Evening Republican, Volume 20, Number 103, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 29 April 1916 — CHICAGO YOUNG MAN CONFESSED MURDER [ARTICLE]

CHICAGO YOUNG MAN CONFESSED MURDER

Edgar Hettinger Killed Milliner to Get Money to Buy His Girl Chocolate Sundaes. On the night of April 4th, Mrs. Agnes Middleton, a widow who conducted a millinery store in Chicago, was murdered. The body showed that she had been 'beaten and then killed with a razor. Thirty or more suspects were arrested and the crime was about to be fastened on a poor musician who roomed in Mrs. Middleton’s house. Detectives kept working on the case, however, and finally a young man named Edgar Kittinger, was arrested and made full confession. He is only 19 years of age and is ilasscd as a “moron.” He related the full story of the killing, saying that he went to bed and after his parents were asleep he got up quietly, procured a hammer from his farther’s paint shop, climbed up a spout and into a window in Mrs. Middleton’s room. He was looking for money when Mrs. Middleton awoke. She sprang from her bed and rushed toward him and he met her and struck her on the head with the hammer, and she fell. He then took his razor and cut her throat. He slipped three diamond rings from her fingers and then escaped through the window and ran, he hardly knew where. He went rp alleys, over many fences and finally sat down exhausted and then returned to his home, tiptoed into the house and went to sleep. He says he threw the rings away in his flight. They have not been found. A policewoman was largely instrumental in the arrest. Kittinger said he needed money to 'buy chocolate sundaes for his girl.