Daily press. [volume] (Newport News, Va.) 1896-current, 1908-05-10
DETECTIVES ARRlrf0 on QUESTION
Many OF the OFFICERS Believe That the
Woman Persisted in the Fire Which
Destroyed Her Home. While Others
Hold That She Set Fire to Her
Home and Escaped.
tBy Associated Press)

I.APOkTE. IND. May 9--Whether
Mrs. Bella Guinness Is alive some
where and subject to arrest for al
legged murders committed on her farm
one mile north of Laporte. or wheth-
or she was burned with her three
children in her house that was de-
stroycd by fire on April IS, is the
problem that tonight doomed mp most
prominently before the officers in
We s,igating the mystery surrounding
the deaths of the ten persons whose
bodies have been buried in the Guin
ness barn yard am the manner in
which the Guinness farmhouse was
burned. Ratocination, as practiced by
the various officers of LapOrte coun-
ty. and differences among these Off
GERS iaave led to a difference Of opin-
ion as to whether the woman IL still
alive.
Many believe that Mrs. Guinness
was burned TO death in the fire that
destroyed her house or that her body
was partly incinerated in that fire at
ter she had been killed by some per-
son outside the family. Previous as
sertions that Mrs. Guinness Is still
alive were added to today by a state
ment said to have been given out by
Or. II. p. Long. a former coroner OF
Lapo-te county. and one OF the four
physicians who performed the an
topsies on the bodies found in the
ruins of the Guinness home
DR.. Long said tonight that he had
not issued such a statement. but had
merely said that he was not satisfied
as to the identity of the corpse In
question.
Doctors Will Not Talk.
DR.. J. l.. Gray and DIR. F.. I. Will
cox, two other members of the board
refused 10 be drawn into the contro-
versy, but DIR. J. H. William Meyer,
the fourth member OF the board, said
he had no doubt but that the corpse
was Mrs. Guinness.
Er Meyer said:
There is absolutely no indication
that the skulls of many Of the bodies
bore penetrating wounds. II has been
asserted that fractures caused by some
blunt inst rur nj had been found on
the swuiS Neither was there any
kind Of brain henorrhages and the
heart and lungs Of at least two chill
dren revealed the same conditions
found in these organs in the body OF
their mother. The hearts were all
Gilated, and full Of cIots and the
lungs had collapsed. This condition
Is found in the organs OF persons
who have died Of suffocatioB and the
circumstance is taken as another in
dication that the theory is unienable
that Mrs. Guinness. having killed her
children substituted a womans body
for her own and then escaped after
setting fire 10 the house"
Manv Visitors at the FARM
The crowds Of visitors to the farm
we're augmented today. In I,aporte
;her. vas a constant stream Of sight
seers visiting the morgues where ~
of the 10 bodies are lying.
New Witnesses regarding Ray Lam
phere's alleged connection with the
deaths at the Guinness farm were
discovered today The most import
an; Of th.s. xcrc william Slater and
John Rice. The latter a\r's tIat
on the dsy when Helgclrin is sup
POSED to- have been killed hr ana
I.smyhcrc drove TO Michigan CITY.
They returned about O'Clock at
night and Lamph,rs alght"d when
they reached a point opposite ihn
Guinness farm and cut across the
acIis toward the h"use rcmarkinc
thar there would bc something dong
there" that night
Slater and i.amphcrc OCCUPIED the
same bed on many ocrasIons. follow =
ting the prisoners dismissal from tho
Guinness farm.
lie says that Iampcrc tod him that
sc had run HcIgeIrin out Of Mrs.
Crinnrss' house at t'be poiEt 81 70
, vo.v.T oa on occasion. bet that the
Ssuih Dako,sn rctsrpcd later ann
reWafpcd.