Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1911-04-06
PAY $4,000 FOR
KIDNAPPED BABY
New Mexico Lawyers Chilu Re.
covered From Outlaws.
MOTHER HELD UP IN HOME
Masked Men Enter House at Las
Vegas-Frantic Woman Offers
Jewels and Money to
Save Little One.

East Las Vegas. n. M. - A
victim of one Of the most daring
and cunningly planned kidnapings in
the history of crime, young Waldo
Rogers, the two-year-old son OF Mr..
and Mrs. A. T. Rogers, Jr.,and grand
son of H. L. Waldo, a Kansas City
millionaire, was stolen Wednesday at
midnight from his mothers arms at
the point of revolpers of masked men.
/ TWenty-four hours after he d1sap-
peared he was returned to his parents
A ransom of $4,000 was first paid.
Four men are believed to be Involved
/ in the kidnapping.
The crime is one Of the boldest and
without parallel in the southwest and
has stirred the people Of this city and
surrounding country to a frenzy
Though the child was stolen
Wednesday night, threats Of the abb
ductors that they would kill the babe
If any report was made to the au-
torities, news of the abduction did not
/ become known until several hours
after the child had been surrendered
and the kidnapers had escaped with
the ransom. At the time of the kid
naping the child's father was absent
from the city. Masked men entered
the home in the fashionable residence
district and demanded the babe. The
frantic mother tried to bribe them with
jewels, silverware and what money
was in the house, but a demand for
$4,000 or the child resulted in the
little fellow being taken.
The bandits left a note telling how
money was to be paid. The note di-
rected that red lamp should be hung
in the rear window of the house at
II o'clock at night if the money was
to be turned over. Failure to do so
was to be taken as refusal and would
result in the immediate murder of
the child, according to threats in the
note which directed that the money
be in bills of ten dollars or less. The
terror-stricken family let no one into
the secret. They got the money and
at the appointed hour, William Rogers,
uncle of the kidnapped child, drove to
a lonely mountain spot with the cash.
There the bandits emerged from their
hiding places with level Winchesters
and took the money which was care
fully counted in the glare of auto
lamps, and finding the full amount in
two packages of $4,000 each directed
the uncle to a point Is miles in the
opposite direction where, beside the
road, wrapped in a blanket, the child
was found asleep and none the worse
for its experience.
The babe was returned to its
parents here as fast as an auto could
burn up miles. Then the officers were
notified. Immediately posses were or
gained and northeastern Mexico Is
being secured by armed men. The
bandits have been trailed to the Bad
Lands, near the Oklahoma line and
with the posses but eight hours be-
hind them and bloodhounds following
the trail, their capture seems certain.
1t is believed the kidnapers, who
are four in number, will be 1ynched IL
taken alive. The stolen child Is a
grandson of Judge Henry L. Waldo, a
Kansas City millionaire, who has Of
fered $4,000 reward for their cap
ture, while the territory and citizens
have increased the reward to $40. 900.