Jasper County Democrat, Volume 23, Number 36, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 31 July 1920 — FOIL ATTEMPTED JAIL BREAK [ARTICLE]

FOIL ATTEMPTED JAIL BREAK

Automobile Thieves Saw Through Bars—Discovery Thwarts Escape. Sheriff Woodworth’s suspicions and close watch of the two alleged automobile thieves in jail here as prisoners of Newton county, resulted in his finding Wednesday morning that one of the bars of a window on the west side of the jail had been sawed in two in two places and the bar beside it was partly sawed in two. Only this timely discovery prevented their escape. The bar is 7-8 of an inch in diameter and it had been sawed in perhaps % of an inch in one place some years ago by a prisoner. This had been filled in and the bar painted, but these prisoners evidently found the gash and with some sort of tool completed the cut clear through. They then sawed into the bar about a foot above where they had severed it, cutting about 2>-3 of , the way through and then breaking it the rest of the way by pulling on the severed end. They had carefully replaced the piece of bar and covered the cuts with soap, evidently waiting for a favorable opportunity to saw out the other bar and make an opening wide enough toi admit their bodies or, perhaps, I lie in wait with this 12-inch bar and beat the sheriff into unconsciousness when he came in where they were and make their getaway, the piece of bar making a very formidable weapon.

It had been Sheriff Woodworth’s custom to Inspect the corridor each morning and test the bars at windows before letting the men out ot the steel cage into the former, and he had been more careful about this since finding that two knives with which they were provided, to eat their meals came back after one of the meals last week with the edges hacked, as if they had attempted to make saws of the knives. Since that time he had fed them without providing knives. A complete search after the discovery of the severed bar Wednesday morning flailed to disclose any implement, although some sort of a saw had been used. They both denied any knowledge of having hacked the knives, when questioned about it, as they also did any knowledge of the severed bar. While they were eating their breakfast Wednesday morning the sheriff made his usual tour of inspection, and on taking hold of a bar at one of the west windows—the cells and cage are in the center, between two corridors —a piece 12 inches long gave way and fell from his hand to the cement floor. Mr. Woodworth Immediately ordered the men back into the cage and made a thorough search of their quarters and later of their persons, but found nothing in the shape of a saw that they could, have used to sever the bar, and at this writing it still remaina a mystery, although a closer watch than ever will be kept on the prisoners and their quarters. There Is but one other prisoner in the jail, Estel Florence, who is awaiting trial at the September term of the Jasper circuit court on the charge of forging the name of C. R. Weiss to a number of checks a few weeks ago, and during the day he Is out in the corridor with the two auto thieves, but at night he accupiee a separate cell The sawIng of the bars must have been done Tuesday, during the day time, but young Florence has evidently been cowed by Mannls and Kasper

or really did not know what was going on, as he asserts that he knows nothing whatever about the bars being sawed off, but says he spent most of the day in the east corridor with one of the men while the other was in the west corridor. As told in The Democrat at the time of their being brought here, Kasper and Mannis came near digging out of the Kentland calaboose when confined there for a short time after their arrest. They are evidently a bad pair, and the presumption that they belong to an organized gang of automobile thieves is well founded. It is possible, of course, that some of their confederates may have passed saws into them from the outside. *\