Arizona republican., 1910-12-16
A CRIME DEVELOPED
 ID GREAT PROPORTIONS
A CHICKEN STEALING CONSTR
 AcY UNCOVERED.
Three Boys duplicate a chinaman as
 Chicken Fence"


 When an officer saw a boy stand on the street corner the other night after midnight holding a gunny sack, he did not imagine that there was a clue to the most comprehensive sys- tenn of chicken stealing ever carried | on in this part of the country. When he took charge of the gunny sack and found three chickens in it he was not aware that he was about to paralyze the noodle and chicken tamale business and set people to complaining more about the high cost of living. But that is what has hap pened.
 There were attached to the gunny sack and the chickens three youths. John HiXon, William Walker and Theo. Morton. They were taken to the city jail with the chickens. They admitted that they stole them from from an uncle of Hixon and under further questioning they admitted that few nights before they had raided the henroost of A J Shambln.
 Yesterday morning they admitted more: they told Deputy Sheriff Ad- ams that they had robbed several chicken roosts generally northwest of the city, but HiXOn who is a cripple and seems to be the promoter of the enterprise regarded the escapade as a joke. Later in the day he took more serious view of it and all the boys made admissions which may send them to the penitentiary for they are all too old for the reform school.
 An old gentleman named. Robinson who lives three miles northwest of town was lately the possessor of fif- teen yellow Minorca hens for which he had paid g. apiece. Last Satur- day morning he was the possessor of two only of that breed. The oth- CTS had disappeared the night before; the leather hinges of a locked door had been cut and the chickens ex- tracted.
 Mir Robinson could not believe that such chickens would be stolen for ordinary uses; he imagined that some chicken fancier had taken them and would try to ship them out of the country. Therefore after that he was present when every train went out
 He was at the depot yesterday morning when Deputy Sheriff Adams and Constable Murphy passed enroute to Chinatown in the hope of getting further light on the chicken mystery. The officers surmised that his chick ems might have been taken in one of the raids of HiXOn Co. Unlimited. The deputy sheriff had seen the Robinson breed of chickens and thought he could identify the kind.
 At the depot restaurant the officers found two chickens of that breed. The proprietor said he had bought them of a couple of boys. He was directed not to touch a hair of the heads of those chickens without fur ther orders The officers went to the Noodle joint next and the Chinaman in charge admitted that he had a large stock of chickens on hand. He had them locked in a building in the rear In the lot consisting entirely of large chickens there were eleven of the yellow MinOrcas All of them were later identified by Mir. Robinson as his
 The Chinaman. Joe Dan, said that he had bought all Of the chickens of three boys. They looked like bloOded fowls and the Chinaman was ordered to kill none of them until the close of the investigation.
 Returning to the jail. the deputy sheriff had another talk with the boys and they admitted the Robinson robbery. They said that they had been the regular chicken purveyors to ( ha ,af, said he had been engaged in the businesss for eight months. Walker had been associated with him the most of the time. Whenever they were in need of money they would go to the Chinaman and contract for the sale of chickens sometime the follow ing night. The Chnaman had always instructed them to get big chickens They said that they had hired not less than twenty different rigs for their night incursions upon the hen rOosts and they estimated that they had sold Dan not less than 200 choice birds.
 On Saturday night there was call from the Noodle joint for more chick ems. big ones. They went to Robin sons place and got all they could carry in the buggy. Joe Dan was so well pleased with them that he asked for more and a second trip was made tO the Robinson rOost that night: they did not know how nearly they had cleaned it out of big chickens on the first expedition.
 But this time they were interrupted by a fierce dog and they thought they heard someone climbing over a fence nearby.
 HiXon said that they had frequently made two trips to the same roost in the night: they did so in fact when ever they found more big chickens than they could take at a load
 On the statement of the boys. Dan was arrested on the charge of receiv- ing stolen property. He said when he was taken into custody that he had always bought the chickens in the day time but the boys said that their transactions with the Chinaman were always carried on at night. He sometimes declined to pay for the chickens until the following day in order that he might see whether the owners of the chickens would come for them. The boys said they got fifty cents apiece for the chickens. about half their market value, for