Jasper County Democrat, Volume 5, Number 13, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 July 1902 — SHE MURDERED 31 PERSONS [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

SHE MURDERED 31 PERSONS

That Is the Confession of Miss Toppan, the Trained Nurse. A record probably without a parallel m the annals of crime is that of Miss Jane Toppan, the trained purse whosi

home is at Barnstable. Mass., and whe was found "not guilty, by reason o 1 insanity,” of th« murder by poisoning of Mrs. Marj D. Gibbs of Catument. Mass., last August. Three experts declared that she is suffering from a form of degenerative insanity, having defective

control and an irresistible impulse. The woman has been committed for life to the Taunton insane asylum. Before her case came to trial she told her counsel that she murdered thirty-one persons. Some she killed with morphine and others with poisons she cannot remember. She said she murdered to gratify a passion, but cannot give the dates of all the deaths she caused. In numerous cases she set fires to houses in which she was a nurse. Her counsel and the experts doubt the accuracy of certain portions of her confession, but evidence to disprove or to substantiate it is lack, tng.

MISS TOPPAN.