Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-01-09
ONE DEAD; TWO MAY DIE.
Greek Florist, Lovesick, Actor In
Triple Tragedy.

NEW YORK. January 8-"Why, the
man is a maniac 1 found him holding
Mrs Wiedman by the hair and pounding
her head on the floor, all the time singing
in grooming fashion"
This is the substance OF the court state
ment made yesterday afternoon by Fred
erick Bergemann. witness to the triple
tragedy in which George Fellen, florist.
killed Mrs. Lena Wiedman. his landlady.
and rnortaliy injured Miss Pauline Ratel
and himself IN apartments at 30 West 82d
street.
Magistrate Whitman in the West Side
also attacked by FeIlen. and whose head
| was swathed in bandages. He was re-
manded to the custody OF the coroner.
Il was visiting Miss Ratel when the muir
a chose friend OF my family and had only
been here q few months. She was employed
/, as a stenographer IN the Hotel Endscott,
and l called at the apartment to arrange
for her to Join a party at my mouse IN
few days.
I'VE were sitting In the parlor and Mrs.
Wiedman was in the dining room Mr..
Wiedman had gone out for walk with his
little son. When Felien came in l went
to the door and told him Mrs. Wiedman
| wanted to see him in the dining room A
few minutes later heard the shots.
There are folding doors between the
diately. A shot came through the opening.
and Miss Ratel fell at my feet. I turned
up the light in the dining room and saw
Fellen pounding Mrs Wiedmans head on
the floor. Then he rushed at me and hit
me over the head with the revolver.
Bergemann. 1t was learned. is married
and has five children. When questioned
concerning his visit to Miss Ratel he said
he had been in the habit of calling two or
three times a week. He had become enam-
ored of the girl.
Fellen is a Greek and has a very violent
temper His admiration for Mrs Wiedman
was wei known to the other boarders. but
was attributed to the mans foreign tenn
permanent. so that. although he had recently
been acting strangely. no suspicion that he
was not in his right mind had been enter
tanned by those who knew him.
The police believe Fellen was worked up
to the deed by seeing a portrayal on the
stage of the deception of man by wo-
man.
Madly enamored of young Mrs. Wiedman
with whom he boarded, the man seemed to
be seized with an insatiate desire for de-
struction of all who were in his path. Coro-
ner Dooley discovered that the triple trag
edy followed Immediately after Fellen had
visited the theater, and the police hold the
theory that the man, obsessed with cray
ing for revenge for unrequfted love. must
have found in the action OF the play some
thing that incensed him. that he rushed
from the playhouse to himself serve the
principal actor in really tragic denoue
ment.
Mrs Wledman was the first attacked by
Fellen. She died almost instantly from two
bu let wounds and several slashes with
razor. Miss Ratel Is In Roosevelt Hospital.
her tongue severed by bullet. and she will
not survive Fellen himself Is in the hos
pital with bullet I'm his brain. eand his
death Is expected at any moment.
Mrs. Wiedman before her death was able
to murmur only few sentences. which in
dictated that Fe,len had worked himself
into a frenzy when she refused to give him
kiss Miss Ratei has not been able to
talk.
Mrs. Wiedman. her husband John and
their son. eight years old. have lived at
the corner for several years. Wiedman was
a newsdealer. with stand at S1st street.
Fellen. who Is about thirty-f1ve years old
has a small florist shop in the same corner