The Florence daily tribune., 1899-02-18
NO CRIME.

A New York retired detective has re
Gently told the following story showing
how a rian may try TO commit murder
and fail
"a Mrs Y was woman Of considerable
wealth and her nearest relative was a
grandson, who had graduated from one of
the medical colleges Of the city two years
before. DIR. Blank, as | shall call him,
had opened an Office for the practice of his
profession. but snrnt most of his time
drinking and gam Bling. His habits were
very bad and had greatly worried his
grandmother. who supplied him with
money The old woman had made a will
leaving most of her fortune to the young
doctor. For three months before her
death he had annoyed her very much by
his bId habits and constant demands for
money She had finally refused him any
further allowance and had threatened to
change her will and cut him OFF without
cent
when my partner and | werc detailed
on tbs case, We went first to the house of
tac dead woman and talked with the ser
wants DIR. Blank had been there the day
bciuU Mrs y. died and had demanded
mcrr money The huusekeepcr, who had
overheard part OF their conversation,
said n q Mrs \ was very angry at first
and hul told her grandson that unless he
reformed AT once he should never have a
penny Il her money That seemed TO
change him and after making many
Apologies he promised TO give up drink
md scttlc down To business. The woman
scCmc,l IN accept his pledge in good faith,
ANA they parted on friendly terms In
fnct. Mrs y had walked 10 the front door
with hcr gra,itlSun aud asked him to send
her some medicine for a cold from which
she WIS suffering At the suggestion OF
the young doctor servant was sent
nrpund'to his office in the next street and
returned in half an hour with the medi-
cine. which was preparation put up in
small cap ules Mrs Y. had taken three
ot these capsules before retiring that night.
Tic box containing the others was placed
in the custody of the district attorney by
the coroner
We questioned the servant who had
brought the medicine from the doctor 5
office, but she was 50 nervous and excited
at the time that we got very little infor-
nation from her However, she reinem-
bercd that DIR Blank had told her that
the capsules cont Iined quinine and
Dover powder. and that 1t was very i'm
portAnt thai Mrs. y. should take three of
them that night Why should DR. Blank
tell IL servant what medicine the capsules
contained There was no good reason
why he should have done so, and the fact
that he did tended to increase our suspi-
oion The girl also recalled that he had
retired to his inner Office to fix up the
medicine
There was plenty of motive for DR..
Blank to poison his grandmother, If she
had threatened To disinherit him, and u
will in his favor was in existence. We in
vestigated the mans record and found
that he had not stood well in college; that
his habits had long been very bad. The
cnsc looked SO bad for him that we de-
cidcd to take him down to headquarters
and let him have a talk with the inspector
pending the result Of the autopsy and in
quest. We had him watched through the
night and next day called at his office and
asked him to come with us and tell Byrnes
all he knew about the case. The man
turned white as a sheet, but made no pro
test against accompanying us to head
quarters.
"We left him in an anteroom while we
went in and told the inspector what we
had done and how much evidence we had
discovered.