The Watertown news. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1917-1919, 1917-06-11
Avengers of Baby Keet Hang
PiersoI Until Almost
Dead.
PRISONERS ARE PUT IN JAIL
Sheriff and Accused Persons CAUGHT
by Mob After Long Chase-All
Declare They Are Innocent
of the Crime.
HISTORY OF THE CRIME.

How case developed from time baby
was stolen until body was found in
abandoned well on old farm:
MAY 3O.-LlOyd Keet fourteen months
Old, stolen from residence Of father,
j. Holland Keet, supposedly through
open window. Taken away while
nurse slept close by.
MAY 31-Father received demand for
ransom and was instructed how to
deposit money in lonely spot, making
trip in automobile at night and alone,
with lights burning in certain man.
ner.
JUNE 1.-Father returned from all
night trip through storms In the
Ozarks
JUNE 4.-Father said to have received
second note, which Is reported to
have raised the amount demanded to
$4,000 and to have warned him the
child must be recovered ''the next
night or never"
JUNE 5.-Mr. Keet made another
night trip, but saw nothing of kid
napers. This is the night the child
is supposed to have been slain.
JUNE 6.-Taylor Adams and wife.
Allie, and their two sons arrested
with George Walker, Sam McGinnis,
Claude Piersol and another man.
Adams and wife confessed plot to
kidnap c. A. Clement, jeweler and
manufacturer, but denied guilt in
Keet case.
JUNE Body Of Baby Keet found in
abandoned WELL Prisoners taken
from Springfield after long automo-
bile chase by large posse Of citizens.
Springfield. Mo-, June 11.-Some-
where the alleged abduction plotters,
held in connection with the KIDNAPPING
and death of little Lloyd Keet, whose
body was found on Saturday, are safe
and unharmed from the mob that early
in the day overlook them at Stockton,
Mo-, 40 miles north of here, and en-
deavored to wiring confession from
them.
The prisoners now in the hands Of
Sheriff Webb are Claude J. Piersol,
Taylor B. Adams, Cletus Adams, Max
inc Adams, Mrs. Allie Adams and Sam
McGinnis.
Springfield is still in the dark as to
where the prisoners were taken Four
were reported currently to have been
kept in the Jail at Stockton. Long
distance telephone calls from towns
surrounding Stockton, which was en-
tirely cut off from outside communi-
cation, were that two had been taken
elsewhere, possibly to Springfield.
Piersol Feels Moose.
Uel Murphy, deputy sheriff at Green
field, about twenty miles from Stock
ton, was told by a young man return
ing from Stockton that one of the pris-
oners had been hung until ''he was
black in the face" in an unsuccessful
effort to make him confess. Murphy
reported that fact over the long-dis-
tance telephone.
Reports are that the mob had placed
a rope around the neck of Piersol in
an attempt to make him say that he
and others had been responsible for
the Keet tragedy But PiersOl, accord
ing to the reports, maintained his in
nocence and the may dispersed. The
prisoners were left unharmed in the
safety of some little Ozark Jail.
Springfield has resumed it's normal
tranquil state, the mob that kept the
city at high tension at night having
dispersed about four o'clock in the
morning.
formation to show that the prisoners
had anything to do with the Keet
baby's abduction and subsequent death.