Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1901-11-13
TELLS Of Plan IO Kill
Newell Rathbun Who Attempted
to Defraud Insurance Com
pany Makes Confession.
Gives Name OF Victim whom He
Swore Was His Own
Dead Self.
Admits Everything But the Kill.
ing OF Goodman.-Rathbun
Badly Frightened.

Louisville Ky, Nov. 13.-Newell C
Rathbun, who, according to the police
has confessed that he planned to de-
fraud an insurance company out OF
$4,000 by pretending that corpse ship
ped to Little Rock, Ark, was his owr
dead body, has admitted, the authori-
ties say, that the man who accompanied
him to the hotel in Jeffersonville. Ind
and was found dead the next day, was
Charles Goodman, who is said to have
come from Evansville, Ind.
Goodman disappeared from the Sal.
walton Army hotel in Louisville last
Wednesday night with the announced
intention of going to Indiana with .
newlyfound friend.
Chief of Detectives Sullivan, Chief
Applegate and Coroner Coots of Jeffer-
sonville interviewed Rathbun yester-
day.
Rathbun listened as one by one the
circumstances which the police regard
L as proofs of his guilt We're laid before
him by Chief Sullivan. According to
the officers, Rathbun sprang up, and
walking hastily to window, looked
out for a few minutes. Then, turning
/ like an animal at bay, he faced the
crowd of men in the room and asked in
a shaking voice:
What is the punishment for offenses
of this kind in Indiana? Does the death
penalty exist there?"
Never mind about the penalty Rath-
bum said Captain Sullivan, what we
arc interested in is the name Of the
dead man.
Rathbun hesitated moment, and
said: You are on the right track.
! Goodman is the name of the dead man.
met him in front of the Salvation
army and determined to keep him drunk
for several days and then fix him.
Here he stopped and said: IF should
make confession it would be printed
in the papers. and would turn the peo-
pie against me-"
He then lapsed into sullen silence,
and would say no more. When ques-
toned further he denied having given
Goodman laudanum, and said he would
have made use of chloroform.
He then refused to go back to Indi-
ana without requisition papers. Col.
John ID. Kodman, United States recruit
ing officer here. notified Chief Sullivan
that no requisition will be necessary for
the return of Rathbun to Jeffersonville.
Ind. He says that Rathbun is now q
government prisoner, charged with de-
ssertion, and as soon as he can commu-
nicate with Washington he will have
the prisoner taken over. The Jefferson
vile authorities will make a CLAIM for
the custody of Rathbun on charge of
murder. The detectives are now work
ing on a clue as to where the laudanum
was purchased.
Further efforts to secure complete
confession We're unavailing, and Rath-
bun was taken back to Jail. Just be-
fore this, however, he made the follow
ing statement to Chief Sullivan:
II admit everything except that
killed Goodman. / meant to kill him,
and kept him drunk for the purpose
but he died of alcoholism, and / was
not forced to make away with him. My
story about an accomplice named Blan-
chard was fictitious. / acted alone, and
without confederate
.Blanchard'' was, according to the
story Rathbun told a corporal with
whom Rathbun got acquainted at
Plattsburg, n. Y.