SENSATIONAL PRISON PLOT.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 9124, 25 June 1908, Page 3

SENSATIONAL PRISON PLOT.

Details were received by the lust mail of a particularly daring prison plot at Minsk, which has been frustrated through the vigilance of the -detective police, and which partakes of the romantic from the fact that one of the prime movers was a young •schoolgirl, who committed suicide in a peculiarly terrible fashion when thti conspiracy jvaa discovered. Some time ago it waa noticed that a girl named V'era Kholmsky, a pupil at the local high school, was infrequent '•ommunication with certain political .suspects. She also made fairly fre--fluailt visits to State prisoners in the Minsk prison, one of those visited by her being a man named Shut, who, in turn, Was observed to be on intimate terms with a prison inspector. Although this inspector had been in the service for twenty years without suspicion being attached tq him. the ►detectives taking the facts mentioned into consideration, found in them the :flrat links of a remarkable chain of evidence, which they eventually completed. On the night of April 14th the inspector in question was searched as h 3 came off duty, and on him was a bundle nf letters, several of nin cypher. One was addressed • .to Vera Kholmsky, and all were •.h[fried over to the polica for examination. They proved to contain the "* fullest particulars of.an attack which ■ha I been planned on the prison. 8.-iefly, it wa3 as follows: — On a night, subsequently to be arranged, the outer gateway of the prison was to be blown up with dyna mite, and the prisoners were to mutiny in a body, breaking out of their cells, and mur'clafing their warders. This done, all Ah 3 prisoners were to assemble at a fetatjd spot, Where they would find everything prepared for their escape. .It was obvious that this plan had discovered at the eleventh hour, .for within a few days many of the convicts in prison would have been en route to Siberia, of which fact tiiey were quite aware. Following on the disclosures, the police proceeded to the honu of Vera Kholmsky, whose father i 3 an official of tha Libau-Romna Railway, and lives in a flat on the fifth .floor of an

•enormous building. As they had I so ns reason to believe that the dynaL 'inite to be used in carrying out the P j)iotwa3 in the girl's keeping, the ' oHiqera endeavoured to enter her.bed- . roofn without nuking any noise. was gmade at night, and succeeded in getting to_ the do »r Of her room without a light. 'Opening the dior, however, they found the room empty and the windo .v wide open. Tha girl, hearing (their approach, despite their precautions, had hurled herself from the window, and, falling over fifty feet 'on to a stone pavement, had been instantly killed.