Democratic Sentinel, Volume 21, Number 36, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 September 1897 — IS THE WOMAN DEAD? [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

IS THE WOMAN DEAD?

LUETGERT'S LAWYERS CLAIM IT CANNOT BE PROVEN. Upon that Point Hinges the Fate of Chicago’s Rich Sausage Maker, Who Is Being Triel for a Most Hideous Crime. Case of Great Interest. Not since the celebrated Cronin case has Chicago had a trial which promised so much in the line of sensation as that of Adolpn Luetgert, the rich sausagemaker who is accused of murdering his wife. The trial, which is now on, will probably continue two months. The long trial and the extraordinary features involved will give the case a place among the most famous crimes of the century. The theory of the prosecution, represented by State Attorney Charles S. Deneen, is that Luetgert, who was not on good terms with his wife, murdered her and disposed of her body by dissolving it in a sausage vat tilled with caustic soda and crude potash. The defense will set up the claim that Mrs. Luetgert is not dead, that she wandered away from home while demented and is still alive. The strength of the prosecutor's case depends upon the ability of the attorneys and police to prove that Mrs. Luetgert is dead. The difficulties involved in establishing the corpus delicti gives the case a resemblance to the Park-man-Webster murder in Boston half a century ago.

Luetgert is about 50 years old. He used to be a saloonkeeper, but after his marriage to 18-year-old Louise Bickner

about twenty years ago he went into the sausage manufacturing business. He had a knowledge of chemistry, and by using it in his business produced a superior article and rapidly accumulated money. He was once worth $300,000, but his fortune has dwindled somewhat. During the last few years he and his wife lived unhappily, and though he ate at home he spent his nights in the sausage factory, which stood in the rear of the house. At 10 o’clock Saturday evening, May 1, little Louis Luetgert bade his mother good-night and left her sitting in the back parlor of their splendid home.

Her’husband was, as usual, spending the night in the factory. When Louis and the other children came down to breakfast the following morning their mother was missing. Luetgert -was informed, but remarked that she would turn up all right. Days passed, but Mrs. Luetgert did not return and finally her brother notified the police. Luetgert suggested suicide. The river was dragged and the country round about searched, but no trace of her could be found. Accused of Murder. Finally Inspector Schaack grew suspicious and when the night watchman and engineer at the sausage factory told him that the night Mrs. Luetgert disappeared, Luetgert had been doing unusual things at the factory his suspicion grew into a belief that Luetgert had murdered his wife. The engineer said that, contrary to the usual order of affairs, Luetgert had him keep the tires at the factory going that night and that he saw Luetgert moving around the place mysteriously until 3 o'clock Sunday morning. Luetgert was arrested and his factory was searched, One of the sausage vats showed evidence of recent use. At the bottom was found, in a very much diluted form, a solution of potash and caustic soda. There were also found two of Mrs. Luetgert’s rings, several pieces of bone, an artificial tooth which a dentist identified as one he had made for Mrs. Luetgert, and, in the

eateh basin of the sewer which drained the vat, several pieces of bone and a small tangle of hair. It was the theory of the police that Luetgert had enticed his wife to the factory, killed her, possibly by strangulation, and that he then immersed her body in the diabolical solution in the vat, turned on the steam until the solution boiled, and calmly watched and stirred the contents until disintegration was complete. To this awful charge Luetgert entered a calm and complete denial.' He maintained that his wife was still alive, that she would eventually appear, and that the alleged evidence of the police was a mass of fabrication. Nevt rt be less he was held for murder. A few days later a young

man said that be had met a demented woman in Kenosha, Wis., who answered Mm. Luetgert’s description and who said that she had a sister in Chicago named Muelkr. Mrs. Luetgert has a sister by that name. Subsequently it was reported that Mrs. Luetgert was seen in New York and that she had sailed for Europe. Luetgert’s lawyers claim that these reports are true and that the murder theory is an outrage. In the course of preparation for the

trial, and for the purpose’of demonstrating that it is actually possible for a human body to have been entirely disintegrated within the time limit set by the police in their theory of the crime, an experiment was made at Rush Medical College a few weeks ago under the supervision of Profs. Haines and Delafontaine, and in the presence of State’s Attorney Deneen and representatives of the police department. The body of a pauper who had died at the hospital, weighing about 130 pounds, was dismembered, placed in a boiler containing a strong solution of caustic soda and potash and boiled for three hours. At the end of that time practically nothing was left except a few pieces of bone, which easily crumbled under pressure, and the bottom of the boiler was found to contain a thick brown ooze, similar in composition to that in the bottom of the sausage factory vat. To offset this experiment the defense ask to be permitted to make an experiment in court. The cadaver used by the State, say the attorneys for the defense, was several days old. In it there was not the resisting power of nerves and ihuscles that a body from which life has just passed would offer to the action of the solution. Acting upon this belief the defense wants to conduct experiments with ,a fresh body.

ADOLPH L. LUETGERT.

THE LUETGERT HOME.

LUETGERT’S BIG SAUSAGE FACTORY.

MRS. LUETGERT.