The Mena weekly star., 1922-03-02
DEATH RHYMES
 STORYOF CRIME
Bud Terry, for Whose Murder Three Mems Lives Were Endangered, Dies at Home in Charleston,
 Ark.-0ne Still in Prison.

A series of criminal deeds, includ- ing murder and perjury, some phases of which read like fiction, have been recalled to old time Mena residents by the death at Charleston, Ark, of Bud Terry.
 Terry, cause of all the past trou- ble died February 20 at his home in Franklin county, fifteen years after he had supposed to have been mur- dered and for whose reported death Willard Vaught, resident of Nunley, was in danger of the gallows. Louis McKibben, another Polk county resi- dent, was at last, reports, a prisoner in the Oklahoma penitentiary, for a part he took in the supposed killing of Terry and the fastening of the al legged crime in Vaught.
 The criminal story, as it now ap- pears in the light of fuller knowledge, has in it's first chapter, a part con corning Mena's first street fair, held in August, 1907, in commemoration of the founding of the city It was hap penings that took place during that street fair that undoubtedly saved Willard Vaught from a legal execu- tion in Oklahoma after he had been charged with the murder of Terry. According to the best information ob- tainable from variety of sources. Terry, whose death has just occurred in Franklin county, and about whose second demise there appears to be no doubt, was one of party of sawmill workers that was employed in a mill near Bates, Ark, in August, 1907. | According to statements made in Vaught's trial for murder at Poteau in 1914, Terry and others had been in Heavener and on the way to the sawmill camp had engaged in drinking bout. An argument over a | woman came up and the drunken 1 men engaged in a fierce fight in which Terry was killed. The body was buried and the party dispersed after agreeing to conceal all mention of the crime.
 1 These statements were made in court by a man named Slyder, who had once been convicted of crime in Polk county, and by Louis McKibben, who had been workers at the sawmill camp. These men fixed the date of the killing of Terry as August 20, 1907. Terry is known to have dis appeared about this date.
 1 More than six years later a skele- ton was found near Bates and was ] identified as the remains of Terry. Oklahoma officers investigated the case and in the course of events ar- rested Willard Vaught, Bert Styles and a man named Bates, charging them with murder of Terry The principal witnesses against them Slyder and McKibben.
 1 A trial was held in Poteau and the three defendants, while charged with the same offense, were placed or trial separately under an agreement that if one was found guilty all were to be punished and if acquitted all were to go free. Vaught was the one selected to be tried first
 Judge J. l. Alley was Vaught's at- torney at Poteau. The defendant stoutly protested his innocence but in the face of the positive evidence of Slyder and McKibben, hung jury with eleven for acquittal was the best the accused man could get out of it. Vaught claimed that on the day of the supposed murder he was in Mena attending the street fair and took witnesses to Poteau to prove certain little happenings of the day. Judge Wright Prickett was one of these witnesses, he being secretary of the fair association. The alibi had it's ef- feet in a second trial of the accused men when Styles was put in the dock and a jury brought in verdict of acquittal.
 Tho Vaught and others had been cleared of the charge of murder the mystery of Terry's disappearance was still unexplained, and it was not until several years later that the missing man was accidentally found in hospital in California. He did not know that he was supposed to have been murdered and that insur- ance had been collected on his life.
 Discovery of Terry still alive aroused interest of Oklahoma officers anew and a new investigation result ed which ended in the arrest of Louis McKibben on charge of perjury. Slyder was sought, but never found. McKibben was taken to Poteac and pleaded guilty to the charge against him, receiving sentence of 21 years each on two indictments.
 The identity of the man, whose skeleton was found near the sawmill camp was never established. That someone was murdered the officers were sure, but no one was ever pun ished for the crime Since returning to Arkansas Terry had lived at his home in Franklin county, and his burial took place in the same ceme tery he was supposed to have been put in many years ago.