HOTEL THIEF KILLED.

Taranaki Daily News, 13 January 1919, Page 3

HOTEL THIEF KILLED.

SHOT BY POLICEMAN. A negro named Williams Banks was shot through the heart recently by a policeman in New York, soon after he had forced his way into the Navarre Hotel and stolen a quantity of bed linen. James Denham, one of the hotel employees, met Banks coining dosn the stairs, between the first and second floors, with a ibrmdle in his hand, a few minutes after 5 o'clock. When reprimanded for using the front instead of the rear stairway, the negro, according to Mr. Denham, became surly and threatened to shoot him. Unmolested, the negro continued on down to the engine room, where Mr. Deham demanded to know what he had in the bundle. The negro refused to tell, and hurried toward the side doorway and out into the street, with Mr. Denham at Ms heels, shouting, "Stop thief!" Banks ran west -with an increasing crowd following him. At Eighth Avenue, Constable Sabotella joined the chase. Rushing inio a hallway, Banks closed the door behind him and hurried upstairs to the roof. Tha policeman pushed tks daor off its hinges Rnd followed, reaching tho stairs leading to the roof just as Banks slammed down tie cover.

Sitting on the roof-cover, the negro refused to let the policeman up, declaring "You've got to get me." The policeman fired a shot through the cover, and then, placing his back against it, forced it up. Banks was standing a few feet away, and as he saw the policeman's head appear he reached for his hip pocket, pulling his hand back with a handkerchief wound around it. Believing the hand held a pistol, the policeman fired a second shot, and tho negro fell to the roof dead_, a bullet through his heart.