The age-herald., 1902-04-05
MAN FORCED BOY
 TO KILL HIM Boy Couldn't Resist Request and Cut O|d Mans Throat 4 READER OF DIME NOVELS Police Believe There Is Story of Moral Deseneracy Behind the
 Crime, and Several Boys
 Are Implicated.
4 READER OF DIME NOVELS

Salt Lake City, April 4.-clyde Felt boy barely 15 years of age, today confess ed to the police that it was he who cut the throat of Samuel Collins the aged watchman of the Wasataka Mineral Springs, whose body was found last Sum day in a small cave in the hillside above Warm Springs. The deed was done, the boy claims, only after repeated urging Of the old man, who told the boyhe intend- ed to kill himself anyway, as he was tired of living. After cutting Collins throat Felt says he took the old mans clothes and hid them under a pile of boulders, walled up the entrance to the cave as best he could wiped the blood off the ra- zor and then went down the hill and washed his hands in the stream. Collins, he said, had given him little money for killing him. Young Felt told the police yesterday that Collins had committed suicide after arranging with him to wall up the entrance to the cave so that his body could not be found.
 Boy Broke Down.
 Early this morning in company with two policemen the boy went out among the hills to locate Collins valise which he claimed he had carried for the old man the day of his death. After several hours search Felt broke down.
 'I killed the old man." he said, "but I could not help it. He made me do it. l did not go up with Ensign Peak and did not have any valise to carry. The old man told me to tell that story if his body was found. When we got to the lit- tie cave he began undressing. I asked him what he was doing that for, and he said he was going to commit suicide. I said oh, don't do that while I am up here then he said: T want you to kill me- Here are some stakes and some rope. You tie me down and then cut my throat. I did not like to do it. but he begged so hard that I just could not stand it. He took the rope and wrapped 1t around his legs and got me to tie his arms to his side. Then I took the razor. He kept on begging, and finally I just took the razor and gave one slash across his throat and jumped out of the hole and ran. He told me to bury his clothes. I went and got the pile and carried them away down he gully and buried them. Then l went back and the old man was dead
 Built Wall in Front of Cave.
 '1 took some rocks and built a wall in front of the cave for about a foot. But I got scared and did not finish it. so I came back the next day and finished walling up the hole. I could not help doing it. The old man could make me do anything he wanted to-"
 Felt insists that he was alone with Col lins when the murder was committed. Nevertheless. the police believe the boy has not told all of his story, and arc working on the theory that others were implicated
 Behind the crime is a story of moral degeneracy that has few parallels. Col lins, according to the police, had num- Der of the boys in the neighborhood com pletely under his influence, and express the belief that his death was the culmi- nation of a plot on the part of the boys to kill the old man and thus rid them selves of his influence over them. Young Felt it is claimed by the police, was a reader of dime novels.
 It is stated by the county attorney that a charge of murder in the second degree. will be made against the boy.