The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1916-1920, 1919-06-30
Physician Moses Rope
About Neck and Ties 1t to
Bathroom Fixture.
INQUIRY is STARTED
Victim Had Been Searched
by MineOla Authorities
After Conviction.
THREE LETTERS ARE LEFT
Suicide Contends He Is Guilt
less, bnt Would BE His
Own Executioner.

Or. Walter Keene wilkins, who was
convicted Friday of murder in the
first degree for the killing of his wife,
Julia. at their home in Long Beach
February q, committed suicide in
the bathroom of the Nassau county
Jail at Mineola last night about 7:45
o'clock. Tying a rope about his
neck, DR.. wilkins attached the other
end Of it to the fixture OF the shower
bath and then jumped from the top Of
a trash can. His neck was broken
and he died a few minutes past s
o'clock.
Prison officials and Coroner Walter
Il. Jones Of Hampstead, together with
Charles W. Weeks, District Attorney.
Immediately began an investiga ton to
ascertain where DR.. wilkins had OBJ
tained the rope-about six feet long
and a quarter Of an inch in diameter.
II was said at the Jail last night that
when the physician was taken back
from court Friday he was searched
thoroughly and everything seized that
could be used for injuring himself.
even small pair of manicure scissors
with which he could have cut an
artery.
But as indication of the fact that
he must have obtained the rope only
short time before he used it, when his
cell was searched after his suicide
prison authorities found rope be-
tween six and eight feet long which
Re had made by tearing sheet into
pieces and plating them together.
Precautions Taken in Jail.
Sheriff Phineas Seaman and his sub
ordinates at the Jail had made every
effort &c safeguard the physician and
prevent him doing an injury to him
self. although there had been little
about his demeanor to indicate that he
contemplated suicide. Guards visited
his cell and looked at him at intervals
Of ten And fifteen minutes ever since
he was convicted and taken back to
await sentence, and when Sheriff Sea-
man left the Jail for few hours last
night he left orders that this practice
be continued during iNs absence.
Shortly before 7:45 o'clock William
Hendrickson, a keeper, went to DR..
Nilkins's cell and found that the con-
demned man had just completed a
large number of letters upon which he
had been working all morning and
most OF the afternoon. The physician
had put on a clean collar, brushed his
clothing and shaved. He chatted
calmly with Hendrickson about the
weather, remarking that there had
been great change in atmospheric
conditions
But l expect another and more de-
eided change in things soon," he said,
and smiled.
Hendrickson attached no Importance
TO this remark. thinking the doctor re-
ferred TO the weather. He turned and
left and as he went down the corridor
Dr Wilkins stepped from his cell and
walked toward the bathroom, some forty
feet away and at the end OF the corridor
on the FIRST floor of the jail. Hendrick-
son watched him until the doctor went
into the bathroom and closed the door.
Then the keeper turned and went back
TO the prison office.
wilkins has gone into the bathroom"
he told John Mills, another keeper.
Five minutes later Mills went along
the corridor and stopped IN front OF Dr.
Wllkins's cell. He saw that the physl-
can was not there. and recalling what
Hendrickson had told him went on down
the corridor to the bathroom. He called
70 Or. wilkins. but got no response. Then
Mills pushed the door open and entered
the bathroom.
D.. wilkins was hanging by his neck
from a rope, which he had made into
moose and tied to the shower bath
appliance. Mills Immediately took his
knife and cn: the rope. He felt the
.1ysic!an's pulsc and detected beat
Try TO Revive Victim.
Ai.r left the physician lying on the
Zoo. a"d went 10 the door OF the bath
roon and called to HendT.ckson, Then
Nils gave the physician what first aid
'-es'ment he knew. while Hendrickson
tsephoncd to DIR. Guy F. Cleghorn. The
I-ison physician, and to the Nassau
County Hospital. which sent DR.. S.
Amahh and an ambulance. When DR.,
[on!inued on Third Page.