Jasper County Democrat, Volume 14, Number 97, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 16 March 1912 — THREE KILLED IN RIOT AT PRISON [ARTICLE]

THREE KILLED IN RIOT AT PRISON

Nebraska Warden, Deputy and Guard Shot Dead. KEEPER WOUNDED BYCONVICTS Guns Smuggled Inside Walls Are Used by Prisoners In Deadly Assault —Three Guilty Men Escape in Snowstorm.

Lincoln, Neb., March 15. —Convicts in the state penitentiary started a riot and killed Warden James Delahunty, Deputy Warden Charles Wagoner and Guard A. G. Heilman. Keeper Doody of one of the cellhouses was slightly wounded. The convicts overpowered a guard, seized his gun and with it attacked the penitentiary officers. Delahunty, Wagoner and Heilman were fatally shot and died within half an hour. When news of the murder. reached the state capitbT a call was at once sent to police headquarters and a. squad of officers left at once for the prison. Company Fof the national guard was ordered out to quell the riot. The convifcts’ insurrection started about 2 o’clock. The riot was quelled l at 3 p. m. State, county and city officers Started at once for the penitentiary on learning of the riot. Guns and dynamite were smuggled into the penitentiary from the outside. None of the dynamite was used, the' imprisoned desperadoes resorting only to the firearms, with which they did their deadly work. The three convicts, Gray, Martin and Forbes, shot Deputy Warden Wagoner in the chapel room, which looks out into the prison yard. Doody was shot in the west cellhouse, where he is the keeper. The murderers rushed the turnkey, took his keys and let themselves out into the main corridor. It was just outside the barred steel doors kept by the turnkey that Warden Delahunty met death. He was shot twice and almost instantly kHled. Hellman was in the clerk’s office, opening into the main hall, and was shot as he started out to assist the warden. The three slayers ran out of the front entrance and made their escape in the snowstorm. It is believed they went south from the penitentiary The sheriff’s office and police have posses out through the country looking for them, and telephone messages have been sent to surrounding territory. None of the other convicts except the three who did the killing attempted to escape or to raisfe any disturbance. The turnkey locked the doors at once after their departure and the force of prison assistants immediately caused the convicts to be locked in their cells.