RANSOM PAID

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 2, Issue 260, 25 June 1932, Page 3

RANSOM PAID

-IN CHURCHYARD DRAMATIC SUJCIDE OF GIRL: BOOTLEGGER KING ARRESTED LINDBERGH BABY KIDNAPPERS. NEW YORK, Saturday. After months, the United States police seem to have plaeed their hands on the Lindbergh baby kidnappers, but one, Violet Sharpe, a maid in the home of the baby's graridparents, was too quick, and poisoned herself. Others have been arrested and the police are asking Scotland Yard to arrest Violet Sharpe's sister, Edna, in England. The most prominent person to he arrested is Ernest Brinkert, 24, exconvict and reputed bootleg king, in whose car it is believed the baby was taken. Brinkert's photograph has been identified by Dr. Condon as the mysterious "John" to whom he paid £10,000 ransom in a New York churchyard. But when Dr. Condon came face to face with Brinkert, he had his doubts. Woman Suspect. "We are assuming that Violet Sharpe was the one who gave the 'tip-off' to the kidnappers," said Inspector Harry Walsh. He cahled to Scotland Yard instructions for the , arrest of Edna Sharpe, who left New 'York within a week of the payment of the fake ransom, and since then has been watched in London, where she was living affluently. , Violet's bankbook was watched after the kidnapping, and she made several considerable deposits of moneys beyond her receipts as a servant in the Morrow home. Dramatic Suicide. Violet Sharpe's suicide in the home of the dead baby's grandmother was a most dramatic event. Already questioned four times about her absence on the night of the kidnapping, she underwent a tonsil operation, and the police were compelled to cease interrogating her. "They will never question me again' 'declared the girl to the other servants, and when Mrs. Morrow's secretary told her to-day to get ready to aceompany the police she was terribly agitated. She went to her bedroom, dissolved a solution of cyanide of potassium, and dranlc it. Then she dramatically walked to the head of the stairs and pitched headlong at the feet of the astonished policemem? Suspicion was first directed against her when she failed to recall either the title, actors or plot of the "movie" she said she witnessed on the night of the tragedy .Later she admitted going out with Brinkert on the fatal night, and the police now believe that it was she who waited while Brinkert and another man stole the baby out of the house. .