Murder Gangs Hold America in Terror

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 237, 27 December 1927, Page 9

Murder Gangs Hold America in Terror

SEVERAL OUTRAGES MURDER gangs have become so powerful in the big cities of the United States that the Government is full of alarm. There has been a practically complete breakdown of the law. By Cable.—Press Association. — Copyright.

Reed. noon. NEW YORK, Monday. pOLICE-LIEUTENANT KENMER, A while shopping for his children’s Christmas tree, saw robbers in a bank and opened fire upon them. The robbers’ return shot fatally wounded him. When dying he scribbled the number of the fleeting motor-car on a piece of paper. The owner, when he was arrested, allegedly confessed that he was robbing the bank in order to buy his sweetheart a present. Another outrage is reported from Circo, Texas. Four bandits, led by one attired as Santa Claus, snatched £I,OOO from the counter of the First National Bank. The police opened fire as he was escaping. In an exchange of shots the Chief of Police, Mr. Bedford, was

fatally wounded and several persons were hit in the hail of stray shots. The Chicago correspondent of the New York “Times” says the “gangsters” and their murderous operations have secured such a firm grip upon various large cities, notably New York, Chicago, Philadelphia and St. Louis, that the Federal Government is alarmed at the practically complete breakdown of the law, and must take a hand in checking the menace. SECRET CONFERENCES Secret conferences are being held in Washington in which the Federal prosecutors from the several cities are consulting with officials from the Department of Commerce, who administer the immigration laws. It is an established fact that the majority of the professional murderers are imported from abroad. Chicago recently had several amazing cases of murderers going free because witnesses had been driven away or slain. New York is said to be the headquarters of a gang of criminals who collect heavy tribute in all the principal cities, through operations in connection with liquor, vice and gambling.—A. and N.Z.-Sun.

POLICE QUARREL SIX OFFICERS KILLED NEW YORK, Sunday.. A message from South Pittsburg. Tennessee, says five officers were shot dead, one was fatally wounded, and three others were wounded in a battle in the main street. The affray was the culmination of bad feeling between the county and the city police officers on the evening of Christmas Day.—A. and N.Z.-Sun. THEFTS AND GUNPLAY OUTRAGE IN TEXAS NEW YORK, Saturday. A mesage from Dallas, Texas, says that in spite of an offer of £ 1,000 for each dead bandit in that State, outrages perpetrated there to-day resulted in three robberies, two dead and two wounded bandits, two wounded policemen and the theft of £4OO from the Dallas bank, where there was a daring daylight, robbery by unmasked bandits. Robberies which occurred in two smaller towns were responsible for considerable gunplay.—A. and N.Z.