The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1907-08-02
S.YEAR. old GIRL MURDERED
MuTILATED BODY FOIND ~ a
FIRST .tIENLE CELLAR.

she HAD Becn Missing From Her Home
Around the Corner for q Week - Woman
VINO Had Been Made "a Leave the G;lris
Hsme and Two itaaans Arrested.
Mrs. Filomens Douris liz her way yester-
day morning down the steep cellar steps
of her tenement lodgings Ut 2Os First avenue
to get wood for her fire. Az she CROPPED
at the foot Of the stairs she stumbled against
a BOX. Her candle snuffed out when she
fell and her hands. thrown out to support
her, fell on a head silky with curls.
The woman scrambled up the stairs.
shrieking out into the huddle Of pushcarts
on the curb. Her Sicilian voice shriiled
over the rattle of q street piano:
"A dead child in the cellar, Mother
Of God. a murdered child in my cellari'
Within five minutes her words had been
carried around the corner TO the tenement
at 34s East Thirteenth street. where Karl
Tietschler. a German. and his family live.
Come. maybe we have found your little
Katie. who has been lost this whole week.
| cried the eager bearers of news. If we
have. then she is dead-murdered." they
added.
Meanwhile a policeman had crushed his
way through the crowd that blocked the
sidewalk in front Of the First avenue tene-
ment. Some one brought a lantern and
he went down the stairs into the cellar.
Tn stairs follow the south wall. which is
dank and drps with moisture. They give
into an underground room about ten feet
long and six in width. 40 shut of from light
and the air that the mould and the cobwebs
nave splotched the walls white.
The policeman raised his lantern and saw
in the middle Of the cellar about two feet
from the foot of the stairs the tumbled
body Of a girl. lying face downward over a
long vegetable crate. A red frock which
WAS meant to cover the girls knees was
about her neck.
The childishly rounded body Of the eight
yesr-old girl had been haggled and mauled.
There were marks where nails had torn
and blotcbes where a fist or a stone had
been pounded upon the flesh. The back
OF the head was crushed. A yellow hair
ribbon had been tied about the throat. but
it was not tight.
Even before the policeman had time 10
notify the Fifth street station a man who
rested a shortened foot on the step of a cane
fought his way through the crowd at the
mouth Of the cellar and cried out that he
was John Bauer. uncle of Katie Tietschler.
come to see il he murdered girl was Katie.
He went down into the basement and saw
the red dress by the light OF the police
mans lantern
-It is Katie he said. W nave hunted
this whole week through and now we have
found her
When Coroner Hamburger arrived he
looked at the little girls body and then
turned to the reporters.
I is the worst crime that New York
has ever had " said he. Il don't want you
men to go down there; nobody should look
at that little girl now
IL was just a week & yesterday that
eight-year-old Katie Tietschler went out
to play with the children in front of the
tenement on East Thirteenth street. Her
mother and her uncle saw her leave the
house shortly after 8 O'Clock. She was
dressed in a red frock, over which was a
blue Bingham apron, and she wore Q red
hat. She did Nc come in to supper hat
night.
About two weeks before the disappear
anoe OF Katie said the uncle. "a woman
who called herself Annie Messner came to
my sisters house while Mr.. Tietschler was
away and engaged a room. When / came
in that night and saw the woman l told her
to get out. She said she would not go.
l threw her out and her baggage after her.
Then she cursed us all and said that she
would get even. When I reported the disap-
pearance Of Katie to the police at the Fifth
street station and W went up to see her.
She denied all knowledge of the girl
Yesterday the detectives looked for the
Messner woman They found that her
rooms were on the FIRST floor front in the
same tenement in which Katie Tietschler's
body had been found. The woman had
left about o o'clock in the morning. other
tenants said The detectives searched
her effects and f0und a handbook showing
tina. Louise Epstein had a deposit in the
Marcus Savings Bank. ct 225 East Four !
teenth street. Investigation brought out
the fact that Annie Messner is Louise
Epstein.
Coupling the coincidence Of the proximity
Of Annie Messner's room to where the girls
body was found with the gossip of the
neighborhood that the woman had been
intimat with two Italian cobblers whose
shop ia at $40 East Thirteenth street. a few
doors from the tenement where the Tiet-
SELLERS live, the detectives went to the
cobblers' shop
Gaetano Ripollone. one Of the cobblers. |
had been sought by Katie's uncle mmedi- |
ately after her disappearance. but he had
one to Bristol. Conn. on hat day and
did not return until Saturday last When
questioned by the police yesterday he ad-
mitted that the Messner woman had come
into his shop several times since she had
been elected from the Tietschler fat. On
the strength Of that the police arrested him
on suspicion Giuseppe Bonzanti, the
proprietor OF the shop. was questioned
at Headquarters and also held pending
further investigation
The police cannot account for the fact
that the girls body could have been I'M
detected for six days. hat being the time
tina. has interviewed since her murder.
according to the Coroner's physician.
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