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Show -I HU How Detective Walter y Confessions From the 1mm Guilty by Application w m r.... 'm.U mam 1 ::f;" ot Mental Pressure, ,. , ;;: Without Resorting jjjjl ft. A social service worker eager to get data on the administration of the third degree In obtaining confessions con-fessions from prisoners, receive! quite a shock the other day when he presented a letter of Introduction Introduc-tion to Walter Whitsett of the Whit-sett Whit-sett National Detective Agency at Kansas City and asked to be ''let in on the inside." The social service worker was admitted to the "inside" but what he saw surprised him immensely. In giving the third degree the prisoner pris-oner i? not clubbed over the head and compelled to confess. That might have worked In former days and Is till in vogue in out of tho w'ay places. Tho third degree as applied by tho up-to-date police official or de-teclhe de-teclhe Is not obtained under duress. If a confession Js obtained in that manner il has no standing in court and prisoners make it a point to deny their confesions on the stand, contending It was obtained under duress. Tho real detective in obtaining ob-taining his confession gets evidence which will bring out other witnesses. wit-nesses. He gets admissions, which can be substantiated by outsde ev-dence. ev-dence. A few years ago when Whltsctt waa a police captain he astounded the country several times by unraveling un-raveling mysteries Whllsett worked up from the ranks of patrolman. While patrolman tils, record for arrests ar-rests was so high that he rapidly gained promotions and finally bo-came bo-came captain of Central District in Kansas City, which was the center of the most notorious characters of the country. Kansas City Is half way place between be-tween one end of the country and the other, whether a man Is traveling travel-ing north and south or east and Tvest. As captain of the district Whltsett soon harl opportunity to show his worth. One of the most baffling cases In which he had to deal was the discovery dis-covery of a man and woman dead In a grocery store one morning. Both had been struck over the head. Sccral weeks after the murder two prisoners were arrested and brought Into Centra! District after an attempt to hold up a grocery store. Whltsett suspected them of the double murder. He did not pick on tho two men by chance. He had a hunch to start with. There had heen hundreds of men arrested and brought into Central District since the murder, but the hunch did not hold on them. To get a confession a man must have a hunch. Whltsetfs hunch came to him tho day of the murder. mur-der. He decided from the positions of the bodies that the gTocer had I been asked to wait on one of the murderers. KILLING WAS NOT PREMEDITATED, IS BELIEF. The men entered the store determined de-termined to rob the place. They would murder if they had to do BO As soon as the grocer was caught off his guard as he stooped over his counter to tie up the bundle of groceries purchased, one of the men struck him with a blunt weapon. The man fell to the floor. The robbers went to the cash register and got $1,500. Before they escaped es-caped .the wife of the gTocer entered en-tered the store, having heard her husband fall. As she entered the store from her living rooms upstairs, one of tho men struck her on the head, killing her instantly. Other police captains Went through the same line of reasoning as Whitsctt, but he seized the opportunity op-portunity when two men were brought before him charged with ,m attempt to strike the Becond grocer down while he was tying up a bundle. The patrolman who brought the prisoners In did not suspect them of murder, but Whltsett Whlt-sett did. He ordered thpm placed In separate sepa-rate cells and after studying them to see which man was the weaker he had what 1p known In police parlance par-lance as a stool pigeon placed in a cell with the weaker man. The stool pigeon is a spy of the police. Ho pretended to bo a crook himself him-self and told the story of his alleged crimes and soon had the other man talking The prisoner then confessed con-fessed to the pigeon the story of holding up and killing the grocer and his wife. He was brought before Whltsett. Whitsett Is a big man with a big face He looks as though he would be able to break a man's back with one blow and he probably could. He has a way of knitting his brows which makes him look fierce. Furthermore, Fur-thermore, he was dressed In the uniform of a police captain. He was the- law. The prisoner was at a disadvantage. He not only did not know he was suspected of tho murder, but he did not even know how much Whltsett knew about him "Whfrc were you three weeks ago Friday night?" Whltsctt demanded. The prisoner paled and trembled that was the murder night. "Where were you," the question came insistently The prisoner hurried to reply. Ho told a lie. Before he had finished Whltsett stopped him. "Listen, my man," said Whltsett, not unkindly, "You are talking to a man you can't lie to. I am captain cap-tain of police here, and if you have ever heard of me before you know I know my business. You can't lie to me; do you hear? Tell me where you were and tell me the truth." The man looked at the chief won-deringly; won-deringly; Ho could not toll vh thi r this big faced man would strike him or not. He could not tell if the big man w is going to be kind All he knew was the big man was determined de-termined to get at the bottom of the f.iets in the case. "I'll tell you the truth now," said the prisoner. Then he gave another an-other version of his whereabouts tho night of tho murder. Whilsett .stopped him again abrupU . "Don't He to me." said the captain cap-tain "Answer me this. Was it you that struck the fatal blow that killed that woman in tho grocery Eftore in Kansas City, Kan., or was It your partner? LAYS BLAME OX THE OTHER FEILOW. Eager to escape responsibility the man quickly threw the blame on his partner. He felt as though he was In the grip of a man with supernatural super-natural powers. He had to confess and do it right away, or else throw the blame on the other fellow. The mind of tho criminal worked slowly. He never had been sweated in this manner before. He had been beaten beat-en before, but never questioned by a determined man with a big fist who did not strike. "He did it," said the criminal. ' And you killed the man?" sug-Kcsted sug-Kcsted Whltsett. "No, he struck tho first blow and I struck him the second sec-ond blow," confessed the weakling. Whitsett then had tho man begin at tho beginning and tell the story all over again. A secretary was next brought In and the crook told the story all over while the secretary secre-tary took notes. A confession was written out on a typewriter and the culprit signed it The other man was called In and when confronted with tho evidence broke down and confessed, too. Confessions are more easily ob- WALTER WHITSETT questioning a prisoner, and in two different poses. tained when two or more persons are In the gang and can be played against each other. That was Whit-sett's Whit-sett's favorite game. A collector for h big feed store was held up one day In a lonely section sec-tion of Kansas City by four highwaymen, high-waymen, who tied him to a tree and escaped. They took only the company's money,' handing back $' of his own money, saying, "Wo rob only the rich " The police did not believe the collector col-lector They had him arrested be-llevlng be-llevlng the money had been stolen by him. He refused to confess, however, and after a while, tho caso was turned over to Whitsett. Whitsett Whit-sett Investigated the case and decided de-cided to take the man's word and turned him loose. Then Whitsett sent Ills special plain clothes men out to watch for spenders It Is a characteristic of criminals that as soon as they get money they will spond It freely. Four men were rounded up and from descriptions given by the man who was held up they were suspected. sus-pected. Women with whom they associated were brought in and questioned. Tho women said the prosperity of tho four men dated from the robbery. They gave other evidence which confirmed Whltsetfs theory they were tho robbers. They were given a thorough questioning one at a time. They were trapped in lies and finally one of them broke down and confessed. The rest followed suit and the Innocent victim of tho robbery rob-bery was ( h ired of bluue Two negroes guilty of attar king a woman, who were hung for their crime in Kansas City, were among Whltsetfs big captures. The woman wom-an had reported she had been robbed by them, but did not tell the police the full extent of their crime. He brought the men before him one at a time, They were hungry. One was a full-blooded negro and the other a mulatto. The full-blooded full-blooded negro was given a breakfast break-fast of pork chops and the other was returned to his cell. The black negro under a flro of questioning after a good breakfast, implicated his partner. DECIDES TO SUFFER I i ll ins FRI1 M. The mulatto was brought out next. He listened to the story told by the black one and then made his confession, Implicating both. Turning to the black negro, Whltsett Whlt-sett said: "You and this other fellow have been pJils, have you not?" "Yes," said the black negro. "If you are guilty you would not want him to take all the blame alone, would you?" The black man shifted uneasily and then rnnde a full confession. That confessions are not used entirely en-tirely to Implicate tho guilty was shown in a murdir mystery at an ice plant, where a watchman was killed with a heavy iron poker. The man was found dead at 5 a. m. The night beforo a jealous suitor killed his sweetheart at her home a half mile distant. No one connected the two cases. The man who killed his sweetheart also killed himself. It was a plain cose of murder and suicide. The watchman's death was a plain case of murder. Detectives working on the case looked for revenge. ' money had been taken from tho watchman, so the motive was not robbery. Revenge, to their minds, was the only motive left. They arrested ar-rested three men who had been discharged dis-charged from the ice plant three months before through being reported re-ported by the watchman. After two days of questioning tho detectives gave the case up and it was turned over to Whltsett. Whltsett sat at his desk thinking the matter over. He called tho manager of the ice plant to him and asked : "Let mo see this watchman's revolver." re-volver." Then they remembered the watchman's watch-man's revolver had been stolen "Let me sec the revolver with which the jealous suitor killed hia sweetheart and himself." Whltsett ordered. Tho revolver was brought to him and he locked it In his desk. Whitsett called the ico plant manager to him again and asked for a description of his watchman's revolver. It was a blue barrel gun with a rust spot on one side. It was loaded with four long cartridges and one short one. It had been loaded the night before and one of the employes of the plant had watched tho process. Whitsett threw a revolver on the table. "Is that If'" he asked It was not. Several others were, thrown on tho table. All were of the proper caliber, but none wero identified. Then Whitsett threw the revolver on the table that tho jealous jeal-ous suitor had used. All the ice plant employes Identified Iden-tified it quickly by its rusty spot and by tho short cartridge in the chamber. ' Thero is your murderer," said Whitsett. "This suitor got mad at his sweetheart He wanted to kill her. and kill her quick. He had no gun. so he ran to the ice plant and killed the watchman. He took tho gun and, running to his sweetheai f a house, killed the girl and then himself him-self " It was easy to see after It had been explained, and It was easier still wh n the manager of the ico plant said: That's right. Do you know that murderer was a sort of a pal of tho watchman0 That Is how he happened hap-pened to know the watchman had a gun. He probably j-ame there to borrow It, and when he saw tho watchman was looking in the other direction struck him on tho head and took the gun. It's all clear now." The suspects in the case wero dismissed. Rigors of tho Arctic. From the rigors of a winter spent in the Arctic, south of Point Barrow, Bar-row, to a luxurious suite of rooms in the New Washington Hotel, is tho experience of John Heard, Samuel Mlxtor and George S. Sllsbee, Harvard Har-vard graduates, sons of wealthy Boston men, who, with Dunbar Lock wood and Ebcn S. Draper, chartered the schooner Polar Bear more than a year ago and set out for the Arctic on a hunting trip. Lockwood and Draper managed to set away before winter closed down, but Heard, Mixter and Silsbee were forced to spend the winter in the Arctic. Provisions ran low. until the meals consisted largely of beans and rice, and with a thirty-mile or more gale whipping down from the Arctic wastes the season was not passed In comfort, the party declares. de-clares. "It would be all right in the summer, sum-mer, but never again for us in the winter," declared Mixter. "of course we had lota of fun and managed man-aged to kill tho time somehow, knowing that we would not have to stay there forever, but we wero glad when the ic0 began to break up In July and we could work the ship out of the does that held her securely for many months " The party which chartered the Polar Bear was accompanied by two entomologists from Harvard University. Uni-versity. Prof. Joseph Dixon and Prof. W. S. Brooke, and W. E. Hudson. Hud-son. The object of the party was to spend the summer hunting In tho Arctic and get out before winter. When the party was ready to sail to the southward it discovered Itself It-self blocked by immense ice floes. With no way of getting out. Heard, Mixter and Sllsbeo decided to stay by the ship, while the balance of the party made their way out over the ice. A shelter was built on shore, where tho three made their headquarters. head-quarters. The steamer Belvldere v. i - also caught In the Ice aeout fourtt en miles from them, and the crews of the two ships journeyed and forth, trading phonograph records and books With reading, listening to phonograph music and hunting, the party passed the winter. They had no fresh vegetables, but by taking plenty o exercise they fought off the maladies which frequently fre-quently attack those who spend a winter in the Arctic. For sixty-three sixty-three days there was no sun, and only three hours every day of half twilight, In which objects such aa ptarmigans and other game could be faintly distinguished. The camp was stirred to excitement excite-ment one night when a huge polar I" t came up to the doorway and started gnawing on the skin "ky-ack," "ky-ack," or Eskimo canoe that stood outside. The Eskimo hunters, however, how-ever, dispatched the bear before he did much damage to tho boaf When the ice broke up this sum , j mer the Polar Bear, with the party, ' ft cruised along Banks land, catching eight whales, then up past Point Barrow, where they caught two more whales off Herald Island. Search was made for the survivors of the Stefansson expedition, but nothing was found of them. Included in the collection of trophies tro-phies which the party will take back to Boston are skins of polar bear, walrus, mountain sheep, caribou cari-bou and a species of brown bear The three young men will leave for Boston some time today or tomorrow to-morrow As the trip was made following fol-lowing the conclusion of their terms at Harvard, they say they except to go back and settle down to work, as their year of plav is ended. . Smuggled Out a Bennett Manuscript The original manuscript of Arnold Arn-old Bennett's "The Regent," also known as 'The Old Adam." is now In this country, tho property of Edgar Ed-gar Selwyn, the dramatist. How Selwyn smuggled tho manuscript out of Bennett's house at Thorpe- j le-Soken. In Essex. England, is aa Interesting tale. Mrs. Bennett Is the feminine Cerberus who guards original manuscripts with a zest and caro verging on tho fanatic. No manuscript has ever been known to leave her possession before. Ben-nett Ben-nett and Selwyn were discussing things in general when the former offered the desired manuscript to the dramatist. "But how will I get it past your Wife?" queried the American. "Here it Is, just put it under your coat and walk out," responded the Briton. "But it's a bulky package and she'll see it " "If she stops you give her this. replied Bennett. And seizing a pea he wrote on the cover of the bundle bun-dle ' This manuscript belongs to Edgar Selwyn and is the property of no woman." And that Is how the manuscript was smuggled out of the Bennett home. Finding the Wind. The way to find which way the wind is blowing is to throw up little lit-tle bits of dry grass, or to throw up a handful of light dust and let It fall, or to suck your thumb, wet it all around and let tho wind blow over it, and the cold side of It will then tell you which way the wind is blowing. |
