The Manning times. [volume] (Manning, Clarendon County, S.C.) 1884-current, 1913-10-01
MERCHANT IS slain
NTEED TO HOTEL ROOM BY A
FAKE SALESMAN
ROBBED and MURDERED
Indianapolis Police Were on Murder
2er's Trail While Crime Was Being
Comnlitted.-Had Worked Similar
Trick on Merchants of Other

Convinced that the young man who
Monday brutally murdered and rob-
bed Joseph Schlansky, clothing
merchant, in a hotel at Indianapolis,
is the person who has committed SIM
liar crimes in several Eastern and
Middle Western cities, the police de-
partment of Indianapolis Tuesday
night asked officers in every large
city east of the Mississippi river to
watch for the slayer. They believe
the murderer is Joseph Ellis, about
twenty-one years old, Of Richmond,
Va. Investigation Of the murder OF
Schlanssy showed that it had been
coolly planned and the escape so cum
ningly carried out as to throw on
suspicion temporarily.
The body of Joseph Schlansky was
found late Monday night in hotel
at indianapolis, which had been occu-
pied by man who had registered as
"W. r. Anderson, Louisville, Ky.
A strong cord had been tied around
the merchants throat and he had
been shot through the head. Ander-
son is said to have told that he was
a salesman, called at Schlansky's
store and asked him to to go his
room In the hotel where he said he
had some goods to show the mer-
chant. When SchlansSy failed to re-
turn his family notified the police.
The merchants watch and about
twenty dollars also were missing.
The slayer left two notes in which
he said he had started to rob the
merchant and then killed him.
After numbering the merchant the
man discarded a collar spotted with
blood, walked to nearby store,
where he purchased another, and
then returned to the lobby Of the
hotel wherein his victim lay dead,
remained for an hour or more. Late
in the afternoon the slayer returned
to his room, and then going to the
union depot obtained his suit case
from the check room and is believed
to have caught an east-bound train.
From information gathered by the
police, Ellis, known also as BrokaW
and Robert Duncan, committed SINH
lar crimes in Louisville last week and
left there Saturday for Indianapolis.
Previous to the Louisville robberies
the man is supposed to have attacked
clothing merchants in Cleveland, Toll
edo, Philadelphia and Pittsburg.
In each town where the man
operated his scheme was the same.
He would register at a hotel under
, an assumed name, call on either one
of the small clothing merchants or a
secondhand dealer and, explaining
that he had some samples he must
get out of his possession at once, ask
the dealer to go to his room. Once
in the mans room the victim either
was struck down or forced at the
point of a revolver to submit to be-
ing bound and gagged. Then his val
uables were stolen; then the rotber,
leaving the merchant to be discov-
cred by hotel employees, departed.
In every case that was called to
the attention Of the polio it was said
the boldness with which tho robber
worked had thwarted suspicion until
his victim was found. The man did
not attempt to use any disguises.
That the murderer Of Schlansky Is
Joseph Ellis, the police say they feel
certain. He was identified at Louis
Vile by photographs sent from his
home and also from photos sent out
by the Pittsburg police, who wanted
the man, under the name Of Brokaw,
for an attack on a merchant there.
At the time that Scalansky was
murdered four squads Of detectives
we're seeking Ellis. A telegram from
the Louisville police department had
been received earlier in the day ask
ing the Indianapolis police to arrest
Ellis. The squads made an investi-
CATION throughout the afternoon and
night. At the hotel where Schlansky
was killed the clerks did not remem-
Der a guest answering Ellis descrip-
fion