The Tacoma times. [volume] (Tacoma, Wash.) 1903-1949, 1911-10-20
(By United Press Leased Wire. ]

DUO NtIN, oCJ. SU.-lHHER Reu
with using poor girls love for
him to feed her poison that he
might marry Boston heiress,
Rev. Clarence Virgil Thompson
Richeson, pastor of the fashion
able Emmanuel Baptist church of
day and charged with first degree
murder.
Not in years has staid old Bos-
ton held such sensation Rich
eson's alleged victim, pretty 19-
yeaI-old Avis Linnell, died in the
bathroom of her home at the
Young Women S Christian associa-
tion here Saturday night of cyan
ide of potassium.
Within a short time after his
arrest Richeson was arraigned for
preliminary hearing. He pleaded
not guilty and his trial was set to
begin October 81, the day on
which he had planned to marry
Viola Edmands, the heiress for
whose sake the state says he slew
Avis Linnell.
At first her death was set down
to suicide, but when druggist
told of selling the drug to the pas
tor the police started on the case.
Early today they went to the
home of Miss Viola Edmands,
$500, 1000 heiress, whom Richeson
planned to we'd October 81, and
arrested the pastor,
Thought lie Would Marry Her.
Miss Linnell Ibelieved that she
was to marry Rfcheson, and upon
the day of her tragic end she read
in the Boston papers the an
nouAcement of the pastors en-
gagement to Miss Edmands,
daughter of Moses Grant Ed
mands, a Brookline millionaire.
Indications are that the girl
took cyanide of potassium under
the belief that it was medicine.
The girls mother said:
avis took the drug because she
had implicit faith in the person
who gave it to her. She thought
it was medicine but it was given
her to kill her"
Avis had told her girl friends
that she was to marry Richeson.
She had prepared wedding
gown, in which she was buried
last Monday After the girls
death, Richeson denied that any
engagement had existed between
them.
Heiress Breaks Up Romance.
Richeson was born in Rose Hill,
Va. He studied for the ministry
at Amherst, Va, and at the New
ton theological seminary in the
suburbs of Boston, paying for his
education by working as a porter
in restaurants. His first charge
was in ST. Louis and his next at
Louisville, Ky.
Later he was called to Hyannis,
Mass, where he first met Miss
Linnell. The couple became en-
gagged and when Richeson was
called to the fashionable Cam
bridge pulpit he suggested she
come to Boston and study music.
Then there came into the life
of the young minister the lure of
wealth and social prestige, dis
rupting the romance. He met
Viola Edmands, an attractive bru-
nette and heiress to half million.
They soon fell in love; Avis was
forgotten, and new engagement
was formed.
Kept Faith Until End.
Miss Linnell remained with her
faith in her minister-lover unshak-
en- to the last.
81 am going to lunch with
him." she said gaily to a group
of her girl friends Saturday.
Throughout dinner that night at
the Y. w. G. A. she talked
brightly and seemed in the best
of spirits.
After dinner Miss Linnell went
to her room where her friends
heard peculiar sounds at II
o'clock. They entered and found
her clad in kimono seated in a
chair. Her feet We're in tub of
water and on the table beside her
| lay a package of cyanide. She
died an hour later without reeov-
ering consciousness.
81 have irrefutable evidence
that Richeson bought cyanide in
Newton said Chief Inspector
IDugan today. II also have a
witness who swears he saw Miss
lLinnell and Richeson together at
the South station on Friday even
ing"