Category: Crimes against property

Mad Mama?

May 13, 1907
Highland Park

15-year-old William McCormick visited the police to make a panicked plea for the salvation of his mother Janette, removed yesteday from 228 South Avenue 66 to the lunatics’ ward of the County Hospital. His mother is, William swears, quite sane, and her confinement the result of a family plot to steal her inheritance.

Mrs. McCormick is the primary beneficiary of a million dollar estate based in Denver, although much of the family lives on the west coast, including cousin Arthur Randall, in whose home the McCormicks had been staying.

Although no warrant for the woman’s arrest was ever produced, Superintendant Barber of the County Hospital accepted the word of the deputy sherrifs who brought the shrieking woman into his ward that such a warrant was in the hands of the Sheriff, and he refuses to release his captive until the case is investigated today.

Young McCormick explains, "After the death of my grandmother, mother and I came to the Coast. When our relatives learned that the greater portion of the property was left to mother and me, they began to plot. While we were in San Diego, Mrs. Belle M. Auston, who now lives in Black River Falls, Wis, and is my aunt, tried to kidnap me and was unsuccessful."

After this shock, the pair moved on to stay with a lady cousin in Ocean Park, then moved in with cousin Arthur. "He is the one who is making this trouble for mother. She is sane and has never been troubled with any symptoms of insanity. I believe that my uncles N.M. Phelps and A.D. Merrill of Denver have hired Randall to try to get mother in an asylum, so as to get her fortune! Phelps was left only $5000 by my grandmother’s will and Merrill was not mentioned. I am not very old, but I don’t want to see them harm mother."

The police sargeant told the youngster to contact the District Attorney.

I Love a Parade…You Fools!

May 8, 1907
Los AngelesOne expects Fiesta-time to be fortuitous to the light-fingered gentry (e.g., V. S. Hawley had a $30 gold watch taken from his pocket; E. E. Leech was relieved of $7 while standing on Main Street watching the floats) but when goods are taken by the wagon-load, then we’ve got serious business afoot. No fewer than nine major break-ins were reported last night. The thieves in each case were evidently experienced operators, who feared little for being molested during their duties, especially given as in every instance the intrusion coincided with the Fiesta parades between 8pm and 12am. Further, the thieves had discriminating taste: at the home of S. H. Garrett, where entrance was gained through a rear window, purloiners went through the wardrobe and selected the finest of silk dresses and evening clothes to purloin; they even absconded with the better bedclothes. At 2629 Orchard Avenue, W. W. Taylor lost a gold watch, chain, necklace, and locket; at the same address Mrs. William Fleckenstein was relieved of her opera glasses and solid silver flask. Most astonishing was the haul from Mr. Nelson Douglas of 2500 Vermont Avenue, wherein unpacked suitcases belonging to his Shriner guests were lifted in toto. Watches, jewelry, money in the children’s bank; all are in the hands of Los Angeles’ dark and shadowy underworld this day.

Of Human Bondage

May 5, 1907
Los AngelesMary Hawn is by all accounts an attractive twentysomething, average enough perhaps, save that she has a Superior Court case today. And she was bound and gagged in her bed by an intruder last night.”Being very much exhausted and having retired rather late, I fell into a sound sleep. When I can next remember I seemed to feel someone’s breath above my head. My mouth hurt me and someone was cramming it full. I opened my eyes and tried to move. Then I was frozen with horror. A masked man was leaning over me and was finishing the work of gagging me.

“Oh, it seemed for such a long time he bent foreward, gazing into my face. Then I tried to move and found my hands and feet bound together. After what seemed to me a long time, the man raised up and walked to the bureau. He searched it and then returned, he whispered that he would kill me if he did not find my papers before long. After making other threats at my life, he left.”

This occurred in her room at the Golden West Hotel, 412 South Main Street. Which Miss Hawn owns; she purchased the hotel from a Covina man in May of 1906. Little is known about their relationship, except that a) the hotelman died a short time later, and b) he left his life insurance to Miss Hawn, some one thousand dollars.

And the Superior Court case? The mysterious man’s widow is suing Miss Hawn for the insurance money. It is papers relating to this case that Miss Hawn alleges her visitor was after.

P.E.O. Sisters Boosted on Budlong

May 1, 1907
Los AngelesThe Sisters of the P.E.O. are a mysterious bunch. So much so that no-one knows what the initials P.E.O. stand for. What began as an Iowa sorority has morphed into a powerhouse of sisterhood, its guarded secrets forever hidden from the world of men.More mysterious, however, was the daylight robbery at the P.E.O. meeting held in the home of Sister Frederika Friend, 2302 Budlong Avenue. Sister Friend had made elaborate arrangements for a delightful afternoon, and as the Sisters talked business, and the cateress and coffee-colored assistants prepared the luncheon, Mrs. W. H. Faust of 2869 West Eighth Street strode upstairs to the dressing-room on the second floor where the ladies had left their wraps and pocketbooks. Mrs. Faust opened her clutch to get money with which to pay her dues, and found twenty dollars missing. She appeared white-faced at the top of the stairs, and in trembling tones exclaimed “Sisters! We have been robbed!”

The sisters rushed upstairs and drove their hands into their pocketbooks and indeed, most every sister had lost some of their cash contents. Police were summoned but they could find no evidence of a “second-story man,” and further determined that no-one could have gained ingress through the rear door without detection. At this information, Sister Friend reportedly broke down and cried. She was joined by others. A search was made of the house (and of the aforementioned cateress and “coffee-colored assistants,” we assume) to no avail. With this, the patrolmen departed, and the sisters sat down and cried some more, after which ice cream was served.

Of course, no suspicion attaches to any member of the Sisterhood.

And there the mystery rests.

New Heroine, Old Story

May 1, 1907
Los Angeles

“I love him, judge, and I just can’t keep away from him,” said winsome Grace Evans as tears coursed down her cheek. But she promised Justice Austin never to go near him again.

She was a simple country girl, caught in the swirl of gay city life, when she was led into a career of sin by one Alfred Medina. He taught her innocent twenty year-old mouth the ways of wrapping around an opium pipe. She stole twenty-three dollars to feed her habit, was popped for grand larceny, and spent a week in jail before being hauled before Austin. It was the contention of Deputy District Attorney Pearson that she had been more sinned against that had sinned, urging that she should escape sentence if she returned to the country to begin life anew.

And so it came to be that she promised never to see Medina again. But a young girl in the throes of having her innocence destroyed can scarcely be believed, though in time perhaps she may be redeemed.

In other Court news, Jesus “Bar Wielder” Suega was convicted of disturbing the peace and sentenced to twenty-five days in the City Jail. Suega had run amok in the Llewellyn Iron Works earlier in the week, attacking the workmen with a heavy piece of iron and driving all employees en masse from the establishment.

Give Them What They Ask

April 28, 1907
Los Angeles
 
Tamalaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay!
 
That is the call of the tamalera, they known to those of us who reside in the Hispanic neighborhoods, a siren song that wakes us to church, to industry, but mostly to meat and masa in husk.  But treat these folk well; James Couts, a sash and door worker playing a game of ball at 38th and Santa Fe yesterday, was knifed repeatedly by a tamale peddler after some trouble about payment.
 
In other news, the rash of burglaries continues to increase as Fiesta nears.  A. C. Nagle was brutally assaulted, and robbed of his diamond ring and Elks pin, at Ocean Park last night.  Rings were stolen from 936 East 31st, and silverware and clothing from 210 East 16th. 
 
Nearer town, in a restaurant on North Main Street, James Selagar and Pedro Fierros fought a furious knife duel, sending both, after their arrest, to Receiving Hospital for treatment.

Do Not Mess with a Woodman

April 26, 1907
Los Angeles

Thomas Cash, State Deputy Treasurer of the Woodmen of the World, was sleeping in his room at 852 Stephenson Avenue early this morning when awakened by a rustling in his adjoining office. Cash armed himself with what was nearest—a sturdy shoe—and advanced on the burglar, who fled, but Cash gave chase. Cornering the housebreaker at the end of the hall, Cash dealt a fearsome blow to the intruder’s face with his shoe. From there they grappled and struggled and rolled onto the rear porch, where the burglar made a wild leap sixteen feet into the back yard and, after having to clamber over a barbed-wire topped fence, disappeared. As a relic of the desperate battle, Cash has the collar and shirt front of the burglar. Other than that, Cash came away without so much as a scratch.

Watch Out!

April 24, 1947
Santa Monica 

When Antoine Busier agreed to purchase eleven trays of golden trinkets for $197.60 from the Elgin National Jewelry Company of Illinois, he thought he was getting a fine bargain. It was only after he had taken possession of the gewgaws that he began to suspect he might have been taken.

He addressed an inquiry to the celebrated Elgin National Watch Company to confirm that he was dealing with so esteemed a firm… only to discover that they did not offer gold collar buttons of the sort he had obtained, and further that they knew nothing of the agent who had sealed the deal.

Antoine Busier had made two payments at this stage; he did not extend the third. The Elgin Jewelry Company subsequently assigned the debt to F. R. Robertson, and it was he who met Busier in the courtroom of Superior Court Judge Wilbur today to demand the remaining $98.80, plus court costs.

Busier suggested to Judge Wilbur that the items might not truly be gold, freeing him of the obligation to complete the purchase. Accordingly, the Judge sent out for a bath of muriatic acid, and dropped a few of the shining pieces into the liquid. The golden surface bubbled briefly, then fell away, revealing plain metal below.

The case continues tomorrow, but courtroom observers suspect it will fall in Busier’s favor. 

Woman Doctor here Near Death

April 24, 1907
Los Angeles
Doctor Mary Green had a thriving practice once, for which she rented an office at 624 Fifth Street; she lives in a comfortable suite of rooms in the Hotel Avalon, also on Fifth.  And yet the Good Doctor, who has practiced in Chicago, Cincinnati, and San Francisco before landing in Los Angeles, is said to be unable to show any certificate showing she is a graduated physician.  It is said as well that she is addicted to morphine.
Last night, according to the proprietor of the Avalon, a man (claiming to be her husband) visited; a short time later, Doctor Mary Green lay dying.  At Receiving Hospital she was indeed found to be a heavy user of the needle.  And, as letters from a Doctor Anderson pointed out (penned after a recent trip of Green”™s to Emergency General), she seemed likely to take her life.  While that life was saved at Receiving, it remains to be seen whether Doctor Mary Green will make it through much more life-time.

Dramatic Disclosures Come After Girl Cashier’s Death

April 20, 1907
Los Angeles 

Pity Miss Alice Chevallier, native of this city, who took too powerful a sleeping potion a few evenings past, and now lays rotting in her grave in New Calvary. She follows her mother and her brother, but unlike them, her death brings with it unwelcome notoriety.

Alice was a longtime cashier at the Ville de Paris dry goods emporium on Broadway, between 2nd and 3rd Streets. At some stage in her career, she developed a system by which she could bring home with her a portion of the day’s receipts. In recent months, it is believed this was as much as $300 a day. A clever girl, she invested her takings in real estate, and built a handsome portfolio.

But her ingrained nervousness and peculiar disposition–she did not care for men, and perhaps not coincidentally suffered ovarian tumors, neuralgia and insomnia–proved the thief’s undoing. She found it necessary to escape to Catalina to rest following an operation, although she must have realized that her absense from the place of her crimes would make discovery likely. And that is precisely what happened.

Alice returned to her home at 226 West Jefferson, distraught from a sustained bout of sleeplessness and the anxiety of meeting the Ville de Paris’ lawyers. Although her real estate holdings were now sufficiently valuable to cover any restitution required and more, she languished in a state of abject horror.

On Sunday evening, Alice told her sister-in-law that she intended to take a sleeping powder, but in fact she took laudanum and chloroform, two drugs with which she had significant past experience. This time, the dose was too much for her weakened system, and the girl lingered until Wednesday before expiring. Her doctors stress that although it might look like a suicide, the true cause was congestion of the brain–the same organic disorder that lead her to steal in the first place.