The San Francisco call., 1898-03-08
Jerry SuIlivan's Bullets Went Wide of Vital
 Spots.
He Still Declines to Talk About the Cause of the Shooting.
How the Wounded Woman Came to Be Styled the Queen of
 Pickpockets."

1 Mabel Heating, who is commonly
 known as the queen of pickpockets, and her husband, James Heating, who
 were shot on Sunday night i'll the lat ter's saloon at the corner of Grant
 avenue and Morton street by Jerry Sul- 1 livan, a janitor employed at the City Hall, are not yet destined to reach the
 Morgue. They are both on the road to
 recovery, and the prison sergeants ex-
 pect to be called upon within the next
 six weeks to again record the name or
 Mabel Heating on the City Prison register.
 Mrs. Heating is not particular as to
 names At times when she has had
 ride in the police van she has posed as Mabel Tierney; on other occasions, when charges were hanging over her
 head in the criminal courts she was
 Mabel Armstrong. Now that she has
 come to the fore in a shooting affray as
 Mrs. Mabel Heating 1t is not improba-
 ble that she may have another change
 of name. Be that as it may, the Re ceiving Hospital physicians discharged
 her and her husband yesterday, not
 deeming their wounds of sufficient se- riousness to prevent them going to their home in hack.
 Sullivan was called for arraignment
 before Judge Conlan yesterday morn ing and at the request of his counsel Arthur Mack, the preliminary hearing was postponed until next Tuesday Sullivan still refuses to talk about the
 shooting, saying that he prefers to tell
 his story in court rather than through
 the medium of the newspapers.
 Mabel Heating has frequently been in the docks of the criminal courts since 1892, on charges ranging from drunkenness battery and vagrancy to that of grand larceny. She lays no | claim to the title of queen of pick
 pockets; in fact, she disdains the | name. It was given to her by writer
 on morning daily several months ago, when she was arrested on charge Of
 grand larceny. Being short of 'lurid stuff to fill the Sunday supplement, it was decided to write up Mabel Keat- 1 ing as the queen of pickpockets." The
 only foundation for the story of her being a clever pickpocket was that she had frequently been arrested for rob- ping drunken and bucolic strangers,
 and invariably succeeded in escaping conviction. A large sized picture of Mabel, labeled the queen of pickpock cts" was published at the same time, and through that Sunday story the title was affixed.
 The fact is that the men who have
 made complaint against Mabel Heating, alias Tierney alias Armstrong, and caused her arrest for larceny could
 never afford to prosecute her. In many | instances the complaint was made by men who would never think of going | into the Police Court as prosecutors
 unless they had been indulging too | freely in the liquor dealt out on the Barbary Coast. When they became | 1,~Ar hn lNIv d dicay
 bearing from the city. Others had | families at home and had gone out on l a lark When they discovered that they ! had lost their pocket books while in the | company of the pleaSant-speaking and
 pleasant-looking Mabel they had her arrested. In the morning they would awaken to the fact that they had been | in places they would not like their 1 wives to know of, and so kept away | from court for fear of the publicity that might follow, charging up their loss to 1 the account of experience on the
 coast
 It was learned yesterday that jeal-
 ousy prompted the double shooting. | A short time ago Sullivan fell in
 love with Mabel Heating and she ap- ] peared to reciprocate his affection. | Freouently the woman and Sullivan
 were seen together, their conduct be- l ing so notorious that it was whispered l among the habitueS or the coast that | she had given Heating the shake" '" l On being appraised of his wife's devo- 1 tion to the gay City Hall janitor Keat- l ing became angry and threatened to l do up the despoiler of his happiness. l Meeting Sullivan several days before :. the shooting he ordered him to cease
 paving attention to his wife or suffer
 the consequences. Fearing trouble
 between the men Mabel sent note to i Sullivan, in which she wrote that she
 still loved Jim" and intended to
 stick by him"
 we must not meet any more" she l wrote. Jim is on to us. Keep away
 from the saloon, as he is likely to kill l you" 1 After receiving the note Sullivan
 went to a friend and borrowed re-
 yolver. When asked what he intended to do with 1t he remarked that if he could not get Mabel to leave her hus- band he would shoot both of them. This was last Saturday. After
 brooding over the matter Sullivan, who
 was under the influence of liquor,
 went to the saloon and meeting his l former sweetheart he shot her and l then her husband.