Salt Lake Telegram | 1939-03-21 | Page 4 | Wife Accused in Blast Death

WIFE ACCUSED 111 BLAST DEATH . ELIZABETHTOWN, III, March 21 INS) Authorltiet charged to- 4 day that tha truck explosion which killed Earl Austin, 40, national youth administrator for Hardin county, was the result of a murder- , for-inaurance plot engineered by Austin's wife and Theodore Simmons, Sim-mons, 30, her admirer and neighbor. The wife, Mrs. Alice Austin. 35, and Simmons were booked for mur- der and held without bail. Tha pair wore taken to Saline county jail at Harriaburg at feeling raa high among Elisabeth town reel- . l dents. Miss Lucine McDowell, young employe em-ploye of a federal home aid service who was ridina. in ths truck with ' Austin, waa injured critically by a the blast, allegedly caused by i "planted" dynamite. Miss McDowell's McDow-ell's left leg had to be amputated and hospital attaches gave her alight chance for recovery. ' . Austin, horribly mangled, died five hours after the explosion. ' Within two houre of the man't death State's Attorney C E. Soward ordered the arrest of Mrs. Austin and Simmons. He said he had evi- ( donee tending to show they plotted to kill Austin for hit life insurance, -which totaled 313.000 In two policies.