NEW GAOL SENSATION.

Taranaki Daily News, 13 December 1921, Page 5

NEW GAOL SENSATION.

CHICAGO CONVICTS’ ESCAPE. A THRILLING ESCAPADE. By Telegraph.—Press Assn.—Copyright. Received Dec. 12, 7.28 p.m. New Yoric, Dec. 11. Chicago is emulating the Slaughter case, in which a prisoner named Slaughter was instrumental in releasing several convicts from a gaol in Arkansas. Tommy O’Connor, murderer,, who was condemned to be hanged on December 15, escaped from gaol, taking three prisoners with him. A fourth prisoner, who was sentenced to a long term for robbery, broke his leg in leaping from the gaol wall and was recaptured. The escaped men were being given exercise in the main corridor of the gaol when O’Connor seized "the guard, took his revelver and bound him- Four other guards weije beaten and boupd. The chief jailer, Lawrence, saw the men fleeing and attempted to shoot them with a rifle, but failed, the convicts gaining the street. They overpowered the occupant of an automobile and sped away. The motor crashed on the curb four squares away. O’Connor’s companions fled but he waited until another auto approached with a man and a woman and stopped them with a revolver. Commandeering the motor he sped madly through the city, steering a wild course. The man and woman, remained on the back seat clinging to each other. The automobile was abandoned on the outskirts of the city, and. the man and woman have not yet been found. O’Connor killed a policeman for which he would have been executed. He is a frail man, his weight being a hundred pounds. He suffered from tuberculosis. He has the record of a desperate crim-inal.—Aus.-N.Z. Cpble Assn. A MURDERER’S END. PRISON-BREAKER KILLED. New York, Dec. 10. A Little Rock telegram states that three negro convicts who escaped from the State prison with Slaughter surrendered in a farmhouse. Ono declared that he had killed Slaughter. This was confirmed when the posse, of police found Slaughter’s body at the bottom of a ravine. Two condemned men are still at large. [Slaughter captured the prison and invited the convicts to flee. Six escaped in a motor car. N The whole countryside joined in the chase.]