The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-12-11
BARBER MAY BE A BLUE BEARD
COLLECTED ON SEVEN
LIVES SINCE 1883.

-Four of the Dead Persons Wives of
the beneficiary, One "a MOther-in-
Law, One a Daughter and the
other an EmplOye - Insurance
Companies Cause His Arrest But
the Evidence Not Sufficient to War
rant a Charge of Murder as Yet.
New York, Dec. 1O.-Charles Zanoli, the
barber who yesterday pleaded guilty to
defrauding an insurance company, and
who admitted that since 1888 he had col
Iected insurance on four wives, one moth
er-in-law, one daughter, and one employe,
was arraigned in police court again to-day
on the charge of being a suspicious per-
son. He was remanded until tomorrow
to give the detectives on the case time to
thoroughly investigate his record and as
certain whether the lives of all these peo-
ple, whose insurance Zanoh obtained, were
lost through natural causes. The charge
made by the insurance companies will not
be pressed until this curious sequence of
deaths has been thoroughly investigated.
ZanoH asserts that all the persons on
whose lives he collected Insurance. died
from natural cause, but admits collecting
1856 on an insurance policy taken out in
his own name, after he had represented to
the company that the dead body of an
employe named Schmidt was himself.
While prosecuting his insurance business,
Zanoli Travelled under the names of Braune
and Summer. The police have no definite
evidence to warrant the charge of muir
der.
Several of the physicians who attended
the wives of Zanoli, made statements to
Police Captain McCluskey tonight. DR..
J. w. Lyman, who attended Zanolis third
wife at the time of her death, told Sergt.
Morris that he was puzzled by some of the
symptoms of the case and that he con-
sidered Zanolfs conduct peculiar at the
time The doctor also said that he had
talked with his wife about the matter,
and that when accounts of the Thorn case
were published he had wondered if the
barber Braune or Zanoli and the barber,
Thorn, were not one and the same. DR..
Lyman said he thought the woman died
from apoplexy, but he never felt positive
about the matter.
DR.. c. E. Barton, one of the attending
physicians on Jennie Sumner, the fourth
wife who died Aug. g. 1897, said that he
examined this woman just previous to her
initiation into the order of United Friends.
Zanoli wanted a policy of 5000 on his own
life, and another policy of $1,000 on the life
of his fourth wife. On account of their ap-
parent poverty, the doctor refused to pass
Zanol for that amount, but agreed to al
low both persons to take out a policy for
81 600. DR.. Barton considered some of the
symptoms attendant upon the illness of
Mrs. Zanoli or Summer, as she was known,
as suspicious, but Dr. Harris, who had
also been called into the case, told him
that the woman died of heart failure.
Dr. Harris corro borated many of the
statements made by Dr. Barton.
DIR. E. j. Sheehan, who attended Lena
Zanol the second wife, who died Nov. 25
1895, said that he gave a certificate that
death was caused by apoplexy. He no
ticed nothing peculiar about the case at
the time he was called in to prescribe for
the woman. The bodies of several of the
persons whose lives were insured in "a
nolPs favor will be exhumed for the pur-
pose of determining, if possible, any ad-
ditional facts concerning the causes of
death.