Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1902-11-10
POLICE BAFFLED.
Clue After Clue in Morton
Case Prove vaIueIess.
Mason Stands Clearer in Light as An
Innocent Man.
JewelIer Fails to ldentify-Negro Ar
rested and Released.

Rostin, Nov. 9.-In the developments
of the day in the Mason case which has
puzzled the police of New England
since Miss Clara A. Morton was struck
down and killed in Waverley, last Sat
urday, there are several striking de-
tails No further evidence, however,
has been aduced which tends to IN
criminate in the case, Alan G. Mason,
the member of the well-known Boston
family, who has been held until, Tues
day. on the charge of numbering MISS
Morton.
In fact, the police were compelled
Friday night, to believe that Mason
stood out clearer in the light OF an III
nocent man. This status OF nina 10
caused for the most part by the 1aii-
ure. Friday. of Joseph Nemser, the
West End ieweler, to identify Mason as
the man who had offered for sale Miss
Morton's watch. last Saturday mght.
The attempted identification was
made. Friday, at the MiddleseX county
jail when Mason was placed IN a group
Of six men and when Nemser declared
he could not say that any one of the
men had been in his store. Friday,
however. when the jewelers. attention
was drawn particularly to the third
man in the line-Mason--he announced
that he might have seen that man De-
fore"
So contradictory have been Nemser
statements with relation to the de-
scription of the man in the case that
the police have lost faith in his Judg-
&c thair cnnclllSiOn OF the
mans varying descriptions of the man
who sold him the watches stolen from
Miss Morton and Miss Agnes McPhee
who was murdered in Somerville.
An important detail in connection
with the disposal of the watches was
the esta blishment, Friday, that the
signatures on the checks Kept on nle
by the jeweler in Identification of the
persons who offered him the articles,
were written by one and the same per-
son. This confirms the theory that the
two women were murdered by the same
man. But Jeweller Nemser has not
agreed at all times that the man VINO
sold the watches was white man in
each instance, or that he was a negro.
The state police are instituting an ex-
merit examination of the signatures in
comparison with Alan Mason's hand
writing.
Other features of the case were the
arrest, Friday, at WATERFOWL of a
young mulatto on suspicion. SHE was
taken to this city and confronted by
Jeweller Nemser but the latter failed
to identify. The negro was released.
A new turn has been given the mys-
terry by the allegation by Mrs. Sayles
of Watertown, in Jail, Friday,
that Alan Mason was the man who had
annoyed her in the rooms of the Nat
ural History building, this city, last
summer This is interesting in the
light of the fact that one So9erquest
was convicted and sentenced as a
Jack, the Slugger" for assault on a
woman in the same building.
Still another clue for the police is the
statement of a Winchester nurse that
she saw a negro board a train at North
Cambridge and leave it at Waverley
Just before the murder of Miss Morton.
This falls i'm line with the theory of
the Boston police that the murderer
was negro and not white man.
So serious has the case become that
Gov. Crane has interested himself and
looked over the scene of the assault
while on visit, today, to Waverley.