LAST OF THE GANG

Hokitika Guardian, 31 January 1931, Page 2

LAST OF THE GANG

BANK ROBBER FOUND GUILTY. FIVE-YEAR-OLD U.S.A. CRIME. T. H. Johnson will pay further toll to the law of the United States for a life of crime in which he gained a reputation as the most daring of North-west bank robbers A jury in a Seattle, court found him guilty of participation in the Queen , City Batik robbery at Fremont five years ago. Johnson was released from prison at Ne(v Westminister, British Columbia, last year, after serving four years of an eighteen-year sentence for the £'---0 Nanaimo Bank robbery, and was .re-arrested at Seattle six months later on the Fremont charge. The jury brought the verdict in after ; Jja£ deliberating only 17 minutes. Johnson was released from the New Westminister prison because of good conduct. In addition to his eight-year sentence he had been given 20 lashes. Asked before the verdict how he felt about the Canadian system of sentencing convicted men torthe lash, Johnson declared: “I would rather take, a hundred lashes, than serve the time.” - 1 With the conviction of Johnson, every man involved in the Fremont V Banic robbery has been brought to justice. James McCarthy and James $ Kendall, arrested shortly after the crime, are both serving sentence at $ WaU'a Walla, James . Burns, the | gallows at San Quentin for the murder J-' of n San Francisco policeman. f ! ■ Atlhough. arrested . with M'Carthy & and Kendall, Johnson was not tried before because the Canadian Covern- | ment already had served notice of extradition for the Nanaimo hold-up. Ho was held at the county gaol for extradition, and escaped shortly before the Fremont Bank robbery.