The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1907-07-25
SUSPENDED FOR COWARDICE
IHIRTI- JEtR Police RECORD
>IOIIED nv TWO MEN.
walsh and ROO~a. patroIncn On Post When
FRANK 10. warner. the Murderer. 40
NwaN. Ia Pace sharxcs-.lOhn a.. will
snn. shooters second Victim. Dead.

NJ 'lH 0ThI Nlint III UtOTe Inbn Unity
yrli- q charge Of cowardice was recorded
Yesterday IN the books OF the Police Depart
mcr' II was more than thirty years ago
that Policeman O'Brien Of the Mulberry
.rrrct station was brought up on charges
hraI-c he failed 10 catch a maniac who
shot pctcctive Furniss outside the old
M.ruyolitan Hotel on Broadway between
Spa'l and Prince streets After the
ma,Ilc had fired into a crowd and shot
Fruiss dead O'Brien hesitated about
gong after him and let him escape. This
IL 'Hc only record in the Police Department
whore any member Of the force was ever
nr lght mp on charges OF cowardice.
,.mmissioner Bingham was compelled
Yesterday 90 suspend two patrolmen who
are accused Of having displayed a lack
o' rc.vo in not attempting to arrest Frank
n Warner, the slayer Of Esther Norling.
on West Forty-seconi street on Tuesday
before he could get awayto Waverley place.
whore hc shot John G. Wilson. who died
Yesterday in st. Vinccnt's Hospital
When Commissioner Bingham got to his
office Yesterday he said ecould hardly credit
ti, belief that any Of his men had shown
'rn white feather He ordered Inspector
Richard Walsh to investigate the case. and
A. q Jesuit III the TtDDTt buDftiiJttu tAUtT IN
the day he suspended Patrolmen Stephen
: Walsh and Tracey L.. Roosa of the East
Firty-frst street station. the two men who
we're on post az the time Of the shooting.
Con. Bingham didn't make public the
report furnished him by the inspector. but
merely gave the announcement that the
two policemen had been suspended on
charges unhecoming an officer and cow
~. iii l. - - =
Third Deputy Commissioners Hanson next
Thursday,
Walsh has had a stormy career in his
four years in the department. Three
months ago, while he was attached to the
Oak street station, he was beaten by three
men who have since beer dismissed from
the department for a~ssaulting him. Just
what Walsh did 10 make himself unpopular
Was not made public.
\ few days later when he appeared
for tho inspection of summer uniforms
before Inspector McNally he was forced
to tell how he came by his injuries. Police
men Eugene H.. Clinton, Christopher Fitz-
gerald and Frederick W. Unger. whom he
accused Of having assaulted him. were
dismissed from the force. Walsh tcsti-
fed that the men had beaten him without
the slightest provocation and as far IA he
knew because they had a personal and
mysterious grudge against him. The three
policemen denied that they had struck
Walsh. Every man in the station house
that night, including two lieutenants, four
sorgeants and eighteen policemen. swore
that they had heard absolutely nothing Of
The battle going on in the section room or
The dormitory. Deputy Commissioner Han
son had the entire platoon transferred
from the Oak street station.
Walsh asked to be transferred. Six weeks
ago Commissioner Bingham sent him to the
Tenderloin. He soon left there and was
transferred by request to the Fast Fifty
first street station.
Walsh "A year & was called upon to
arrest some men who assaulted n news
paper man in Printing House square. He
got three Of them. They told him that they
were constituents of Battery Dan Finn and
that If he tool them IN things would go
mighty hard with him. Jhereupon he
turned two of them loose and was about to
let the third go when several persons who
happened along demanded that he take the
one prisoner remaining to the station house.
The man was later indicted by the Grand
Jury upon n charge Of felonious assault.
The victim of the assault lay in Hudson
street hospital for three weeks.
Roosa was appointed two years ago and
has a good record.
When Inspector Walsh began his exami-
nation in the West Sixty-eighth street police
station yesterday morning, about all the
men who have business on the lower floors
of the Spalding Building, in West Forty
second street. by 8 o'clock in the morning
were there to tell what they knew of the
actions Of the policemen who failed TO
capture Warner. The principal witness
against Pauolman stephen Walsh was
Emil Munich. who is a cutter in q X. Georges
tailor shop on the second floor of the Spald-
ing Building.
MUNICH was at work. he told the inspector,
when he heard a shot outside the open door
Of the shop. He looked up in time TO see a
policeman stumble through the door crying
I'm shot. I'm shot"
Well, why don't You pull out your gun
and shoot, too2" MUNICH says he inquired.
Instead Of replying. Walsh, whom MUNICH
closed the door and put his shoulder against
II. Presently. Munich says. Walsh walked
over to a window on Forty-second street
and tapped on the pane.
The people jammed in the. street APP
p%arently thought that Warner was in the
and to shout: Hes there. he's there"
Walsh finally sank into a chair and said
something about waiting for the reserves.
Ne was in the room thirty minutes. sc-
cording to Munich. Meantime Warner
reloaded his revolver-they found the
bunch Of empty shells in the corne yester-
iav dropped out Of a window and went
downtown to shoot Wilson.
Both Walsh and Roosa were on post on
street when Warner started
n run wild. They were first among the
officers TO reach the Spalding building when !
Warner drcked in there and under the police
code II is held that they should have kept
right after him until he or they were stopped.
Nine traffic squad policemen and a plain
clothes man got to the building directly |
after. The conduct Of a of them il to
he iuvestigated and IL is just possible that
there will he at least one more suspension.
tn" bravest cop in the lot. according to
The elevator man in the Spalding building.
was Patrolman O'Leary OF the East Fifty
first street station. He got his revolver
ont 80 soon as he arrived, took the elevator
10 NJ" top ioor and had got down 10 the
thIr7 n"or in a systematic search OF all the
rooms and hall corners when he learned
maj Warner had escaped.
warner il still unconscious in ward n,
h~rN"F'le, with two policemen on guard and
q mar ready 10 get a statement IL the pris-
one revives enough TO make any. His
skn'I Was fractured by Truckman Jake
Rose bale hook. and the chance Of his re-
cor"rv : slim. John c. Wilson. the Wav-
er'"y place hat manufacture xyhom Warner