Los Angeles herald., 1907-04-05
.STACKPOLE GOES
TO PENITENTIARY
SHERIFF TAKES NO FURTHER
CHANCE
Barefoot Burglar Is Strapped to Cot
and Third Man Who Attempted
Jail Breaking viii Be
Tried Today

Shackled hand and foot and closely
guarded by armed deputies who had
their orders to shoot at a seconds no
tice, Ernest G. Stackpole, under life
sentence for the murder of Joel Scheck,
and one of the ring leaders of the at
tempted break at the county jail
Wednesday night, was taken north to
San Quentin penitentiary last night,
where he will be entirely beyond the
fascination of Jail breaking as light
night exercise.
Stackpole, according to the state
ments of both Sheriffs Hammel and
White, was one of the most vicious and
desperate criminals they ever had to
deal with. Two terms he had spent in
states prison, and he knew what one
meant. The nature of the revolving
crime that caused him to fall into the
hands of the Los Angeles police was
enough to have put him in bad stand
ing with the Jail authorities, but Stack
pole had a faculty of getting into trou-
BILE.
StackpoIe Bully
His conduct prior to his conviction
was bearable, but thereafter no one
could tolerate him. He bullied every
other prisoner he had a chance at and
met defeat only once when he struck a
drawf negro sailor.
The little black man nearly killed
Stackpole with no other weapon than
his hands before the guards could in
terfere, and after Stackpole got out of
the hospital he behaved himself for a
while; but that didn't last long, and
he began to take cigarettes and tobacco
away from his fellow prisoners. He
was shifted from one tank to another
until he met Fleenor, the giant negro
barefoot burglar. Stackpole feared the
negro and accordingly made friends
with him. They fought in free-for-
all fist and rough fight in
one of the tanks several days ago, and
Stackpole's left hand was so injured
that he was compelled to have it done
up in bandages. Following that small
riot Stackpole, Fleenor, the barefoot
burglar, and Borne, a mulatto under a
burglary charge, with a dope fiend"
under forty days sentence, were locked
up in the emergency tank, and planned
the escape.
That Fleenor was able TO wrench the
locks from the cells seems almost su-
pernatural. The negro appears gorilla
like, with his long, hard arms and huge
hands. He conceived the escape and
his hands carried it out.
Rips Iron Like Paper
With one rip he tore the pipe from
under the toilet in his cell, breaking
the brass casting like it was wisp Of
straw. The water gushed out on the
floor and Fleenor stopped up the pipe
with a piece of soap. Armed with e
half-inch pipe scarcely eight inche:
| long, the negro barred his arm, reached
it through a narrow opening in his cell
trrl,t
tongue out of the lock. Once out in the
little corridor about the tank, he ripped
| off the paddock leading to Stackpole''
cell and freed the white man. Fleenor''
strength came in again when he tore
the window, casing and all, from the
mortar.
Then they were interrupted by the
guards Oscar Norrell was the frs
guard to enter the tank where the mer
We're loose. He turned to the right anC
walked around the tank, and that fac
saved his life, for the three men were
| lying in wait for him just around the
curve at the left side of the tank. A:
! Norrell advanced he heard some one
mutter "Grab him" and as he heart
the sound he saw the top of the negro;
head appear around the end of the
/ tank, and he fired at it, the bullet stun
ming the negro, and glancing off, strucl
Borne in the hand.
Officers Are Commended
Yesterday both officers were highly
complimented that they had managed
to capture the desperadoes without kill
| ing them, since the guards were ordered
to kill any man found in the corridors
at night
Stackpole yesterday, shivering ant
whimpering with fright, tried to beG
off. but was strapped to the floor of his
/ cell and kept there while an order was
| issued yesterday confning him to Sar
/ Quentin prison, Yesterday Fleenor, the
barefoot burglar, spent the day
strapped to cot, and his wound is i'm
proving rapidly.
This morning Borne, the third mem,
ber of the gang, will be taken to de,
partment one of the superior court fol
trial At that time a felony warrant
charging him with jail breaking viii
also be filed against him, and 1t is
thought he viii plead guilty to one on
the other of the charges.