The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1933-03-08
TWO ARE HELD
AS KIDNAPERS
Of MILLIONAIRE
Dragging Remarks Heard
by Cop Leads to Capture
of Boettcher Suspects.
BY CLYDE G. BYERS
United Press staff Correspondent

DENVER. March IA former
trainman on a Canadian railroad,
and an insurance agent, stood ac-
cused today of kidnapping Charles
Boettcher II, Denver millionaire, and
collecting 100000 for his release.
Arthur Youngberg, 81, brakeman
of the train crew, and Carl w.
.Pearce, IS, the insurance agent, were
under arrest.
Authorities hunted Verne San
key, Al, and Gordon Elkhorn, 80,
former engineer and fireman, be-
lieved to have fed to Canada with
most of the money.
John H. Wells, patrolman, was
promoted Tuesday night to the rank
of detective because he fitted a
Dragging remark of Pearce's into the
jig-saw pattern of the kidnapping.
Pearce professed to speak author
itatively about the kidnapping of
which all Denver talked during the
seventeen days the young millionaire
was held in a remote ranch house in
the South Dakota hills.
Cop Gets Into Gang
Wells overheard Pearce, in the best
detective tradation switched to plain
clothes, made friends with Pearce's
sweetheart, and had himself intro
duced into the inner circle of the
alleged kidnap ring.
Pearce and his sweetheart, Mrs.
Ruth Kohler, 80, were seized.
Mrs. Kohler's sister, Mrs. Verne
Sankey, was taken into custody, as
were Mrs. Kohler's two daughters,
Miss Merelyn Kohler and Mrs.
Pauline Coughlan. The latter two
were held merely to prevent leaks of
information which they might have
divulged.
Questioned for hours, Pearce,
Mrs. Kohler and Mrs. Sankey re-
vealed all the intricate details, po-
lice claimed. These sent detectives
in two airplanes to Sankey's "anch,
fifty miles south Of Chamberlain,
S. D., to aid Sheriff George Carroll
of Cheyenne, Wyo., and aides in a
raid which they expected to yield
the kidnapers.
Only One at Hangout
Only Youngberg was found. San
key and Elkhorn had fed. The
money was gone.
Youngberg tried to commit sui
eide by slashing his throat and
wrists with a razor in his cell at
Chamberlain. He was started back
to Denver by train Tuesday and was
said to have confessed to Detective
Chief William j. Armstrong.
The kidnapers will be prosecuted
under the new and drastic federal
kidnapping law because they carried
young Boettcher from Colorado
through Wyoming and Nebraska to
their hideout.
Sankey, police claim, made sew
eral trips back to Denver with notes
from young Bottecher which we're
delivered with ransom instructions
typed by Pearce to the millionaire'S
father, Claude K. Boettcher, before
the ransom was paid and the vic
tim released last Wednesday night.
Wanted BonfiIs as Victim
Part of the ransom money $1,400,
was found in Sankey's home here.
4. The ranch hideout, owned by San
key, fit the description given by
young Boettcher of his prison, in
Guiding a burned carpet, which
Boettcher damaged with a lighted
cigaret so he could Identify it later.
Mrs. Kohler said Boettcher was
selected after the death of Frede-
rick G. BonflS, wealthy publisher,
whom they had planned to kidnap
for 100000 ransom.
Sankey, Elkhorn and Youngberg
worked together at Rainey River,
Ont, before embarking on what au-
thorities said was a career Of bank
robbery with headquarters at the
South Dakota ranch.