The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1932-04-18
Kidnaper Is Hanged to
Tree After Abduction
From Cell.
SHERIFF HELD PRISONER
Keys Taken From Pockets
of Officer by Leaders
of Avengers.

SO, confessed abductor and killer of
an 8-year-old girl, Dorothy Hunter.
The mob overpowered Sheriff A.
A. Bacon of Cheyenne county,
forced him to unlock the jail, seized
Read, took him to an isolated rural
spot near Mcdonald, and hanged
him from a tree.
AS he stood beneath the tree with
the moose about his neck, Read,
former Colorado convict, again adj
mitted his crime and told the mob:
You are lynching the right man."
He said he was intoxicated at the
time he kidnapped the girl at Selden,
Kan, Thursday afternoon, assaulted
her and held her captive more than
twenty-four hours before he killed
her.
Nearly 200 men were in the crowd
that drove in automobiles to ST.
Francis when the carefully-guardcd
secret that Read was held there
finally spread across the western
Kansas prairies.
Forty of the men approached the
courthouse, where the Jail is sit
uated, and overpowered Sheriff Ba-
con.
No Resistance Offered
The mob entered st. Francis
quietly, and surrounded him before
he had opportunity to prepare to
resist it, the sheriff said.
THE men came running up as I
was standing outside the court
house" Sheriff Bacon said.
Before I had a chance to run
inside and lock the doors behind
me, was overpowered and carried
about 200 yards, where there were
other members of the mob.
Il pleaded with them to allow
the law to take its course.
Cries came from the mob to
lynch Read. The leaders found the
keys in my pocket and unlocked the
JAIL
Read was dragged from his cell.
pleading for mercy.
SAFC JOh CIIS SdIlG mercy
you gave that little girl" one of
his captors answered.
Read was dragged to an automo-
bile. 1t drove eastward from St
Francis with other members of the
mob following other cars.
Sheriff Is Kidnapped
The sheriff, placed in one of the
cars, was driven to point about
four miles from st. Francis, where
he was released.
Were not going to take any
chance on you getting out your dep
uties and stopping this lynching,
one of the ringleaders told the
sheriff.
The procession continued east
across the Kansas plains into Raw
Inns county. Midway between Nc
Donald and Atwood it stopped on
the banks Of Little Beaver creek.
A rope was thrown across the
limb of a tree, and the moose was
tied about Reads neck.
Facing his captors in the glare
OF automobile headlights that
formed a circle of light into the
night, Read said:
Il am guilty, your are hanging the
right man. 1 was drunk when I
took Dorothy. If I had been sober.
I wouldn't have done such a thing.
A moment later he was hoisted
up. The crowd stood WATCHING
silently as he died.
Girl Vanished Thursday
Sheriff Bacon meanwhile walked
to farmhouse and telephoned to
officers of nearby counties that the
mob had Read.
Before deputy sheriffs could or
ganize to rescue the prisoners, word
came that he had ben hanged.
Dorothy Hunter disappeared from
her home at Selden Thursday after
noon. At nightfall, her parents be-
came alarmed at her absence and
q hunt was started.
Read was arrested late Friday at
Rexford. He was intoxicated. He
was taken to Jail at Colby, where
he admitted killing the child, but
refused to say where her body would
be found.
ChiId's Skull Crushed
Early Saturday a mob went to
Colby. 1t surrounded the jail and
prepared to storm it.
Sheriff Mckinley told the men
the child's body might never be
found if Read was lynched.
The crowd quoted. Read, terri
fed, agreed to lead officers to where
he had hidden Dorothy's body.
AS soon as the crowd dispersed,
Mckinley took his prisoner to a
farm east of Colby, where Read
pointed to haystack and said:
There she is"
The officers searched under the
haystack and found the body of
Dorothy. She had been killed by a
blow that crushed her skull.