Lake City
before the robbery. He refuted Harry Logan’s story saying that if he knew the
police was looking for a wanted many why didn’t he seek out authorities that
same day.
When cross examined by District
Attorney Loofbourow Sullivan kept to his story intact even when confronted with
“scathing sarcasm by state prosecutor.” It was noted by reporters that
Loofbourow “failed to rouse the ungovernable temper” of Sullivan’s that “guards
predicted would burst forth” when provoked.
Sullivan stuck to his story “again and again” with the exception of one small detail. Sullivan had confided that he refused to work out at the Murray Smelters because of his “distaste of mixing up with foreign element.” Loofbourow trying to make the case that Sullivan and Garcia had known each other longer than was admitted asked Sullivan why had he agreed to be taken to Garcia’s room to get something to eat before starting on his journey if he had a distaste for a foreign element. Sullivan’s was “Because we would have lunch.”
Sullivan again claimed he went from
Salt Lake to San Francisco. In San Francisco he said his relatives there gave
him $15. When asked who were these relatives, Sullivan flatly refused to
answer. When asked in what part of San Francisco did they live, Sullivan
answered, “ I positively refuse to answer that question.”
On Friday March 20, as that no more
witnesses were called a summation of the proceedings was presented to the
twelve man jury in the afternoon.
Chapter Thirty-One
Closing Arguments
Friday morning, John Bailey brought
into the courtroom his 6 year old son to make an emotional appeal to the
jurors. Comparing his son to Sullivan he remarked that the mother of Sullivan,
“no doubt at the time Sullivan was six years old” also had great ambitions for
him. He spoke of Sullivan’s mother sitting in her home anxiously awaiting the
news of the fate of her son and described “the aged mother” as sitting with her
knitting in her hands, praying that the jury would give her son justice. “She
is not praying for mercy but for justice.”
He then inquired of the jurors if
they had any wayward children who might find themselves in difficulties. Bailey
then said, “I am thankful to God we have married men on this jury who have boys
to think about.”
After the trial resumed from lunch
recess, Salt Lake County Attorney Willard Hanson for the prosecution addressed
the jurists at two o’clock. “Hanson spoke for one hour and a quarter” during
which time he tried to convince the jury that the shooter of Officer Ford could
not have been John Owen as the Defense had argued. He said therefore the
murderer must have been either Sullivan or Garcia. Hanson said that Owen had no
gun when released from the city jail and that even after the robbery Owen was
captured without a gun. “I want it remembered that Garcia asked for Sullivan
before the shooting. He did not ask for Owen. That is a circumstance worth
considering. Why would he have given Sullivan a weapon and not Owen? Why would
Sullivan need a gun any more than Owen?”
Hanson then related how Sullivan
fled Salt Lake. He recalled that Sullivan hid in a box car, suffered from cold
and was emaciated when he reached Portland. He asked, “Do you believe an
innocent man would act that way?”
Hanson summed up his address
saying, “That shot that killed Officer Ford was not fired at him, as a person.
It was shot against organized law and order. It was a shot against me and
against you. Ford with his helmet and badge was merely the target.”
“The blood of Charles S. Ford is
crying to me and to you to do our sworn duty. I want you to have justice and
mercy for the wife and children of Officer Ford in your verdict. If you do
thus, the defendant will pay the penalty of his crime.”
Defense attorney John H. Bailey then
resumed his arguments from the morning and talked for most of the afternoon. He
commenced a passionate plea for the life of Sullivan. He referred to Sullivan
as the “Nobel youth at my side” although Sullivan was 29 years old and Bailey
not much older at the age of 34.
He said Willard Hanson knows who
fired the shot that killed Officer Ford. “Sullivan was not there. They are
bringing him to trial simply because they caught him.” Bailey placed the blame
for the murder on Joe Garcia and John Owen.
Bailey appealed to the Mormons in
the jury box and referred to many songs that he had sung while in the mission
field. He then proceeded to recite poetry and to read passages from the scriptures,
“especially references to the principles taught in the Mormon Doctrine and
Covenants.”
The attorney then proceeded to
describe the death of the Mormon Prophet Joseph Smith and of Jesus Christ, and
dramatically declared “as the rabble clamored for the death of these men, so
does the rabble today clamor for the death of that innocent man, Joe
Sullivan.” “Dramatically raising his
arms above his head” Bailey “fairly screamed at the jury to remember the martyrdom
of the Mormon Prophet.”
He argued that Sullivan “was a
valuable man, worth 100 acres of such men as John Owen,” and “there is no life
I would rather save then his.” Again Bailey referred to Sullivan as “a noble
young man with the blood of youth still coursing through his veins.” He
inquired, “Would you have the red blood of this strong man upon your hands and
upon your head?” He then shouted, “Do
you wish to go through life with the awful horror of having sent a brother man
to his maker without absolute proof he is guilty?”
Bailey then proceeded to “pass
judgment” on all the prosecution’s witnesses and the evidence against his
client. As to Owen’s testimony, he declared that the man gladly took twenty
years in the penitentiary for robbery to save his neck from the hangman. Mrs.
Belcher, he said, “told a false story for the purpose of saving her husband.” He
had not closed his summation when the court finally adjourned for the evening.
On the first full day of spring, at
ten in the morning, the court bailiff called the court to order. The large
courtroom was crowded as that now the “sensational plea for mercy made by
Bailey had attracted to the building more than could be accommodated.” Those
lucky to get into the room, heard John Bailey for nearly an hour continue the
“most sensational and unique plea that had ever been heard in the courts of
this state.”
When Defense Attorney John H.
Bailey resumed his address to the jury, “it was even more sensational than on
the previous afternoon.” Bailey was very animated. He spoke glowingly of
Sullivan’s intelligence and appearance. He insisted that “He has more brains
than I possess, more brains than any lawyer for the prosecution or the
defense.”
He told the jurors how Sullivan had
“raised that noble head of his while being questioned by the prosecuting attorney.” He continued unabashedly observing that
Sullivan “was better looking than all the lawyers at the trial.”
To dramatically replicate the two
forms of execution required in Utah, hanging and the firing squad, Bailey leapt
upon a chair, and then mounted a table in front of the Jury Box to implore the
jury not to hang the accused. “You are not going to hang this man. He will
live. It is as wrong to accuse him of that murder as to accuse me.”
He declared, “Supposing this table
were a scaffold and I was the man you were trying, could you watch them place a
rough rope where my necktie now rests and slowly strangle the life out of me
just to satisfy the desire of a certain clique among the sheriff’s force in
this city to see me die? That is the condition under which you will convict
this man at my feet if you vote guilty.” He then implored the jurist not to
place a rope around the neck of Sullivan where there was a necktie he had given
Sullivan to wear.
“Descending from his perch,” Bailey
seized then the revolver taken from Sullivan which had been placed in evidence.
He beseeched the jurors not to “point the weapon at the heart of an innocent
man.” If it takes my last dollar, I
shall see that those who thirst for his life do not hang or shoot him.” “There’s
no life I would rather save than his.”
Finally Bailey tried to convince
them to save Sullivan’s life by appealing to their remorse if they did. He
said, “Ah gentlemen my sympathy is with you if you have decided to convict this
man. For the long years of your life, and some of you are still young, you will
have the specter before your vision, this specter of a man you have murdered,
nonetheless murdered, because you are only one of twelve to do it. Don’t do it
gentlemen. Don’t do it, I beg you.”
His voice choked with emotion as he
told of the dark hours that would be brought upon Sullivan’s aged mother if her
only son was killed. After making an earnest plea for the mother of the accuse,
Bailey sat down.
A few minutes before 11 in morning,
Defense Attorney Frank E Vickery took the stand and talked for an hour and a
half. “He left out all sentiment and dwelt upon nothing but the facts.” Vickery
made a “clear and impressive review of the testimony bringing out points
favorable to the defense.” One point he brought up was that the men who
witnessed the robbery did not see a “gray clad suited man” which was the only
clothes Sullivan had at the time. He insisted that John Owen’s testimony was
worthless. “The Belchers and that of other witnesses he also cast aside.”
Vickery criticized the prosecution
for bringing into the court room the blood-stained garments of the dead
policeman. He lifted the vest on the evidence table “displaying the dark red
mark upon the white linen” stating it was “unfair in leaving the bloody clothes
of the murdered man in plain sight of the jury.”
One of the jurists, Samuel Oldham,
was so moved, he sobbed for several minutes. Judge Armstrong called for a
recess for the man to compose himself.
Returning to his summation, Vickery
picked up the bullet taken from the dead officer and dropped it down the barrel
of the gun. “It was too small and dropped out as the gun turned upside down.”
He was proving that the weapon Sullivan had on him when arrested could not have
fired the lethal shot.
Vickery also mentioned Sullivan’s
mother, describing her as a “little gray haired woman waiting for her son’s
return.” Upon the mention of his mother a reporter wrote that the “softest
light and expression” momentarily was found on Sullivan’s face.
At 12:30 in the afternoon, Vickery
finished his address and declared there was more than a reasonable doubt of
Sullivan’s guilt and demanded a verdict of acquittal.
Because the government had the
burden of proof, as lawyer for prosecution, District Attorney Frederick Loofbourow
was then entitled to make a concluding argument, sometimes called a rebuttal.
This is a chance to respond to the defendant’s points and make one final appeal
to the jury.
After a recess for lunch,
Loofbourow, began the final address for the prosecution at 2 in the afternoon.
He admitted “I start with the assertion that the prosecution does not know who
fired the shot but as far as the defendant is concerned it makes no difference.
All are equally guilty. All act together.”
Loofbourow then defined murder in
the first degree and murder in the second degree for the jurors. He insisted
that “a man who engages in the commission of a crime with another who, while in
the act or while escaping commits a murder, is guilty of murder in the first
degree.”
The District Attorney conceded that
some of the witnesses for the prosecution, “like some for the Defense,” were
convicts or “persons of evil lives.” Tip Belcher he classed as a criminal
having had served terms in penitentiaries and was now in jail. James McGivern,
Loofbourow said was a “fence” for the burglars at the Kimball house and the
reason for his favorable testimony was that “his natural impulse would to be to
shield Sullivan” as “convicts are vindictive.”
Referring to Richard Deming, the
District attorney said he was trying to curry favor with Sheriff Emery when he
“was induced, through self-interest, to tell of Sullivan’s attempt to escape
from the county jail.” He claimed convicts Furey and Munroe’s words were unreliable as they probably “helped raise
the money used in defraying the expense of his defense.”
Loofbourow told the jury that
although Sadie Belcher “was a guilty woman with Joe Garcia” for having “illicit relations” with the criminal,
her first impulse should have been to shield him. However instead she
incriminated him with being with Sullivan after the murder of Officer Ford.
“Mrs. Belcher and Conductor Logan
and Brakeman Harrison of the Oregon Short Line left no doubt” that Sullivan was
in Salt Lake and had “testified falsely that he walked from the city before the
crime was committed.
Loofbourow closed his summation
declaring the state’s prosecutions was not directed against the man, Sullivan;
but against the criminal Sullivan. He observed solemnly “Crime cannot be
prevented unless everyman does his duty” asking that the jury return with a
guilty verdict.
Judge George Armstrong before
recessing the jurors, commented that “When a man is being tried for his life on
circumstantial evidence each link in the chain of evidence must be proved.
Concerning the latter of an alibi, if there was any doubt that a man was in a
certain place, the man must be given the benefit of such doubt. Sullivan’s past
life should not influence the jury in bringing in a verdict. His past should
only be considered so far as it affected his credibility as a witness.”
He also reiterates with what
Sullivan was being charged. “Murder in the first degree was the slaying of a
human, being with premedication. Murder in the second degree was the killing if
a man without justification but without premeditation. If Sullivan was one of
the men who held up the Albany Saloon and was present when Policeman Ford was
shot his participation in the crime took the place of premeditation under the
law. Under the law of Utah the penalty for murder in the first degree is death
but the jury could recommend imprisonment for life.”
Chapter Thirty-Two
The Jurors Deliberate
After the jury went into
deliberation at 4:30 in the afternoon, Sullivan reportedly said to his defense
team, “The jury is out. The situation as it now stands reminds me of a game of
poker. I have been dealt cards but have not yet drawn to my hand to see how I
stand in the matter of winning the stake. A man may win and a man may lose. And
it all depends upon the twelve men who have just gone out. No man on earth
could guess what they will do.”
Sullivan sat for nearly an hour in
Judge Armstrong’s court. He lit a cigarette and smoked quickly and nervously.
When it was apparent that the jury would not report for some time, Sullivan was
taken from the court room to the County Attorney Willard Hanson’s office “until
he might be wanted in the court room again.”
Before he walked out, someone gave
Sullivan a “beautiful red rose with a long stem” which he took politely. The
rose was probably a gift from the unnamed young woman. Then “as soon as he
could without offense,” Sullivan laid the flower aside, placing it on the court
table where he had been sitting and “signed wearily.” It was noted that when
Sullivan walked out of the court room “he left the rose where he had dropped
it.”
Sullivan waited in County Attorney
Willard Hanson’s office, guarded by four sheriff deputies and when it was
realized that no verdict had been decided he was returned to the Sugar House
penitentiary.
The jury, unable to agree on a
verdict with two men swaying towards acquittal, after midnight were taken to
the Kenyon Hotel to be locked up for the night after having considered
the case for seven hours. They would take 48 hours in all to come up with a
verdict.
Chapter Thirty-Three
The Attack on Nick Prusessing
When Sullivan and Deming were
locked up in the county jail in January awaiting trial, they were punished for
trying to escape by sawing through some steel bars. A German named Nicholas
“Nick” Pruessing alias Martin Brown was also in the county jail as an inmate
and a trusty. For some reason Sullivan concluded that it was Pruessing who had
snitched on him regarding his plans to escape jail and he then had “made up his
mind to kill him if ever he had the opportunity.
The opportunity came nearly two months
later on March 22, after Pruessing was taken to the penitentiary. He had his
trial for forgery and was sentenced to three years in prison. As soon as he was
seen by Sullivan at the prison, he told the forger, “he would get him.”
Sullivan made a “murderous attack”
upon Pruessing assisted by Richard Deming. When the bell in the second grade
cell house was rung, as the signal for the prisoners to go from their cells to
the wash room, Sullivan “was laying for him.” As Pruessing entered the wash
room, Sullivan attacked.
Sullivan had secured a knife and he
struck Pruessing “cutting him beneath his chin but not making a serious wound.”
Pruessing screamed and Deming, who was with Sullivan, made a “vicious lunge” at
him, “striking him in the mouth” and “knocking out a tooth or two.”
Pruessing, being the larger man,
fought off Sullivan and Deming and managed to break away. He ran towards a
guard at the end of the prison corridor as other guards “came to the rescue.”
While Pruessing’s injuries were painful “they were not serious,” meaning life
threatening.
The “murderous convicts” were
overpowered and locked in their cells until they were brought before Warden
Arthur Pratt. When the warden asked why did they attack Pruessing, Deming
remained silent, but Sullivan responded saying, “I had trouble with him in
jail. I know my act will count against me, but I lost my head.”
Most likely Deming’s support of
Sullivan in the attack on Pruessing was to show his loyalty to Sullivan after
Sheriff Emery’s testimony in the Third District court room claimed that it was
Deming had “squealed on Sullivan’s January escape attempt.”
Both Sullivan and Deming were
returned to solitary conferment for several days. However the attack reiterated
the views of the prison guards that Sullivan was a dangerous man. A reporter
added, “The attack of Sullivan shows the viciousness of the convict, as does
the act of Deming. Both convicts are of the desperate class, and they add two
more to the most vicious, murderous lot of convicts that are confined in the
penitentiary in the United States.”
Chapter Thirty-Four
The Verdict
On Monday March 23, an all-male
jury found Joe Sullivan guilty of first degree murder but recommended, instead
of capital punishment, that he be imprisoned at “hard labor in the state prison
for life”. Judge George Armstrong could have, “if he saw fit,” sentenced
Sullivan to death. He was under no obligation to follow the jurors’
recommendation but agreed to impose the jury’s recommendation..
His attorney John H. Bailey, after
hearing the verdict, left the courtroom, and “took a long walk out to Ensign
Peak to think over the case and to place his future movements.”
After Sullivan’s trial concluded
the Belchers were released from jail. “Tip” Belcher had “gained immunity from
prosecution in exchange for his testimony and cooperation with the police.”
Sometime later the couple left Utah for good. Sadie Belcher relocated to Boise,
Idaho where she was residing when she received the news that Joe Garcia had
been shot.
On Thursday April 9, Joseph Sullivan
was returned to Judge George Armstrong’s court to hear his sentence. Judge
Armstrong sentenced Sullivan to life in prison at hard labor.
While it must have been a relief
that he was not sentenced to be executed in front of a firing squad or hung, a
reporter remarked on Sullivan’s probable state of mind. “A return to prison
will be little less terrible than execution to Sullivan. For five years he
defied the rules of the penitentiary and rebelled against the authority of the
guards.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
Back to Prison
When
Joe Sullivan returned to the Sugar House Penitentiary in April 1908 there were
272 prisoners locked up in the prison with only 238 cells available. “Constant
watchfulness” was “necessary to prevent hatching up plots.”
The state prison had three grades
for the housing of convicts. Upon arrival in prison, an inmate was placed in
“second grade” where he would remain for several months, “pending an
investigation of character and behavior.” From there a person could advance to
“first grade,” if orderly, and given more privileges. However the unruly and
desperate were placed in the “third grade” which meant solitary confinement.
Sullivan was considered “unruly.”
Prison Officials, who learned of
Sullivan being returned to serve out his sentence in Sugar House “believed that
when he returns that he will be more reckless and dangerous than before.”
The fate of John Owen, “the convict
informer” and Richard Deming was also of concern to prison officials. The two
convicts “would be in the penitentiary with Sullivan for years” It was believed
by “those who understand his malignant nature” that “he hates them with all the
bitterness of his criminal heart.” Prison guards believed that Sullivan “will
seize the first opportunity to kill both Owen and Deming.”
For the attack on Nicholas
Pruessing, Sullivan and Deming were placed in solitary confinement until
September, 1908. Solitary confinement consisted of a “solid chilled steel
cell,” “five feet wide and seven feet long” furnished with a narrow bed, a
small chair, and a stand on which to place items. Sullivan was allowed a “limited number of pictures and
books but never visitors. He saw no other convict, not even his next door
neighbor.
The exception for human contact was
for a guard making his rounds. Sullivan was shaved inside his cells by guards
and was only allowed out of his cell occasionally to bathe. His clothes
consisted of a “prison stripped coat, shirt, underwear, pants, and cap.
Meals were passed to him through
bars and the only light in his cell was from an electric bulb. Hour after hour
he heard no sound. A person in solitary confinement “had no work to do” and
could only “read, write, think, sleep’ and “walk up and down his seven foot
cell.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Joe Garcia Shot in Seattle
When Joe Sullivan was captured in
Portland, it was speculated that he was there in Oregon to meet up with Joe
Garcia. Garcia was in Portland when Sullivan was captured but whether the two
had made plans to rendezvous there was speculative.
By accepting John Owen’s confession
and the Belcher’s statements, the police came to believe in a variety of
scenarios that placed Garcia and Sullivan as partners. One was that Garcia
immediately conference with Sullivan and decided to flee Salt Lake City. “It
was planned that they should leave separately not to attract attention, if
possible, and make their way to Seattle or Portland, and rejoin each other.”
To explain why Garcia and Sullivan
were not captured together, Thomas Pitt, Salt Lake City’s Chief of Police, who
had never actually met Garcia, reportedly said “Garcia is a cunning fellow. He
is not the set to take desperate chances. His movements are directed by a
crafty mind. He is wholly unlike Sullivan and the two could not long work
together.”
Garcia had been in Oregon, as he
had burglarized the home a Portland minister and afterwards went to Seattle,
Washington, supporting himself by a “series of burglaries, holdups and porch
climbing thefts covering a period of two months.” He was said to have kept to
himself as he had in Salt Lake City.
The Utah authorities, determined to
link Sullivan and Garcia together, claimed that in Seattle, Garcia kept himself
informed “as to the disposition of Sullivan’s case.” “He appeared as well
informed about Sullivan as any of the authorities, showing that his interest’s
in his pal’s fate was all-absorbing.”
It was more likely that Joe Garcia
was in communication with his longtime friend and associate, Tip Belcher,
rather than with Sullivan who he had barely met in December. Sometime after the
March trial was over, Garcia had written to Tip Belcher asking for a portion of
the money which he thought Belcher had “fenced” from jewels Garcia had heisted.
Tip Belcher came to Seattle,
probably from Boise, Idaho in April. In Seattle he and Garcia quarreled and
fearing that “the desperado would kill him,” Belcher said he wired Sheriff C.
Frank Emery that he knew the whereabouts of the outlaw. The real reason why he
contacted Salt Lake law officers was probably for the $500 reward as that
Garcia was wanted “dead or alive”.
When Salt Lake Sherriff Frank Emery
arrived in Seattle, on Monday May 4, Tip Belcher told him to “shoot Garcia on
sight as he would not hesitate to add further to his list of murders”.
Sheriff Emery spent three days in
Washington, meeting with Seattle law enforcement and planning Garcia’s capture.
When Belcher finally managed to make contact with again with Garcia, he
contacted Sheriff Emery.
On Thursday May 7, Belcher induced
Garcia to leave their room and walk to a corner at Pike Place and First Avenue
where a trap was laid for him. There several police officers and detectives
were stationed.
At dusk, Garcia, wearing the
clothes of the Portland minister whose house he had robbed, walked down the
street accompanied by Belcher. When he recognized Sheriff Emery, Garcia
“whipped out two revolvers from his pocket.” He did not have a chance to fire
his weapons, before being shot; three times by the six shots fired by Seattle
law officers. The “desperate gun fight” was in a “busy thoroughfare with the
streets full of people in the heart of the city. “The street was crowded with
passerbys and it is remarkable that someone was not killed.”
After being shot Garcia “sank to
the ground cursing and groaning in pain.”
He was taken to the emergency hospital
where he “hung on for a week” part of the time unconscious and delirious.
Garcia made a “brave struggle for his life and showed marvelous pluck” but
peritonitis developed from his wounds.
“A few hours before he died, he was
living over, in his deliriums, his escape from Salt Lake City, beating his way
by riding brake beams and rods and blind baggage and the like.”
In his lucid moments Garcia
confessed to a score of thefts and burglaries but “told nothing of his past
life” and gave no information about his family. “I want to spare my mother” was
his excuse for not letting authorities know that his true identity was Cuaz
Cordova. “Garcia declined to talk much about himself consequently the story of
his life, a carnival of crime, will go to the grave.”
In Boise, Idaho, Sadie Belcher upon
hearing the news that Garcia was wounded in a shootout sent a telegram to the
Seattle Chief of Police asking about his condition. The telegram was delivered
to Garcia by the Police Department’s Chief of Receipt. He told reporters “ the
Belcher woman’s telegram appeared to brighten Garcia up and sent a flush to his
cheeks. He received no letter from the woman of who, he was enamored that I
know of though.”
However, another reporter stated
that Garcia received a letter. “With death but a few hours away, a letter came
to Garcia from his sweetheart, Sadie Belcher, of Boise Idaho wife of “Tip”
Belcher the man who is believed to have betrayed the Mexican bandit to the
police authorities. The dying man’s pallid face brightened up as the missive
was read to him by a nurse. His eyes were kindled with a strange feverish light
and he listened intently to every word. When the letter had been read to him
Garcia signed audibly, his tense muscle relaxed and shortly afterwards lapsed
into unconsciousness. Death came within two hours afterwards.”
Garcia died on Tuesday May 12, and
his body was presumed, if unclaimed, turned over to the states University of
Washington for dissection by medical students.
The Stool Pigeon,” who betrayed Joe
Garcia, was never identified by Utah, but there was little doubt that it was
“Tip” Belcher. In Seattle, he had been pressed for money having spent nearly
four months in the Salt Lake County jail without an income.
After Garcia’s death, Sheriff Emery
returned to Salt Lake City from Seattle by way of the Oregon Short Line. He had
been by Garcia’s hospital bed for much of the time. He had gleaned from the
desperado few details of the robbery and killing of Officer Ford during
Garcia’s lucid intervals before death. Most disappointedly Garcia refused to
place the blame for who fired “the fatal shot” that killed Officer Ford
“removing the last chance of any further light on the circumstances attending
the death of Ford.”
The Sheriff however was convinced
that Garcia “made a tacit confession by saying “Sullivan got life but I guess
they’ll hang me if I live.” However his statement could have simply meant that
as a nonwhite he was more likely to get the death penalty.
John Owen’s “confession” stated
that Joe Garcia was involved in the robbery of the Albany Saloon and therefore
was with Sullivan when one of them fired the shot that killed Officer Ford.
This became the official version of the robbery of the Albany Saloon even
though both of the holdup men, according to the barkeep Andrew Buckley, spoke
English. He also said neither of the highwaymen resembled Garcia. Buckley said,
“I did not see a third man and saw no one who looked like a foreigner.” In fact
Garcia was not even known to law officials until the “confession” of Owens as
that Garcia kept a low profile.
Buckley felt that Garcia did not
have anything to do with the robbery and that the police had permitted the
actual murderer of Officer Ford, John Owen, to “slip through their fingers” by
letting Owen plead guilty to burglary. Buckley was adamant that there was no
“look out” as Owen claimed that he was.
The
highway men who robbed the Albany Saloon were of different heights according to
Buckley, as were Sullivan and Owen, while Garcia and Sullivan were basically
equal in height.
The two revolvers Garcia had
carried when he was shot were brought back to Salt Lake City. One pistol was
the same .38 caliber as the one which fired the bullet that “ended the brave
patrolman’s life”. However .38 caliber revolvers were extremely popular for
years.
Upon news of Garcia’s death
reaching Salt Lake City, one reporter wrote, “Now that he has collected the
wages of his sins, the Salt Lake taxpayer is entitled to a sigh of relief.
There will be no long trial for Garcia, no pettifogging by attorneys, no cheap
display of claptrap sentiment, no raving and ranting for the benefit of weak
counsel, limber-kneed, spineless jurors. The man will not be an expense to the
county, a burden to the state or a source of constant anxiety to prison
officials. He is dead and the city and state are the better for the miserable
ending of his misspent life.”
Chapter Thirty-Seven
The Belchers Leave Utah
Five months after the death of
Police Officer Charles S Ford, who was shot across the street from the Albany
Saloon on west second South, the three men implicated in his murder had all
been punished. John Owen was sent to prison for twenty years, Joseph Sullivan
was given life at hard labor, and Joe Garcia was dead, shot down in the streets
of Seattle, Washington.
The Belchers had left the state
after the charges against Tip Belcher were dismissed in recognition for his
corroboration with the prosecution. In April and May, 1908 Tip Belcher was in
Seattle Washington betraying his “lifelong friend”, and his wife’s lover, Joe Garcia
for the $500 reward offered by Utah.
Sadie Belcher was residing in Boise
Idaho when she learned of Garcia having been shot. After the death of Garcia,
it was believed in Utah that Tip Belcher had moved back to Colorado “where he
had served time for various offenses.” However newspaper accounts showed that
Tip Belcher was in Spokane, Washington in August 1908 using an alias leading a
life of crime again. Spokane was nearly 370 miles north of Boise, Idaho.
An old man riding a street car in
Spokane, coming home from the Barnum and Bailey Circus, had his pocket picked
by two men in August 1908. As the men jumped from the street car they were seen
by a police officer who arrested the thieves. The pair gave their names as
“C.M. McKay” and “John Kent.” McKay gave his age as 22 years and that he was a
“window dresser” from Ohio. However C.M. McKay was later identified as Tip
Belcher.
No information was given to why Tip
Belcher had resorted to being a pickpocket after having received $500 in May
and what he was doing in Spokane. Belcher alias “C.M McKay” appeared in a
Spokane courtroom on November 11 along with John Kent where they pled guilty.
They both were sentenced to one year in the county jail.
On November 12, under the alias of
McKay, Belcher was convicted in a Spokane Court. He was sentenced on November
20 to one year in Spokane County jail. On 21 November 1908, The Spokane
Chronicle Newspaper identified McKay as Belcher. ““George Belcher that is the
real name of a young man arrested in the act of slipping a purse from an old
man’s pocket at a circus last summer and later sentenced to one year in the
Spokane county jail for larceny from that person.
“Belcher well known in his home
town of Denver, Colorado as “Tip” Belcher is claimed, in a letter received from
H. Armstrong chief of the Metropolitan police department of Colorado, to have
been a criminal practically all his life. He is the son of one of Denver’s
prominent citizens, who is now dead. Yet he has served time on various offenses
at that place. Chief of Police Rice has been referred to Salt Lake City, Utah
where it is said a long criminal record is held against Belcher alias McKay.”
In 1908 Tip Belcher was identified
as a member of a gang lead by a man known as “Montana Red” alias G.W. Hart,
George Smith, G.W. Welsh and Red Hart. Under the name of either Tulby or Tully,
Montana Red was caught in Salt Lake City in connection to a series of burglary
and had been sentenced to a term in the Utah penitentiary. An article on
Montana Red stated “About the time a man named Garcia was killed in Seattle,
Montana Red was taken in custody by the police but could not be connected with
any crimes perpetrated there, ordered out of town. After he was released it was
learned that Garcia was his partner. Montana Red and Frank Harris associated
with Garcia are considered two of the most expert porch climbers in the west
today.”
After Tip Belcher’s arrest in
August, 1908 Sadie Belcher moved to Seattle Washington with a “quartette of
criminals”. After she relocated to Seattle, Sadie Belcher began using the
pseudonym “May Williams” and continued a “fencing operation” for four “good thieves.”
Before moving to Seattle Sadie
Belcher may have been in Spokane where Tip Belcher was in jail waiting to
appear in court. A 25 September 1908 article in the Spokane Press, it mentioned
“A Japanese who game the name of Charles Toga and a white woman named May
Williams were arrested in a lodging house at the corner of Front and Wall last
night by Patrolman Shannon and Bush. They were charged with vagrancy.”
Shortly after Tip Belcher was
sentenced to one year in the Spokane county jail, Sadie Belcher was arrested by
Seattle police detectives on November 23. The Seattle Star newspaper on 25
November 1908 featured an article on her arrest with the headline “WOMAN IS
LEADER OF THIEVES.”
“Sadie Belcher, friend and advisor
of Joseph Garcia Cordova, highway man and murderer, who was shot to death by
police detectives at the corner of Pike Street and First Avenue on the night of
May 6 this year was released from the city jail last night and ordered to leave
the city immediately.”
“It was rumored that the woman was
in Seattle to revenge the murder of her lover, Cordova, but acts brought to
light today tend to reveal that she was here for a far different purpose.”
“For the past four months Sadie
Belcher under the name May Williams has been stopping at the Davenport Hotel,
Third Avenue South and Washington Street and her apartments have been the
rendezvous for four “good thieves who have been operating unchecked.”
“Police detective have been aware
that the Belcher woman was in the city and were satisfied that she was the
instigator of a series of burglaries which have baffled the police for the past
three or four months.”
“From investigations by police detectives
it has been ascertained that one of the four thieves was a “prowler” of the
first water and that he was the nervy thief who has been looting apartment
houses time after time.”
“When arrested two nights ago by
City Detectives Peterson and McClurg, Sadie Belcher was taken to the police
station, but she successfully parried the searching questions put to her by a
half-dozen detectives. She refused to tell her business in Seattle and made no
admission which warranted holding her longer.”
“The Belcher woman according to
information in the hands of the police gathered the quartette of criminals and
came to Seattle to raise sufficient finds to secure the release of Tip Belcher
and one Bennett from the state penitentiary to which institutions they were
sentenced for four and six years respectively some months ago.”
“Guided by the woman, the gang
carried on the wholesale looting of apartment houses and stores although the
woman never actually engaged in the thievery herself. One member of the gang,
the apartment house thief, stayed in Seattle and prowled about while three of
the gang visited small towns in the vicinity of Seattle and brought their booty
into the city to be deposed of at the “fences” and second hand stores. These
facts were in possession of the police detectives for several days prior to the
arrest of Sadie Belcher, but so cleverly did the criminals hide their tracks
that the officers were never able to catch the gang.”
“When Sadie Belcher was released
two nights ago the criminals under her direction left the city quietly but with
a great deal of haste and it Is believed that they will not return.”
“Since their departure it has been
learned that at least two of their number are known to the police but prior to
Sadie Belcher’s arrest the police did not realize that they we e engaged in
thievery.”
After this article, Sadie Belcher
disappears from history. She may have gone under another assumed name. It is
doubtful she would have given up her criminal career in which she was able to
control and manipulate men. She is not associated with Tip Belcher again
although he did at times use Williams as an alias.
The Salt Lake Tribune which carried
the Seattle article added “Sadie Belcher is well known in Salt Lake where she
was reputed to be the consort of Garcia prior to the killing of Officer Ford
December 14, 1907 for which Joe Sullivan is now serving a life sentence in the
Utah State penitentiary, while Garcia is pal was killed while resisting
arrest.”
No further information has been
located on Tip Belcher or Sadie Belcher until February 1917 when “Tip” Belcher,
“said by the police to be a notorious crook,” was arrested in Denver. Belcher
was using the alias “Williams” when he shot and fatally wounded 35 year old
Charles Russell. The two men were engaged in a “revolver duel’ in front of a
hotel at 1110 Nineteenth Street in Denver.
The trouble between the two men
“started the previous fall of 1916 at Clifton Colorado in a peach and Apple
orchard over some pay for work that Belcher had performed.” Russell in his
incoherent statement as he was dying “brought in the name of a woman who also
caused friction between the pair.” Russell died at the county hospital hours
later.
Belcher was convicted and placed in
a “murderer’s cell” but by 1923 he was released as that he arrested again in
Denver. He was convicted of being a member of Denver’s “million dollar bunko
scheme” and sentenced to serve “seven to ten years.”
The last known record of Tip
Belcher was his being arrested in May 1940 in Kansas City, Kansas. He had been
involved in a June 1939 “alleged horse race betting swindle of $20,000” in
Iowa. Belcher was arrested on a fugitive warrant that charged Belcher with the
illegal transportation of $20,000 in cash from Sioux City, Iowa to St. Paul,
Minnesota.
Belcher was a sick man when he was
brought to Sioux City and was placed in a hospital where his condition was
described as “serious.” Hospital physicians said he was suffering from “chronic
heart disease, coupled with dropsy and high blood pressure. Dropsy was an old
fashioned term meaning retaining an excess of water in the body.
In June 1940, Belcher was brought
to the Sioux City, Iowa court house in a wheel chair but he walked into the
court room. He was accused of swindling two men out of $20,000 in a horse race
betting scheme. He was tried and convicted of having committed larceny and was
sentenced to the Iowa State Men’s Penitentiary at Fort Madison, in Iowa for 5
years.
Prison admitting records stated
that he was 58 years old, five feet and eight and half inches tall, 150 pounds,
with dark blue eyes. He only had a fifth grade education was considered
“intemperate,” meaning usually self-indulgent especially with alcohol. He also
said he had no particular religion.
Tip Belcher was only in the Iowa
prison from a little more than a month, from 15 June 1940 to 16 July 1940, when
he died of heart failure, complicated also by kidney failure and syphilis. He
died in the prison hospital and his death certificate informant was the Iowa
State Penitentiary. He was buried in the Oakland Cemetery at Fort Madison.
PART THREE
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Richard Deming in Prison
After Joseph Sullivan was sent to
prison for his role in the killing of Officer Ford, his associate, Richard
Deming, who had already been sentenced to ten years in prison for robbery, had
additional charges of perjury and destruction of county property filed against
him. The perjury charge was for suggesting that Sheriff Emery had Deming assist
Sullivan in a jail break so Sullivan could be shot escaping. The destruction of
property was for participating in the sawing nearly through of the jailhouse
bars.
Sullivan and Deming for their
attack on Nick Pruessing, stayed in solitary confinement until the first of
September 1908 when they were released and put to work again with the other
prisoners. For a time Deming “put on his best airs but it was only to look for
opportunities for further deviltry.”
Deming declared to the warden that “he was fully intending to
reform and behave himself like a model prisoner and was so emphatic in his
declarations that the warden trusted him.” Warden Arthur Pratt in releasing
Sullivan and Deming “intended to treat the convict like a man and give him a
chance to show if there was anything of a man left in him.”
While Utah’s Governor Cutler was
with the Board of Pardons at the prison Deming requested to see him. Deming had
lost his false upper teeth in his escape from the hospital the previous
December and wanted to tell of his “digestive troubles due to his lack of
chewing gear.” The governor’s “feelings were touched by the man’s tale”
and said if Deming “behaved himself he
would give him $5 with which to buy a new set of teeth and left the money with
the warden.”
Deming had no intentions of
behaving himself because he was planning an escape. Deming was to be sentenced
in September for his perjury conviction and devised a scheme where he would
name Joe Sullivan and another prisoner name Abe Majors as witnesses for the
defense. Deming, as the accused, had the right to summon witnesses in his
defense. The escape plan was for the men to murdering his escort guards on the
way from the prison to the courthouse.
On September 8 Warden Pratt was
given a tip that Deming had a knife and that Deming, Sullivan, and Majors had
“put up a scheme to kill their guards and escape when being taken to court. The
informant had heard Deming boasting of his plans. “As is usual among evil
doers, the tendency to boast of what they purposed doing and their vanity in
fancied self-security, defeated his intentions, so the warden soon found out what
was in prospect.”
On the morning of September 13, it
was confirmed to the warden that Deming indeed had a knife on him and Pratt
decided “it was high time to act.” He ordered prison guards Henry Taggart and
George Cleveland to take Billie clubs and go into where Deming was being
housed, “as though they had no particular errand and seize Deming as soon as
they got along side of him.”
The guards did as they were
instructed and “marching him toward he cell, Deming reached inside his shirt
for the knife which he pulled out but in the scuffle drop to the floor where
Cleveland quickly picked it up.”
“Deming broke away and a cordon of
convicts surrounded him from the officers.”
A prison trustee witnessing the altercation “ summoned by phone”
for help from the warden office and
immediately “three bells were rung from the yard gong” a signal for all
prisoners to return to their cells immediately. “The entire prison obeyed
promptly except Deming.”
Warden Pratt sent all available
prison guards immediately inside the prison armed and he “hurried with the
guards to find Deming had taken refuge at the head of the corridor stairs.” As
the guards rushed their way from that location Deming climbed over the railing
as Guard Taggart “struck him on the head and he dropped to the floor below with
a bad scalp wound.”
As two guards ran down towards him,
other convicts came out of their cells and “gathered around to protect the
desperado.” With the ringing of the gong again, the “prison population
disappeared into their cells, leaving Deming raging around like a mad man.” The
sounding of the gong meant that a prisoner could be shot if found outside of
his cell,
Deming “ran up the second tie
stairs with blood streaming down from his head.” Warden Pratt called for Deming
to come down or he would be shot. “The convict only replied with blasphemy.”
Pratt then told his deputy to shoot
“but at that instant Guard Cleveland, an old soldier from the regular army, had
got behind Deming and gave him a terrible blow on the head from his black jack.
The man came tumbling down the stairs in a heap, a few seconds longer Deming
would have been shot dead.”
Deming recovered his wits in an
instant from being knocked down “and was in for further fighting but “he was
subdued after being beaten into insensibility with a club by one of the guards.
“The officials took him severely in hand and beat him up so that he was quickly
used up and could offer no further resistance.”
The knife taken from Deming was a
thin piece of steel five inches long and nearly two inches wide, tapered off
and sharpened to a needle point. He told the warden that he had another knife
in his cell but the guards were unable to find it. Deming was then led out after being “pacified” and escorted to the
“tombs” where he was left. The tombs were a large concrete cell at the rear of
the prison which the warden had built for men like Deming.
A November newspaper article about
the inmates of the prison wrote “Three of the most troublesome convicts are Joe
Sullivan, Abe Majors, and Richard Deming. Each has to be kept constantly locked
up in solitary confinement.”
Richard Deming was out of the news
after his 1908 incident in the Prison. He had five additional years, for his
perjury and destruction of property charges, added to his ten year sentence.
However he must have eventually adjusted to prison life for a 1910 newspaper
account remarked on him as being a banjo player. “Richard Deming, a convict had demonstrated rare talent in
thrumming the strings of a banjo. His banjo solo given Sunday at the services
of the prison by the Christian Endeavor was excellent.”
The Christian Endeavor group was a
Presbyterian Church prison outreach service organization that held Sunday
services at the prison for the inmates. They were holding service in 1908 at
the prison when Deming had fought with the guards. Seventy-five prisoners who
had been attending church services that day scrambled back to their cells upon
hearing the three alarm bells and the Christian Endeavor officiates were
quickly evacuated.
Richard Deming sentence was up for
termination in 1917 and he was pardoned from prison in July 1917. No more is
known of him. However in 1928 In Los Angeles, California a “Richard Deming” was convicted of burglary but it is unknown
whether he was the same man as the Utah convict.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Abraham Rockwell Majors [1881-1957]
In December 1908 Joe Sullivan made
his last escape attempt with a fellow inmate named Abe Majors who had been also convicted of murdering a police officer. Neither
man actually had murdered anyone.
When
Abe Majors was a two year old child his father, Lloyd Majors was hanged in
California for his alleged role in masterminding a gruesome murder. He was
convicted on the evidence of one of the murderers who received a life sentenced
for his testimony. However, later it came out that his father may have been
innocent. The whole story was a sensation in the Bay Area at the time.
His mother remarried and but kept
the knowledge of who his true father from Abe Majors. His step father deserted
his mother to live with another woman when he was 9 years old. Abe Majors’
mother was then left in “absolute poverty” and subsisted on Christian charities
in Oakland.
Abe Majors’ older brother, Archie
Majors, left home in 1890 at the age of 14 years when his mother divorced.
Archie Majors claimed he left his mother as that she “was a very hard woman to
get along with” and he “did not believe she is mentally competent.” He went to
live with his stepfather who had refused to pay alimony to Abe Majors’ mother or
child support to Abe Majors’ infant half-brothers. Majors’ step father’s
abandonment of his mother left him, as a ten year old child the sole support of
his family and he went to work as a child in Oakland.
In 1894 Abe Majors ran away from
home and went with his older brother to Fresno to work in a vineyard there.
They had walked the entire 180 miles distance. In Fresno, they were “both
industrious boys and did their work well at the vineyard.” However Abe Major’s
mother was distraught over his disappearance and a woman from the Prevention of
Cruelty To Children organization, a Nineteenth Century child protective agency,
located him in Fresno.
In March 1895 Abe Majors, before he
turned 14, was arrested as the only means for him to be returned to his mother.
He told authorities that he was only “trying to earn money to support his
mother” but he was held in the county jail until August when he was convicted
of “vagrancy” and was sent back to Oakland.
While Abe Majors was in jail, he
learned who his real father was and how he was executed for murder. He had
thought he was the son of his stepfather. After confronting the truth from his
mother, he refused to accept the name Majors and left home again in order to
make enough money to leave California. Majors said that when he heard the “fate
of his father he felt there was no use struggling against the reputation” and
that “the shadow of the gallows was across his path and he could not get from
beneath it.” “In his youthful way he was a pronounced fatalist.”
Abe Majors left his mother and
moved in with a neighboring widowed woman named Ella Willmore. She had two
children about his own age, a son Wilbert “Bert” born 1879 and a daughter
Gertrude “Ina” born 1883. Ella Willmore’s husband Simon had died in 1891
leaving her basically penniless and her children fatherless. Bert Willmore had
also gone to work right after his father died in order to support his mother
and sister.
 |
| Bert Willmore |
While Abe Majors lived with the
Willmore family, he and Bert Willmore began burglarizing homes and businesses.
Ella Willmore may have even encouraged her son and Abe Majors to engage in
these burglaries as Abe Majors later confessed that she would use some of the
loot they would bring home. His infatuation with Ina Willmore was also claimed
to have been a reason he became involved in crime, “in order to buy her
presents.”
In three weeks, between January and
February 1896, Majors and Willmore had thirty-four robberies and burglaries to
their names. The two teenagers, besides home robberies, became experts
“safecrackers” using small amounts of dynamite. In fact the crimes committed
were so involved that law agencies were sure that they were up against professionals who had
years of experience.
The youths were caught when they
were discovered out on the street early in the morning and stopped by two
policemen. At first the patrolmen thought they were simply Newsboys but
investigating furthers, they found fuses and burglary tools on the two youths.
The lads were taken to police headquarters where they made a full confession.
The youthful criminals confessed to having “performed all the safe crackings
and store burglaries in Oakland Alameda and Berkeley.”
While Bert Wilmore gave his real
name and said he was 16 years, Abe Majors who looked much older than Bert, used
the name “Ralph Ford” as an alias. When asked why , he said he wanted to spare
his mother the shame of his arrest. Abe Majors’ age was listed in the police
reports as 17 years old when in fact he was still only15 years old.
California newspapers were filled
with stories in February 1896 of the exploits of the youthful burglars and
safecrackers. At first it was assumed that the boys would simply be sent to a
Reform School but instead they were sentenced to ten years in the Folsom State
Penitentiary. Abe Majors and Bert Willmore were youngest convicts in Folsom
prison when they were incarcerated 3 March 1896.
Actually Majors was illegally
sentence to prison. The judge stated that the law permitted those 16 years or
older to be imprisoned and believing Majors was 16, he sentenced him to the
California penitentiary. California state law, However, said those under 16
must be sent to the state reformatory. Majors was 15 when he was sentenced to
prison and would not have turned 16 until that April.
Folsom Prison was officially opened
in 1880 with a capacity of 1,800 inmates. Prisoners spent most of their time in
the dark, behind solid boiler plate doors in stone cells measuring four by
eight feet with six-inch. After the state of California took sole control of
the death penalty in 1891, executions were held at Folsom and San Quentin. The
prison's first hanging occurred on 13 December 1895 just a few months before
the boys were sent there.
While newspapers claimed the pair
was used as “messenger boys” due to their age actually they were put to work in
the general population. Willmore was allowed to work in the electrical shop
while Majors was sent to the quarry that provided granite for the foundation of
the state capitol building and much of the gravel used in the early
construction of California's roads.
Due to the boys’ ages, there were
several attempts to have Majors and Willmore pardoned and finally they were
paroled on Christmas Eve 1898. Majors came out of prison, at the age of 17,
having served two years and ten months for burglary.
Chapter Forty
Abe Majors Arrested in Utah
Leaving
prison, Majors was unable to find work and “became discouraged.” His older
brother Archie Majors, while Abe was in prison, had tried to create a new life
for himself. He went and worked as cowboy in Texas and was able to develop a
skill as a horse veterinarian. When Archie Majors returned to San Francisco, he
met Lena Stone a “Salvation Army” member who he married but then later deserted
unable to support her or his baby.
Abe Majors having met up with his
older brother tried to make a new start away from California. They left San
Francisco and went to Portland and then to Seattle but finding no work there
decided to head east.
As part of his parole, Abe Majors
was to report to his parole officer once a month however in April 1899, he had
failed to do so as that he and his brother were making their way west towards
Salt Lake City. The brothers had exhausted what funds they had in Box Elder
County and Majors stated it was either “beg, steal, or starve.” Majors said he
and his brother were too proud to beg.
On the night of April 29 the
brothers robbed a traveling salesman outside of Brigham City for food. They
also stole his watch, the man’s shoes, and stockings, all worth about $1.80.
Although the man had been bound up, he managed to untie himself, and reported
the highway robbery to the local Box Elder county sheriff
Sheriff Herbert Horace Cordon, who
along with his deputy Joseph Thompson, rode out to arrest the so called
“tramps.” On the morning of April 30, a “pitch battle ensued at the Warm
Springs Hotel in Box Elder County. However the Majors brothers managed to
escape into the foothills east of Willard and north of Ogden. The Box Elder
Sheriff then contacted the Ogden police for assistance and a posse of lawmen
from Brigham City and Ogden found the brothers hiding among boulders on a
hillside.
Three law officers of the Utah posse were stationed above the brothers on a hillside, when the brothers were spotted. During the attempted arrest there was a shootout between the posse and the brothers. Police Captain William A Brown of Ogden was recklessly charging ahead of the other two lawmen when the firing of weapons began.
 |
| William A Brown |
“Although there were many shots fired, those
which killed Brown and Archie Majors were only two which took effect.”
Twenty-four year old Archie Majors and 36 year old Captain Brown were shot dead
during the melee.
Archie Majors was shot in the
volley of gunfire from Captain Brown, Sheriff Cordon, and Ogden deputy sheriff
Joseph Belnap. Talking to a reporter later, the Sheriff claimed, “I do not know
who killed the dead bandit, as the three of us fired all within the same two
seconds. We all fired about the same time.” He said was he was “not certain who
fired the fatal shot that ended the life of Archie Majors.”
Although each of the lawmen shooting
had different caliber weapons, no autopsy was done on Archie Majors at the
inquest to determine who killed him.
As to who actually shot Captain
Brown, it was eventually determined to have probably been an accident on the
part of Deputy Belnap, who was the only peace officer carrying a Winchester
rifle. However in the heat of the moment Brown’s death was attributed to Abe
Majors.
According to Sheriff Cordon, “The fellow who
is now alive shot Brown. I saw him do it and am certain of it. Brown dropped a little
after the robber fell.” Others at the scene all claimed to have seen the same.
Only George J Wells, the Constable of Willard, Utah, who had actually witnessed
the shooting through “field glasses” would not adamantly say that Abe Majors
shot Captain Brown. He kept his mouth shut.
The sentiment was that someone had
to pay for the death of Captain Brown and there was only one of the brothers
still living.
Box Elder County Deputy Sheriff
Thompson, ten months later, actually admitted to a relative that “he did not
believe Abe Majors killed Brown.” When he asked why he was still trying to
convict him, Thompson replied said, “Well we have to convict everyone we
arrest, or they would think we were no good. Abe Majors is no good. He ought to
hang for treating Hansen the way he did.” Hansen was the man who the Major
brothers had originally robbed of $1.80.
When testifying at the 1901 Logan
retrial of Majors, General William H. Penrose of the United States Army said
that the guns used by the two Majors brothers were “cavalry revolvers” and that “in
his opinion a ball from such a weapon would not pass clear through the body of
a man the size of Brown.”
He also said, after being shown
Captain Brown’s clothing and notepads that “it was “impossible for a ball from
a .45 caliber Colts” which were the weapons the Majors brothers possessed, “ to
pass through such an amount of material then through the human body.” General
Penrose then “swore positively” that the bullet that passed through the
material came from above Captain Brown and not from below where the brothers
had been hiding.
After being repeatedly fired upon,
Abe Majors surrendered, and as he was being arrested, the 18 year old said,
“Never mind me, see to my brother there.” When it was evident that Archie Majors
was dead, Abe Majors “cried a good deal and talked about his dead brother. He
wanted to “kiss the corpse believing he will never see him again,” as he was
hauled off to the Brigham City jail.
When Abe Majors was arrested he
gave as an alias the name of “James Morgan” and his brother he named George
Morgan. The true identity of the brothers was discovered from photographs,
Archie Morgan had carried of his abandoned wife and son.
When news reached Ogden that
Captain Brown had been killed, the city went “simply wild with excitement” and
“great crowds of people congregated on every street corner.” Captain Brown was
considered “one of the most popular members of the force being absolutely
fearless.” He had just been promoted to the captaincy earlier in the month and
was said to have been the right hand man of the Ogden’s Police Chief.
He was also
the brother- in- law of Frank J Cannon, Utah’s first United States
Senator. “The talk of lynching was furious for a time and had the prisoner been
brought to Ogden” instead of Brigham City, “he might have fared badly.”
A quick trial was held in May 1899
for Abe Majors in Brigham City, who had only been in Utah less than a month and
“didn’t have a friend nearer than California.” A jury found Abe Majors guilty
of murder in the First Degree on May 14, and he was sentenced to be executed on
July 7. His conviction was a foregone conclusion, with one of the jurists,
before the trial even began, having said that Majors should be hung. This
jurist’s prejudicial comments were reasons for his Brigham City trial being
over turned and Majors being retried in Logan.
Majors was allowed to choose his
means of execution, and he chose the
firing squad over being hanged. He had just turned 18 years old in April when
he was sentenced to death.
While Abe Majors was being held in
the Sugar House Prison in Utah waiting his execution, back in Folsom prison, in
June 1899, the man who had been the principle witness “who sent Abe Major’s
father to the gallows was murdered by a fellow inmate”. The dying man
“confessed he had sworn falsely in his testimony against the elder Majors,
which bore out the belief that the father of the boy was hanged for a crime
that he never committed.” Some newspapers actually tried to accuse Abe Majors
of orchestrating the murder from Utah, so incense were people over the death of
Captain Brown.
In California, Bert Willmore, now
known as “the Kid,” was shot and killed by police during a jewelry store
robbery that went awry in October 1899. Bert, according to the Ogden Standard,
had “tried to go straight but fell into his old ways, and was killed in Alameda
County while resisting arrest.”
 |
| Bert Willmore |
Willmore had become a partner in crime with a 40 year old man named C.C. Sullivan who was said to have been like a “father figure” to him while they were inmates together at Folsom. Willmore had even been released from incarceration on the same day as Sullivan. Twenty years old Bert Willmore was wounded on the ground, when he shot in the head by the police officer.
On July 2, Majors’ execution was
stalled while irregularities in his first trial were being appealed. Also there
was an outcry among Utah’s Protestant ministerial groups and women
organizations opposed to the death penalty, especially when applied to an 18
year old young man.
Majors became a “cause célèbre” and
his death sentenced was appealed even to the Utah Supreme Court, citing extreme
prejudice. The court said however the trial was conducted fairly and they
upheld Major’s death sentence. Thus the Board of Pardons refused to commute his
death sentence and his date of execution was moved to 14 August 1900.
When it was learned that a member
of the 1899 Brigham City jury had publicly stated he thought Majors should be
hanged, on July 26 the Board of Pardon postponed the execution. Majors was then
retried in Logan, Utah in September 1901.
Eight of the Logan jurors wanted to
vote to acquit Majors of First Degree Murder but four “hold outs” claimed that
even if Majors had not shot Captain Brown he was still a “bad boy” and needed
to be punished. The jury finally agreed to find Majors guilty of second degree
murder, which spared him from the death penalty. The Jurists had assumed that
Majors would only receive perhaps a sentence of ten years but when Majors was
given life, two thirds of the juries stated they would never have agreed to
convict him if they knew he would have received such a harsh sentence from the
judge.
On 11 October 1901, twenty year old Majors received a life
sentence for the Second Degree Murder of William Brown and he remained locked
up until 1918, much of that time in solitary confinement. During those years,
Joe Sullivan, Richard Deming, and Abe Majors were considered by prison
officials as “the most dangerous inmates in the prison.”
Chapter Forty-One
Majors in Prison
In 1903, two years after Abe Majors
had been returned to Sugar House, he made an escape attempt with six other
“desperate prisoners” who “made a dash for liberty.” The prison break was
considered “one of the boldest jailbreaks in the history of the state” and was
said to have been masterminded by Majors and a fellow inmate named Harry
Waddell.
 |
| Harry Waddell |
Harry Waddell had been arrested in 1901 in Ogden, Utah with three other “tramps” and convicted in February 1902 of burglary. He was sentence to prison for seven years. During his sentencing hearing, Waddell hurled an “iron cuspidor” at one of the witnesses and he was then also charged with assault to commit murder. Three more years were added to his sentence for a total of ten years behind bars.
In July 1902, Waddell was put in
solitary confinement after he was caught sawing through his prison cell bars
assisted by another convict named Frank Dayton called a "desperate thug" who was serving a 12 year prison
sentence.
During the 1903 prison break, Frank Dayton, Harry Waddell’s pal, was shot and killed and four prisoners were wounded, including Abe Majors, Harry Waddell, and 15 year old Edward J Mullin. Two other convicts, who were in prison for murder, however had managed to escape.
Three prison guards were also
wounded in the prison break, one guard being shot, another struck over the
head, and a third severely beaten. Waddell was considered “foremost, on the
assault made upon two inside guards,” and he was badly wounded, “shot in the
thigh” during the attempted escape. Abe
Majors was shot in the wrist.
One convict, who was a trustee, was
severely beaten “while aiding the guard,” and another, who had frustrated the
escape by alerting the prison office, saved himself only by hiding in a cell.
Depending on the reporting, “Majors was the ring leader of the gang and Waddell was his chief
assistant in the well laid plans.” However others reported that Waddell was the mastermind. They both had managed to obtain guns and were the only ones who had revolvers.
After their escape attempt failed Majors and Waddell were placed in solitary confinement for five months until February 1904.
Ten days after the sensational
prison break, Joe Sullivan was incarcerated at the state penitentiary in
October 1903. He certainly would have been made aware of the death of an inmate
for trying to escape. He certainly would have also been made aware of the
character of Abe Majors. Sullivan was in prison with Majors, the first time,
from 1903 until 1907 and again from 1908 until 1918. Joe Sullivan, Richard
Deming, and John Owens were all inmates in the Sugar House prison in 1908.
During the next three years there
were no reports of incidents involving Abe Majors until August 1907. The 26
year old man tried to murder 33 year old Harry Waddell. “The prisoners had been
released from their cells to take their usual morning bath and Abe Majors
instead of going to get a pail of water, waited until the guard’s back was
turned then walked into the cell occupied by Harry Waddell and plunged a keen
blade of a knife several times into the vitals of the defenseless man.” Majors
stabbed Waddell eight times; the most severe injury was a slash on the throat.
Waddell survived the attack and
Majors was transferred to the “Tombs” and placed on bread and water “for making
an assault on a fellow prisoner.” No official explanation was made for the
reason of the attack. The prison guards believed the “cause of the assault was
over a slight difference in a money transaction.” Waddell and Majors had been
making “bridles” during their leisure hours but what may have led up to the
attack is pure speculation.
After the August 1907 attempt on
the life of Harry Waddell, Majors was declared “absolutely unmanageable and
sent to confinement for life.” While in prison, Majors like Joseph Sullivan
“developed reputations as being dangerous inmates.”
In November Joseph Sullivan and Abe
Majors, both convicted as “cop killers” planned another escape from prison. Abe
Majors had been working in the tailor shop and had even made shirts and
trousers out of their blankets to replace their stripped prison clothes.
Sullivan made a key that at one end would fit Sullivan’s cell and the other
Majors’ cell. Their plan was to overpower a guard, take his key to the cell
house, and make their escape along the wires over the prison wall by using a
pulley they had fashioned. Their “desperate plan” was discovered and if they
had actually tried to escape “they would have been shot if they ever left their
cells.”
On December 1, Sullivan, and
Majors, since they were already in solitary confinement were “placed on bread
and water diet by order of State Board of Corrections for having in their cell;
ropes, clubs, clothing made from blankets, and apparatus to be used in an
escape attempt. As an additional punishment,
“no reading material” was allowed in solitary confinement.
On New Year’s Eve 1908, Majors and
Sullivan were transferred to the new North Cell House “where the third grade or worse class of
prisoners” were housed. In January when Richard Deming was tried for destroying
jail property he was “considered the third most dangerous man in the Utah State
prison , the first and second being Abe Majors and Joe Sullivan.”
Eventually Abe Majors was back into
the general population working again in the tailor shop. However “Bad blood”
must have continued between Majors and Waddell. While working in the tailor
shop in August 1911, he gave a 20 year old inmate, named Leonard Markham, a
pair of scissors by which he used to assault Harry Waddell while he was napping
in his cell.
Waddell was stabbed several times,
superficially, in the face by Markham before he was stopped by guards. The
reason for the attack was that “Waddell
is said to possess a disposition that does not take much to incense his fellow
prisoners against him.”
The real reason for the assault was
not known but it was supposed that it was the result of a “long-standing feud
and grudge between Majors and Waddell.” Markham for the attack had twelve years
added to his sentence. In 1913 Leonard Markham tried to commit suicide and in
1914 Harry Waddell finally had his sentence commuted and he was released from
prison.
Abe Majors’ involvement in
providing the shears used to attack Waddell, had Warden Pratt transfer him back
to solitary confinement for four months. However the State Board of Corrections
did not think the punishment for “having on August 24 1911 instigated the
attack by Prisoner Markham upon Prisoner Waddell” was severe enough and he was
transferred back to Third Grade. He was kept in solitary confinement until 12
September 1912 when Warden Pratt finally released him. However Majors must have
committed another infraction for Warden Pratt transferred him right back to
solitary confinement a week later where he remained until March 1914.
When Majors was finally released
from solitary confinement he was transferred to the “First Grade.” Evidently
there must have been trouble between his and other prisoners because six months
later he was “transferred from First Grade” back to Third Grade “for safe keeping” by Warden Pratt. He would spend the next
fourteen months again in solitary confinement until released to the “Second
Grade.”
On 24 Nov 1915 Abe Majors was
released from Third Grade to the second grade and “since last release Majors
has worked every day in the tailor shop. His record has been perfect.” While
Majors was an inmate he “mastered the tailor trade being the most proficient
man in that trade in prison.”
In the meanwhile, Judge J.W.
McKinney was convinced that Abe Majors was not guilty of the murder of Captain
Brown and had spent three years in “gathering data relative to his alleged
crime, finally succeeding in having him paroled, his sentence being later
terminated.”
A pardon for Majors was asked in a
1917 petition, on the grounds that a Constable George Wells, who had watched
the pursuit through field glasses, testified that Abe Majors never fired a
single shot from his revolver. Testimony from the first trial showed that
Majors’ pistol was found with all the bullets in it and none had been shot.
Abe Majors had been incarcerated in
Utah’s penal system for nearly 18 years and as a newspaper observed, “If Majors
is granted liberty, a man will walk forth from prison bars into a new world.
Automobiles have been perfected since he went behind the bars; he has never
seen an aeroplane: Salt Lake City has grown from a town to a modern city in
that time, when he passes out of prison.”
In January 1918 Abe Majors was
finally paroled from prison although he wanted to be pardon. He was employed in
July 1918 by the Mountain States Telephone and Telegraph company doing
construction work and was still working for them in December. When he
registered for the World War 1 civilian draft he gave the prison as his home
address.
Abe Majors moved from Utah in 1919
to Los Angeles, California along with his mother and half brothers, Charles,
and Ralph Wagner. While in Salt Lake City, his mother and brother Ralph Wagner
were part of an occult organization called the Utah State Spiritualists’
Association incorporated for the purpose of “teaching the philosophy of the
phenomena of the spirits.” His brother even had made a living as a Palmist,
fortune teller, and Spiritualist medium and also had his own petty issues with
law enforcement primarily due to the fact that he was the brother of “notorious
Abe Majors.”
In December 1919 Majors, with a man
he had met in prison, was arrested again in Los Angeles charged with
burglarizing a business. He was convicted of Second Degree Burglary and
sentenced to another five years in prison at the age of 39 years. In September
1920 he was incarcerated in San Quinton but in October he was transferred to
Folsom. His occupation was given as a tailor. He was discharged from prison in
January 1924.
The 1920 Federal Census showed his
mother and half-brothers living in Los Angeles Ralph Wagner’s was given as a
“laborer in Poultry Yards” His brother Charles Wagner was remarried and working
as a truck driver. Abe Majors was incarcerated in San Quintin Prison but later
transferred to Folsom.
While Abe Majors was in Folsom
prison, his long suffering mother died in January 1922 in Los Angeles
California and was buried in Forest Lawn Cemetery in Glendale, California. His
half-brother Ralph Wagner had telegraphed Judge J W McKinney in Utah to inform
him of her death as that she and Majors two half-brothers had lived in Salt Lake
City for most of the time he was incarcerated in Utah.
Judge McKinney said of Lucinda
Wagner, she “had more grief in her
lifetime than is generally allotted to a dozen mothers. Her first husband was
executed in California for murder, and her two sons by this marriage caused her
no end of grief. One son was killed by the police and Abe Majors served nearly
19 years in the Utah state prison for the alleged murder of Captain of Police
William A Brown of Ogden.”
When Abe Majors was released from
prison he returned to Los Angeles County where he was found located in the 1930
federal census working doing house repairs and rooming in a private residence.
In 1942 he was still living in South Gate although at the age of 61 years he
was “unemployed at present”.
He died in November 1957 at the age
of 76 in Los Angeles County and was
buried in the Park Lawn Memorial Park in Commerce, California. Abe Majors never
married.
Chapter Forty-Two
Ralph Waldo Wagner, [1889-1957]
Abe Major’s youngest half-brother,
Ralph W. Wagner, had his own colorful life. He was raised in
Salt Lake City as that his mother wanted to be near her imprisoned son.
In 1904, Ralph Wagner at the age of
15 contracted Small pox which was first misidentified as Typhoid Fever. “The
patient is Ralph Wagner who is brother to Abe Majors the life convict. Wagner
was taken from his home, 636 South First West to the quarantine hospital
yesterday.”
In January 1908 Ralph Wagner stated
to the police he was robbed by two African American women. “Ralph Wagner who
was held up on State Street between Fourth and Fifth South Streets Saturday
night by two negro women relieved of a watch and $2.45 and then told that he
was a cheap guy, has identified Mabel Todd arrested by Policeman Bush Sunday
night and Jemima Oakley arrested by Policeman Howell Monday Night as robbers.
Wagner was not certain in his
identification of the Todd woman but was positive when he saw the Oakley woman
at the police station that she is the tall angular and muscular negress who
stood guard over him with a big revolver while the smaller of the thieves searched
him. Both women denied their guilt saying they hardly knew each other.
Wagner is a brother of the
notorious Abe Majors, serving a life term in the Utah State prison for the
murder of Captain Brown of Ogden while the latter was attempting to arrest him.
The order was issued from police
headquarters Monday to drive Negro streetwalkers from the city or into houses.”
Later in May 1908 Wagner was
arrested himself charged with stealing a bicycle which he sold to John Olson a
clerk for $1.50. Olsen after learning that the bike was stolen confronted him when he saw Wagner
trying to sell another bike for $2 . Olson took after him and Wagner ran but “Detective
Schulze witnessed the race and placed Wagner under arrest.” Wagner pled not guilty to stealing three bicycles
and he was represented by same attorney F.E. Vickery who had defended Joe
Sullivan. As that he said he was only 17 his case was referred to the juvenile
court. He was actually 19 years old
It is not certain when Ralph Wagner
and his mother became known for being “spiritualists occult scientists and
teachers of mental telepathy.” However in 1910 when he was 21 years old he was
arrested again for swindling. “Ralph Wagner was arrested just before noon today
by Detective Earl Ripley on complaint of Leo Paffery, a stranger in the city,
who alleged that he had been stung to the extent of $6 as a result of his faith
in Wagner’s powers as a palmist, fortune teller, seer, and revelator. Wagner
has been conducting a clairvoyant business at the Globe Hotel 269 South Main
Street.
Paffery told police that he had
gone to Wagner’s apartments to have his fortune told. At the beginning of the
séance Paffery says Wagner told him to take all the money out of his pockets
and put it on an open Bible, which the fortune teller had put before him. Paffery
did as instructed and the next proceeding was for him to cover the money with
his hands. He did this also and then he says Wagner told him to shut his eyes and
make a wish- to wish for the thing in life he most ardently desired.
Paffery wished. Then he was told to
remove his hand he alleges that Wagner took the money all but 75 cents in
change. Paffery naturally asked that his coin be returned to him but Wagner told
him that there was no ‘come back.’ Then the victim applied to the police for
the arrest of the fortune teller. Wagner who is half brother to Abe Majors his
held on swindling.”
He was arrested again in 1915 and charged
with obtaining money under false pretenses
as a fortune teller. He had several arrests and fines of $10 for fortune
telling.
Ralph Wagner was in trouble in 1917
for violating Salt Lake City’s ordinance “forbidding the practice of fortune
telling or clairvoyance.” To avoid being
arrested, he placed a Spanish Flu quarantine sign in a prominent place
near his front door but the police later
learned that there “was no sickness within.”
When he registered for the draft in
June 1917 Wagner stated he was self-employed
“psychologist “out of his home at 425 Church Street in Salt Lake City. He
claimed an exemption from the draft due to a physical disability due to “general
heart trouble.” He also claimed that his mother was solely dependent on him
In 1918 both his mother and her
were members of Utah State Spiritualist association and Wagner was giving
lectures on spiritualism. Wagner left Salt Lake in 1919 for California after
his brother was paroled from the State Prison.
The 1920 federal census showed that both 31
year old Ralph and his brother Charles were residing with their mother in Los
Angeles. Charles had separated from his first wife he had married in 1908 in
Utah. Ralph gave his occupation as a laborer in a chicken yard while his
brother had no occupation.
Called “a crystal gazer, in March
1922 Ralph Wagner as on trial in Los Angeles accused of a “statutory offense”
against a 14 year old boy named Ernest Eugene
Pettinger [1908-1969]. He was accused by Ernest’s older sister of living an
“immoral and dissolute life.”
Wagner was acquitted after the boy rescinded his testimony and
refused to complain against him. The boy’s mother, “trying to protect the
reputation of her son,” refused to permit him to “say anything detrimental towards
Wagner.”
Ernest Pettinger however formed an
attachment to Ralph Wagner that lasted two decades. He even took ‘Wagner’ as
his last name and in newspapers account he was referred to as Ralph Wagner’s
“adopted son.” Ernest
was a protégé and business associate of Ralph Wagner as well. They went on
trips to Mexico together and lived together on a ranch in Sargus, California
until 1941 when Ernest left him and married a woman in Florida. The following
year Ernest enlisted in the service during World War II and Ralph was in
prison.
By 1927 Wagner was calling himself
“professor” and “Dr. Ralph Wagner, astrologist and Psychologist”. He claimed to
have been an “expert Palmist and Astrologer of National Fame and Reputation.”
In his large newspaper advertisements he also claimed to have met “presidents,
kings, queens, statesmen and leading lights of the professional world.”
Plus in 1927 he was “appointed the
guardian and manager” of young prize fighter named Tony Escalante “the Mexicali
Kid”. Escalante was a minor when Wagner became his manager and “represented him
in the business end of his profession.” It was reported that Escalante wanted
Wagner’s “astrological and psychological advice which by this arrangement will
be thrown in, so to speak, gratis.”
Ralph Wagner made a small fortune
as a “astrologer and Psychologist” in the 1920’s but by 1930 he gave up fortune
telling and to become a prize fight promoter. He bought a 161 acre ranch 45
miles north of Los Angeles near Sargus that he named Rancho Chihuahua. It
became the center of a type of dude ranch and training camp where “several out of
work boxers and wrestlers” lived. He also had a stable of prize race horses and
claimed to have gold mine interests in Death Valley.
In the 1930’s Wagner was referred
to as a “Hollywood Millionaire sports promoter” as well as the “Sage of Sargus.”
He was constantly in the papers living an extravagant lifestyle with his
“adopted son Ernest Wagner.”
In 1940 Ralph Waldo Wagner was
enumerated along with “Ernest Wagner” who he listed as his adopted son. They
were living in Soledad, Los Angeles County as a mining promoter and a gold mine
miner. When Ernest Pettinger registered for the World War II draft in August
1940, he listed his name as Ernest Eugene Wagner, age 32, single, and he also
listed Ralph Wagner as his father.
In December 1940 however Ralph
Wagner was charged with evading Income Taxes on $100,000 he made in 1934 and
was sentenced to federal prison for two years, a sentence which he fought for a
year. He was considered a “tax evasion fugitive” when caught and sent to
Terminal Island federal prison at San Pedro, California in December 1941.
Ernest dropped the Wagner surname
and went by Pettinger. He married Irene Fouchek in Florida and in 1942 joined
the army and served until 1945.
After getting out of prison Ralph
Wagner was arrested again in 1944 for violating California’s Corporation
Securities Law. He was charged with having taken $100 to $500 from people in
1935, for “filing and survey claims” in Inyo County, California. He was accused
of running a “bunko scheme.”
Wagner was sentenced to five years
in prison and his term in Folsom began in December 1944. He listed himself as
“single” and that Mary E Pettinger, the sister of Ernest, was his nearest
relative as that Ernest Pettinger was serving in World War II. In December 1947
he was transferred to Soledad Prison.
Once released from prison, in 1949,
Ralph Wagner tried to rebuild his career as a “famous California “Psychic and
Philosopher” and moved to Nevada to try his hand with mining claims again. He
also bought an interest in the Ballarat Ghost Town in California, in an attempt
to make it a tourist attraction.
He moved to Reno Nevada in 1955 where
he was married to Mrs. Laura May Wagner. He died of heart disease in 1957 and
his widow put on his death certificate that he was a psychic and a seer by
occupation.
Ralph Wagner’s obituary only
mention his wife, his nephew Leo Wagner, and his brother Abe Majors of South
Gate, California Evidently he was
estranged from his brother Charles Wagner who also survived him. He was buried
in the Mountain View Cemetery in Reno Nevada.
All of the siblings of Abe Majors,
as well as his mother are buried in different locations. His half-brother
Charles Wagner it seemed lived the most normal life, raising a family while
employed as a truck driver. He died in 1971 and was buried in the Westminster
Memorial Cemetery in Orange County, California.
In the Willard Utah Cemetery, a
monument with the following inscription was placed which stated: “Archibald Majors, son of Lloyd Leadbetter
and Lucinda Webb Majors, was shot and killed by a sheriff's posse near Stinky
Springs on the southern border of Box Elder County. He was survived by his
beautiful wife, Lena, and his baby boy, Lloyd. Now, more than a century later,
his posterity can finally honor him knowing the true story of his life and
premature death.
Grandpa, may you rest in peace
knowing that you are loved and have not been forgotten. Along with our
grandfather, we wish to honor all those buried in the Stranger's Lot beside
him. Many of these people remain nameless, but they are somebody's family and
they also have stories waiting to be discovered.”
Chapter
Forty-Three
The 1910 Federal Census of Prisoners
Contrary to all the dire warnings
that returning Joe Sullivan to prison, he would continue to be a dangerous man,
instead he seemed to have adjusted after the December 1908 escape attempt with
Abe Majors. He seemed to have accepted his circumstances as being one of twelve
men sentenced to “Murderers Row.” There were no reports of any violence or
retribution against Richard Deming or John Owens either as was predicted.
Two hundred and eighty-eight
prisoners were enumerated within the Utah State Penitentiary on May 9 for the 1910 Federal census. The vast
majority, eighty percent were listed as single men, with only fifty-eight claiming
to be married or had been married. Thirty three men stated they were still
married, fifteen said they were widowed, and ten stated they were divorced. As
that divorce was still considered shameful, those claiming being widowed could
have been men whose wives simply left them.
The census showed that the Utah
judicial system had a propensity for incarcerating non Utahns as that 88
percent of the prison population were nonnative Utahns. Of the thirty-six Utah
born inmates, only seven of them had parents who were also Utah natives making
up just two tenths percent of the prison population. Clearly there was a strong
bias against outsiders and non-Mormons within the state.
The majority of the inmates were
itemized as being “white” with twenty being listed as “black,” three as
“Mexican,” two as “Indian,” and two as “Japanese” Asian. Foreign born inmates
made up 15 percent of the prison population; giving the prison a definite
“international flavor.”
The greatest number of
non-Americans incarcerated, ten, said they were natives of Ireland. There were
five each claiming England and Germany as their birth country. Four were from
both Canada and Mexico, three from Greece, with only two individuals each
listing Sweden, Japan, Russia, Italy, Denmark, and Scotland as their native
countries. There were only 1 person each who claimed Norway, Finland, and
Frances as their countries of origin.
Surprisingly two females were
listed in the prison count but they might not have been inmates, perhaps
employees, but it is not clear. They were listed together possibly in the same
cell. Clara Smith was a 36 year old Native American from Kansas but said her
father was from the West Indies so she may have been mixed race. No occupation
was listed for her. Next to her was Mary J Smith a 47 year old African American
widow from Texas whose occupation was given as a cook.
The occupations given for each
individual may have been their prison jobs or perhaps their trade before being
arrested. It is not clear whether each prisoner was contacted for the census
data or was simply supplied from prison records.
Among the inmates enumerated in
1910 was Joseph Sullivan who was listed as being 31 years of age and born in
New York State which conflicted with some reports saying he was a native of Washington
State. His occupation was given as “machinist,” this may have been his prison
job as he had no trade before entering prison beyond being a seaman.
Four individuals away from him was
enumerated Abraham Majors, the man convicted of killing Ogden police officer,
Captain William Brown. Majors was listed as being 29 years old a native of
California and a “stone cutter.” They were probably in the Third Grade section
of the prison in solitary confinement.
Twenty
seven individuals from Sullivan was enumerated Richard Deming who gave his age
as 30 and a native of New York State. His parents were natives of Scotland. He
was listed as a common “laborer.”
Four characters away from Deming
was John Owens who was kept some distance from Joe Sullivan. Owens was listed
as a 38 year old native Ohioan but gave his occupation as “R.R.” meaning
railroad man which was his former occupation. In other accounts he was named as
a prison cook so it is not certain whether all these occupations given were
legitimate or not.
Just two persons away from John
Owens was John Furey, who gave his age as 32 years old and a native of
California with Irish parentage.
While in prison Furey had testified
in behalf of Joe Sullivan along with two other members of his former Ogden
gang, Richard Deming, and John “Little jack” Monroe. They were called by
Sullivan’s defense team however the state prosecutor claimed that they were
considered unreliable witnesses because they were convicts and were presumed to
have thought of Sullivan as a hero and John Owens as a “snitch.”
In October 1909 Furey, now 32 years
old, was paroled, but within a matter of days he was involved in another
robbery. He only had six weeks of freedom before being arrested again. He was
incarcerated in jail for six months before he was sentenced in April 1910 to
twenty years in the state Prison at hard labor.
At his Court sentencing, Furey said to the judge “You censure me for
going back to the old life. I am sorry you should take occasion to do so. Now
tell me what I could do. Every door was closed against me. I was turned out of
the prison with no money; I had no friends and nobody would give me work.
Everyone I approached was against me, except the friends who I had made in my
life before I was sentenced. Whom else could I seek? It was natural that I
should go to them willing to aid me and it follows that with them I went back
to my former life. Then, when a crime was committed I was one of the first to
be suspected because of my jail records. There is no square deal for the man who
has served his time.”
"Death Cause Solved-Heart Trouble Not Poisoned Food Killed Furey- Results of an examination into the case of the death of John J Furey reputed victim of ptomaine poisoning at the harbor, were reported yesterday to the Board of Health’s local office by Inspector Duffy of the chemistry division. The examination was made at the request of Dr. Dick’s secretary of the State Board of Health, following reports from the harbor district that a number of deaths had occurred there recently as a result of ptomaine poison contracted through the consumption of tinned food."
"Furey a longshoreman in the employ of S.S. Yale was proven to have died following a heart attack to which by the testimony of his brother-in-law Arthur McCarthy residing at 345 Santa Cruz street Los Angeles Harbor, he was subject. The longshoreman’s home was 128 Clipper Street San Francisco to which point the body was shipped. Investigation by the State health officials at the harbor failed to uncover any recent instances of deaths from poisoning. "
A death noticed stated his widow's name was "Mamie" and that he was a San Francisco native. He was buried in the
Three people away from Furey was Harry
Waddell, enumerated as a 34 year old man and native of Pennsylvania. He was
listed as a “stone cutter” which probably meant he worked breaking up rocks.
Thirteen individuals from Waddell
was enumerated Nicholas Pruessing, the 37 year old German who had been attacked
by Sullivan and Deming on his arrival in prison in 1908. He listed his
occupational as a baker. Ten individuals from Pruessing was 18 year old Leonard
Markham a native of Minnesota. No occupation was listed for him.
Eventually, while confined at the
Sugar House prison, Sullivan was looked upon as a model prisoner and to have
had “inspired confidence among the guards” who had so feared and despised him
during his first incarceration.” Over the years Sullivan spent some of his
spare time making “bead fobs and necklaces which he sold to earned money while
in prison. While Joe Sullivan was at the Sugar House prison, labor organizer
Joe Hill was executed there by a firing squad on 19 November 1915.
Chapter Forty-
Four
Joe Sullivan “Model Prisoner”
Arthur Pratt, warden of Sugar
House, for much of the time Joe Sullivan was incarcerated, was allowed by the
state to use convict labor to build state roads. Inmates would apply for the
work as that it got them “outside the iron bars and brick walls.” The convicts
were even given a ten day reduction in their sentence for every thirty days
they worked on road construction.
Arthur Pratt’s term as warden ended on 1 April 1917 and George A Storrs, a former Utah
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| George A Storrs |
County sheriff, was appointed to replace him. Warden Storrs immediately initiated an honor system and placed a greater number of inmates at work on the highway work and on state farms. One of the first road jobs undertaken by Storrs in May 1917 was to improve the highway between Spanish Fork Canyon and Price Canyon.
A large camp site was set up at
Colton with Captain William “Bill” D. Silvey in charge of the work crew of
nearly one hundred men. Bill Silvey had been a former police captain in Ogden,
Utah and was the same man who dealt with the murder of the tragic prostitute
Lena Carter twenty years before. He was now a 64 year old widower.
Captain Silvey’s road gangs “were
fed well, worked only eight hours a day and were on the honor system to not try
to escape, however Warden Storrs provided enough guards to make sure they kept
the honor system.
Joe Sullivan by 1917 was a “model
prisoner”. As a reward for his good behavior, he was assigned to a prison road
gang at the Colton camp in the Price River Canyon. He was moved to Soldier Summit to help out the
Denver and Rio Grande construction crew who were rebuilding the train tracks.
He was there working when on Friday July 28 when two African American men,
named Sam Perry and Merwin Perkins, escaped.
Although a life-termer, Sullivan was entrusted with a revolver by Captain Bill Silvey “with
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| Bill Silvey |
instructions to go after the fugitives.” It was “understood that Sullivan had always been a model prisoner” and was prison officials were confident “that he could soon obtain a pardon” and doubted that he would do anything to jeopardize his chances.
Silvey told Sullivan to join him in
the search of the escaped prisoners and during the pursuit Sullivan disappeared
for ten days. The next day, however, the
two African American men were picked up in Salt Lake City.
Sullivan followed the two men all
the way to Denver, Colorado “working day and night in an attempt to capture the
escapees. On his pursuit of the wanted men he said he went “seventy six hours
without sleep” and in Denver he looked in all the “Negro lodging houses, pool
halls and every other place” he thought there was a probability of finding the
escaped convicts. “He searched practically every railroad yard between here and
Denver”
By Friday, August 3 Warden Storrs
“had given up hope” that Sullivan had not escaped and “offered a reward for his
capture.” Storrs offered a reward of $50 for Sullivan’s capture but he never
posted it. Additionally upon learning that Captain Silvey had given Sullivan
the weapon and had ordered him to go in pursuit of the escaped men, Storrs was
hesitant to list Sullivan as an “escapee. The Warden did dismissed Silvey from
his job within the prison service and “Roland Gillespie was appointed to take
his place.”
After Sullivan’s strength gave out
he “telephoned the surprised Warden Storrs” that “his search had been in vain
and that he was returning to prison.” The prison officials had by now been
certain that Sullivan had escaped.
On Sunday August 5, much to the guards
at the Colton Camp astonishment, Joe Sullivan returned and told of his
adventures in pursuit of the escaped convicts who he was convinced were heading
towards Kansas City. Sullivan returned after a ten day in search for two the
escaped convicts.
In an article from 6 August 1917,
Joe Sullivan told his story to a newspaper reporter. “When I left Captain
Silvey of the prison guard at the road camp near Colton, I determined to scout
around the hills near the town until dusk-not later- believing that surely by
that time I would have captured Sam Perry and Merwin Perkins the two Negros who
made their escape.”
“For several hours after our
separation, I became so interested in the pursuit that I forgot the captain.
But when dusk came I had found no trace of the convicts. I was so certain that
the trust reposed in me by Mr. Silvey would not be shaken by a day or two’s
absence, that I decided, rather than go back to the camp without the prisoners,
to make straight for Redcliff Colorado. I had some money with me I had earned
from the sale of bead fobs and necklaces, I had made in spare time, and with
this I managed to obtain enough to eat and a respectable place to sleep each
night, although as for traveling I took the common way of all impecunious
travelers- I beat my way to Pueblo.”
“I decided it would be a wise move
to cut in advance of the negroes and after passing through Pueblo, where I sent
a message to the officer in charge of the prison camp, I made my way to Denver.
At Pueblo I also sent two letters explaining my where-abouts.”
“But at this time I had the
revolver a 39-40 “gat” which had been given to me by the captain to aid me in
the capture of the prisoners. I knew if I arrived at Denver before the convicts
I could easily pick them up at the freight yards- likely without the aid of the
gun. So I sent the revolver back with a message.”
“I was disappointed at Denver in
not locating the negroes for I was certain they had taken that route in their
escape. I learned today, however; they had been picked up in Salt Lake.”
“When
I found I could not get the Negroes in Denver, I bought a railroad ticket back
to Salt Lake and made all possible speed back.”
“The idea of escape never appealed
to me. Although I will admit it came to my mind a couple of times, I can appreciate
the good treatment, and rather than violate a confidence reposed in me, I put
the idea from me. Rather than play against the men who have treated me square
for the last eight years, I would stay in prison for many years. I value my
word more than my liberty.”
“I am only sorry that it was
necessary for me to stay away so long causing doubt to rest upon my motives for
leaving the camp and after leaving the camp I am intensely grieved to hear that
Captain Silvey who one of the whitest men I have ever known has been let out on
my account.”
Philip Houtz, a 50 year old guard
at the State Road Camp #2 at Colton, wrote to Warden Storrs on August 13 “When
Mr. Joseph Sullivan’s case comes before the Board of Pardons on Saturday next,
please add my word of praise to that of others for the noble way in which he
kept his promise to me under the greatest of temptation and trying
circumstances.”
“Such noble sacrifice has not been
exceeded in all my experience. It was my implicit confidence in him that
permitted me to give consent to his accompanying Mr. Silvey as a scout in the
search for the fugitives.” “That he did not betray that trust, should certainly
rebound to his credit.”
“Upon his leaving the camp on the
evening of the 26th of July last, in company with two guards, for the purpose
of setting up a chase for the two negroes, I told him that with his successful
return I felt I could do something for him. I take that he did return
successfully, and therefore I owe it to him to urge favorable consideration.
That he is not now a fugitive from justice, he alone is responsible.”
“It is for such unselfish sacrifice
that the soldier on the battlefield is rewarded. Why should not the same deep
consideration accompany this case?”
Because of Joe Sullivan’s ten day
adventure, he was “withdrawn from the prison camp” and returned to the
penitentiary. He was not however charged with trying to escape as that he had
been under orders to pursue the escaped convicts.
When questioned by Warden Storrs
why he came back, Sullivan explained that since he has been in the penitentiary
he had “never been known to go back on his word.” He said that Captain Silvey’s
trust in him meant that escape would have “entailed the betrayal of the
confidence which the guards at the prison have placed in him for the past
several year” and “to do such a stunt he said would be poor stuff.” Sullivan
said, “he had known Silvey for fourteen years and considered him a friend.”
Bill Silvey had been a captain in the Ogden police department when Sullivan was
arrested back in 1902.
Sullivan’s voluntarily returning to
prison, justified “the faith the chief of the convicts road camp had placed in
him” and while Captain Silvey was vindicated for putting his confidence in
Sullivan, he was “at the same time bereft of a job.” Silvey did not get his old
prison job back and he died a year later on 20 August 1918 of heart failure at
the age of 65. He was interred in the Ogden City Cemetery.
Warden Storrs was able to use the
fact that Joe Sullivan returned to prison as proof of the success of his honor
system being used at the prison. Storrs said, “I still hold to the idea that
humane treatment of men will bring out their best qualities.”
Chapter Forty-Five
Death of Joe Sullivan
Joseph Sullivan was a picture of
“robust health” in May1917 but had dropped his weight from 165 pound to 130
pounds within three months. He was in the “grip of quick consumption” a
commonly used name for Tuberculosis or “TB.” It was also commonly called “the
white plague” due to the paleness of its victims. The tuberculosis bacteria
usually attack the lungs, and it is spreads through the air by coughs, sneezes,
or even talking by a person infected. Before vaccination, TB killed one out of
every seven people living in the United States. Sullivan was slowly dying from
“consumption, induced by his long confinement.”
On 15 June 1918, Ed H. Whyte, a Parole Officer, and State
Agent in California, wrote to Warden Storrs saying he was willing to assist
Sullivan when paroled. He wrote “Deputy Probation Officer Michael J Sullivan
and myself will lend all assistance possible in case of Joseph Sullivan if he
is released. Will see to giving him employment and will see that he reports
regularly to you if required. Letter and agreement to employ now in the mail.”
In 1918, sixty five men were released under the supervision of Warden George A. Storrs who took on this responsibility as parole agent along with his other responsibilities serving as warden.
Joe Sullivan was finally paroled on
June 20, 1918, ten years after having been sent to prison. One of the reasons
for an early parole was his terminal case of tuberculosis and the fact that he
had returned to the road camps in eastern Utah the previous summer. That was
said to “have been a factor in determining the attitude of the pardons board.
Sullivan was paroled to the
California parole agent and it was understood by the Board of Pardons that he
would “work under the direction of that official in the shipyards on the
Pacific Coast.”
Not everyone was happy with
Sullivan’s parole. It was also reported that, “considerable surprise was
expressed at police headquarters over his release, this being according to
policemen, the third release of men convicted of killing policemen.”
Sullivan kept in touch with Warden
Storrs after leaving the custody of the Utah State Prison system. He wrote to
Warden Storrs frequently and expressed his intention of going to sea but said
“his physical health prevented this.”
Instead Sullivan was compelled to go to a
hospital in Fresno, California where he died on 15 March 1919 at the age of 40.
He was probably buried in a pauper’s grave.
It was several months later in May
1919 before Sullivan’s passing was mentioned in Salt Lake City papers. The
Deseret News on May 28 reported “Joseph Sullivan, a former life termer at the
Utah State prison is dead at Fresno Cal., according to word received by Warden
George A Storrs. Sullivan died of tuberculosis. While confined at the prison
Sullivan was looked upon as a model prisoner. He was 40 years old.”
The Salt Lake Telegram also
mentioned his passing rehearsing his conviction in regards to the death of
Officer Charles S. Ford and “and at one time was away from the prison for
several days chasing two negroes who escaped.” This article also referred to
the reformed convict as being a model prisoner.
Chapter Forty-Six
John W. Owen Paroled
The ominous predictions of the
prison guards that John Owens would be killed in prison failed to materialize.
He learned the profession of being a cook while in prison and became Warden
Arthur Pratt’s personal cook. During the time incarcerated, Owens wrote to the
Utah Board of Pardons several times for a “Commutation” of his twenty year
sentence. Commutation was a form of clemency that reduced the prison term for a
crime.
When a road crew of prisoners was
sent to Southern Utah he was among those that were allowed to work outside the
prison. In February 1914 while working at Washington, Washington County, Utah
in a prison road camp, John Owens wrote to Frederick C. Loofbourow, the
attorney who acted as prosecutor during
Owens’s trial in December 1907. Loofbourow, now a judge wrote back to him, Your
letter on the 8th instant reached me in due time. I remember you very well and
your testimony in the Sullivan case and firmly believe that all the
circumstances of your case deserve clemency.
However I am not in the position to
do you any good by recommending clemency. Any kindness I can do in any other
way I will be glad to do.”
He did however sent a letter to the
Board of Pardons listing how Owens had helped the state prosecute the case
against Joe Sullivan.
Owens also wrote his mother in
Canton, Ohio asking her to write letters to Utah officials to appeal to their
sympathies for her as an aged, widowed mother. She wrote at least four letters
in February 1914, one to Governor William Spry, one to William Barnes of the
Board of Pardons, one to Frank Emery, sheriff of Salt Lake County, and another
to Albert R. Barnes, Utah’s Attorney General.
In the letter to Governor Spry, she wrote “My son J.W. Owens incarcerated in the Salt Lake City
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| Gov. William Spry |
prison, Utah, has put in an application for commutation of sentence. He was rejected some time ago for not having served enough time on his sentence. There being other objections. Would you kindly help him as I am a widowed Mother, 70 years of age and have no income but $12.00 a month pension and I am in need of his help. My health is failing fast. I am willing to pay his way out of the State if liberated. He has done good service for the State as we learn and is a trusty now. Hoping that you may do all in your power for the boy and myself as I think the boy has surely learned a lesson. Thanking you kindly.”
She wrote to William Barnes about
having sent fifty dollars to a Willard Hansen who said he could help with
getting Owens clemency. “When my son put in his pardon, Willard Hansen,
prosecuting Attorney for the state at his trial, told my son he would defend
him, if he got a pardon, so I sent him $50.00 all the money I had. When I sent
it he did not recognize my check for two weeks. I had to write to the Post
Master to know if the money had been paid to him, now that I think, was money
paid out for nothing as he surely knew he had not served enough time when he
took up the case. What has Mr. Hansen to do with the case? I should think the
Board has it all to do. Please explain this to me as it will help me know that
I do not pay my money for no use. It is my loss and not the boys gain. My son
has promised to pay it back when he gains his liberty which I trust will be
soon. Please answer me this and kindly oblige his mother. PS this is private
between yourself and I. Please do not read before Board.
Mrs. Owens’s last letter was to the
state’s attorney general. “I wrote to you some time ago when my son John W.
Owens applied for pardon from the prison of Salt Lake City. You wrote me he had
not served enough time, now he is making application for commutation of
sentence. How will his chances be? I am in need of his care. Will soon be 70
years of age and all my income is $12.00 pension. He has promised me after he
gets out, he will help me and I am sure he will. I trust you will do all you
can for him and for my sake and fully trust it will make him a better man in
the future.”
To Sheriff Emery, the destitute
mother wrote, “ In behalf of my son J.W. Owens, who is now in the Utah state
prison for commutation of sentence, won’t you please help him in some way for
the sake of a widowed mother of 70 years old and he being her only support
except $12.00 pension. He was rejected some ago on account of not having not
served sufficient time. He has done good work for the state as I can learn and
the Warden is in favor of him. He promised to be a good boy in the future and
help me. I am willing to pay his way out of the state so kindly do what you can
please. If just on word will help how grateful I would be. I want the boy to
have another chance in this world to prove what he can do. Please help him if
possible.”
Owens’s only sister wrote to Warden
Pratt on his brother’s behalf at the same time their mother had written to Utah
officials. “My brother has written to me in regards to going in for commutation
of sentence and he speaks so highly of you that you must be very kind to your
prisoners. My mother is 70 years of age and is in bad health needing his
support so much. He has promised us to be faithful to her in the future . Can’t
you kindly help him some for her sake. She will be willing to pay his way out
of the state if liberated. So please do all you can for this unfortunate boy if
you can do anything that will help him. Thanking you so kindly for what you
gave done. I remain his sister.”
In March 1914 Warden Pratt sent a
note to the Board of Pardon writing, “I herewith report that John Owens has
credit for good conduct during his term in this institution. He is working on
the state highways in Washington County and stands in first grade. “
John Owens’s petition to the Board
of Pardons dated 25 May 1916 was filed. In it he wrote in a letter along with
the petition, “That the details being quite familiar in my case, I will refrain
from dwelling thereon; that I am not asking for clemency on the grounds of
innocence, but simply asking the Board to take into consideration of time
served; that I have served eight years and six months of a twenty year
sentence; that I have been holding a trusted position in one capacity or other
all during that time, also that have worked diligently or the road for three
years of that time, in fact every day of the eight years and six months.”
“My past life on the outside has
been nothing to be proud of, and I hope that you will see fit to grant me
clemency that I may have the opportunity of redeeming my past and profiting by
the mistakes I have made.”
“My profession is that of a Rail
Road man but owing to an accident to my hand I will be unable to follow this
kind of work. I have, while incarcerated, learned the trade of cooking and am
capable of making an honest living at that profession.”
I have no one to represent me
before the Board, in fact I have no friends, all having deserted me during this
trouble, therefore I stand alone in plea to this Honorable Body for clemency
and trust as fair minded men you will see fit to give me the opportunity, for
which I shall conduct myself in such a manner that there will never be any
regret on your part for giving me just a chance. P.S In case the Board should
see fit I am prepared to pay my way out of the State.”
A letter date 27 May 1916 was sent to the board by Frederick C Loofbourow. “Referring to the
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| F C Loofbourow |
application of John William Owens for clemency, I desire to state that some years ago I recommended a parole or pardon for this prisoner; I don’t remember which. Mr. Owens plead guilty and was given a sentence of twenty years. Afterwards, he helped us very materially in the case of the State of Utah against Joe Sullivan, and at about that time helped Mr. Sharp, who was sheriff of Salt Lake County, very materially with information in other cases somewhat allied with the Sullivan case. Under the circumstances I feel that the man should receive some consideration at the hands of the Board; and considering the fact that he has been in the institution about eight and one-half years, I believe clemency should be extended.”
The Petition for clemency was
followed by another note dated June 1916 from Warden Arthur Pratt on his
behalf. Pratt wrote “I hereby report that John W. Owens has credit for good
conduct during his term in this institution. He stands in the 1st Grade and a
trusty outside the Prison walls. He served a term in Ohio.”
Six months later John Owens was
still in prison seeking commutation of his sentence by the State Board of
Pardons. In January 1917, he wrote “May it please the Board to grant a
rehearing of my case on the following grounds: That I have served all but
eleven months of a twenty year sentence; that my sentences expires in November
of this year, and owing to the scarcity of work, unfavorable weather conditions
etc. that exist at this time of year, I am very desirous of obtaining a
rehearing that I may be able to file an application for a little clemency at
the February meeting of the Board whereby I can hope to gain my freedom in the
early spring.”
“I have worked most diligently for
over nine years here in one capacity or other of trust and am now an honor man
working in the warden’s kitchen, as his cook. By profession I am a rail-road
man, and during my imprisonment II have learned the art of cooking which will
give me a splendid profession whereby I can earn an honest livelihood.”
“The foremost desire in my mind is
to lead an honorable and industrious life, and I firmly believe, if given the
opportunity, I will make a good citizen.”
At the February 1917 Board of
Pardons’ meeting John Owens had his sentence commuted to take effect 1 March
1917. When he was released but he spent at least nine and a half years in
prison, nine years with Joe Sullivan the man he betrayed. Sullivan once told a
fellow inmate “There wouldn’t have been anything to this if Owens had kept his
mouth shut.”
Chapter
Forty-Seven
Owen After Utah
John Owens mother died in August
1916 while he was still incarcerated so it is doubtful that he returned to
Ohio. Owens went by various pseudonyms after leaving Utah including “John W. Smith,” “Finger Smith” as well as
“John W. Cook.”
In 1924, he was “well known in
Walla Walla, Washington where he was a “boxing promoter” and was employed as
“cook in three restaurants.” He had been arrested there twice on “disorderly
conduct charges” but according to the police had no other record there. While
the Utah Board of Pardons had given him the opportunity to “make a good
citizen,” he hadn’t. A that newspapers reported in 1925, that he had been seen
in Idaho Walla Walla, Washington and Portland, Oregon.
In 1926 John W. Owens was convicted
in the town of Kelso in Cowlitz County,
Washington of “Murder in the First Degree”. When he was arrested for murder in
1926 he was arrested under the name of John W. Smith.”
On 19 June 1925, Thomas Dovery, editor of the Cowlitz County News, was found shot on the streets of Kelso, a town across the Columbia River from Portland, Oregon. His death at first was thought to have been a political assassination, with Kelso political rivals accusing each other of the murder and suing each other for defamation.
A break in the case came in October
1925 when a man held in the Cowlitz County jail said the gun discarded at the
scene of the crime had been loaned to a “John William Smith, itinerant fight
promoter” with the intention of “doing a job.” John William Smith was known as
a partner to Frank T. Hart, who had “an almost continuous prison record dating
back to 1916.” Hart had also worked as a cook and promoted prize fights before
the murder in Kelso.
A reward of $500 was offered for
information leading to the capture of the “Smith” and Hart. A woman named “Mrs.
Rosetta Smith of Genesee, Idaho” provided information that the man calling
himself John W Smith came to Latah County, Idaho shortly after the death of
Thomas Dovery “where he stayed with a woman whom he had formerly lived.” It was
through Mrs. Smith “that this relationship was traced” and it was learned that
Smith later left for St Louis, Missouri.
Washington Detectives went to
Missouri and found John Owens alias “Smith” employed as a cook on a river
steamer in St. Louis. Rosetta Smith shared in the $500 reward that led to the
capture of Owens although Frank Hart was still “at large.”
Owens’s confession had a familiar
ring to it as that “he laid full blame” of the actual death of the newspaper
editor on Hart who was his partner in promoting prize fights. He claimed that
on the day when Dovery was killed, Hart had purchased a gun in Portland with
the intention of holding up the “Long-Bell Lumber company” payroll at Longview
as that a prize fighting boxing match had failed and the men found themselves
“without money.” The robbery of the lumber company was a failure so the men
decided to “hold some one up and prowled around Kelso until they met Dovery.”
Thomas Dovery was told to “throw up
hands” and when the editor said he had no money, Hart “cursed him and struck
him on the head with the gun” which discharged killing Dovery.” Owens also
claimed that Dovery was targeted for his opposition to a prizefight being held
in Kelso.
The next day Hart and Owens fled
Portland in a stolen car going to La Grande Oregon and then parting ways at
Laramie Wyoming. Owens returned to Idaho for a while before heading back east
to Missouri where a year after the killing of Dover, Owens was arrested.
A Spokane Washington newspaper
reported that on 25 July 1926 “ “John W Owens alias John W. Smith, 54 year old
ex-convict arrested in St. Louis”, adding “Owens a former prizefight, he has
served ten years in prison for complicity in the murder of a policeman.”
During his trial Owens admitted being
with Hart at the time of the murder but claimed that it was Hart who had the
gun and did the shooting after he had tried to “dissuade him from his purpose.”
He said when they stared out to do a crime that he later he changed his mind
and “had no part in the attack on Dovery.”
The Kelso Washington jury convicted Owens on 23 September 1926 of first degree murder for
 |
| Walla Walla Ste Prison |
his role in the killing of Thomas Dovery. He was sentenced 4 October 1926 to 99 years in the state penitentiary. The 1930 Federal census for Walla Walla Washington listed John W Owens, age 57 born in Ohio, as a cook in the penitentiary.
Frank Hart remained on the run for
twelve years even when in1931 an award of $200
was offer for his arrest and conviction. Finally in 1937 a man calling
himself Fred Hall was arrested in Columbia South Carolina on a minor charge of
drunkenness and identified through fingerprints as Frank T Hart. In May 1937
Hart was acquitted of charges in the slaying of Dovery after a trial in Kelso.
Owens was still serving a 99-year sentence in Washington when Hart was arrested but it is not certain when John Owens was released from Prison. He certainly was there in 1934 when on February 12, inmates killed one guard and guards kill seven inmates during an escape attempt from the Washington State Penitentiary at Walla Walla. Another inmate died e of wounds later. However in 1938 he filed for Social Security benefits in Oregon and again in 1940 under two different accounts.
John William Owens outlived the
rest of the characters surrounding the drama that played out in 1907 on West
Second South in front of the Albany Hotel. He had left the west and was
residing in the Little Sisters of the Poor Home for the Aged in Nashville,
Tennessee. This Catholic order’s mission was to provide care for elderly,
needy, persons of any religion. In his final days he was cared for by a convent
of Catholic Nuns.
POST SCRIPT
As for the crime that occurred on a
snowy December day in 1907, it was only one of many robberies that took place
at the old Albany Saloon.
An August 1910 newspaper article
about a robbery was eerily similar when it reported “Two masked men, with drawn
revolvers, entered the Albany saloon at 579 West Second South Street at 12:30
this morning and compelling the bartender to hold-up their hands and one or two
patrons to hold-up their hands and proceeded to rob the cash register. They
secured $35 and made their escape near the Denver and Rio Grande freight
depot.”
More revealing to how dangerous the
bar was, is the little passage that
said, “This marked the fifth hold-up of the Albany bar within three years.”
Utah’s Alcohol Prohibition Law of
1917 essentially closed all the saloons, bars, and taverns in Salt Lake City.
Utah’s state law was enacted one year prior to the Eighteenth Amendment to the United
States Constitution, ratified in November 1919.
Earlier in September 1919 the
Albany Hotel which had become a ‘flop house’ for indigents burned down during
an alcoholic fueled orgy.
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