Alexandria gazette. [volume] (Alexandria, D.C.) 1834-1974, 1911-10-20
UNDER ARREST FOR
F|ANcE's MURDER.
Rev. Clarence Richeson of Boston is
Charged With Bling Response
BILE for Girls Death.
BUUGHT POISON.
e.orv of Love and Death That Rivals
Eict,on-WeddIng Dress tof Murdered
Girl. Recently FINISHED Used as Her
Shroud.

Clarence PlTSil lhoAhPooh
the young Baptist minister OF CAM
bridge. in connection with the death
of Miss Avis Linnell, was issued at
1925 today by Judge Duff OF Crim-
inal Court. The warrant was grant
ed Immediately after druggist WIN.
Hahan of Newton, Mass, absolutely
identified Richeson as the man 10
whom he had sold cyanide or potas-
SUM last week.
Boston, Mass, Oct. 20.-Captured
this morning in the home OF his nan
GEES father, just two weeks before
his intended marriage. Rev. Clarence
Virgil Thompson Richeson, pastor
Of the fashionable Immanuel Bap-
tist church, at Cambridge, is held In
a cell here today, while police inves-
tigate the death Of beautiful AVIS
Linnell, who told her friends she was
the divine's betrothed.
Richeson, pale and haggard, asked
the police what they wanted with
him.
1--WE want you to go to headquar-
ters and answer some questions re-
garding the receipt by Miss AVIS
Linnell of poison which she thought
was medicine" said Inspector Du-
gan.
For a moment Richeson Wavered;
then Immediately regaining his SELL
composure. II will go with you'
was all he said.
In a taxicab. accompanied by Du-
gan, Allen Rutherford, chief OF the
BrookIine police, and Watts, Richie
son was hurried to police headquar-
ters in Boston.
Inspector Dugan says the police
are working on the theory that some
person, wishing to make away Win
Miss Linnell, gave her poison and
told her it was harmless medicine.
They believe the girl swallowed it in
that belief
The girl died Saturday night in
the yong women's Christian Associa-
tion. An autopsy revealed that she
had taken cyanide of potassium, the
deadliest drug known, supposedly
mistaking it for headache medicine.
Chief inspector Dugan, Of the Bos-
ton police. declared after the arrest
that he had located druggist in
Newton who had sold cyanide of po-
tassium to the Rev. Richeson six
hours before the girl placed a poison
vial to her lips.
No technical charge has been placed
against Rev. DR.. Richeson. he
simply is being detained, pending an
investigation of the remarkable cir
cumstances.
Surrounding the death of the girl
and the OBTAINING of the preacher IS
a story of love and death that rivals
modern fiction.
Pretty little Miss Linnell, student
at the Boston Conservatory of Music,
believed she was to marry DR.. Richie
son. On the day of her death she had
read in the Boston papers the an
nouncement of Rev. Richeson's en-
gagement to Miss Violet Edmands,
daughter of Moses Grant iEdmands,
a resident of fashionable Brookline,
n Boston suburb. A few hours later
she was found dead, a victim of cy-
anide poisoning, in the bath room OF
the Y. w. C. A. At first the police
believed she had killed herself; later
developments, they maintain, indi-
cate that she took the drug in the be-
lief that it was a medicine.
"She took the drug because she
had implicit faith IN the person who
gave it to her." walled her mother.
"She thought it was medicine; it
was given her to kill her."
Miss Linnell had told her friends
she was to marry the pastor. She
had prepared her wedding gown;
she was buried in it Monday. After
her death, Richeson denied that an
engagement existed.
Richeson's arrest today was sensa-
tional. William B. Watts, deputy
superintendent of police, drove an
automobile full of policemen to the
home Of Moses Grant Edmands at
one o'clock this morning and demand.
ed that Richeson come out and sur.
render. The police were unable fol
some time to awaken the inmates OF
the house. 1t was daylight before
they secured admission to the resi-
dence. reused the pastor from his