Part 4: Toronto: Front-page crime shorts from a bygone era

[Hownow]

Part 4:

The Toronto Daily Star
FRONT PAGE
August 17, 1933

RIGHT TO CHIN COST $100

Hamilton ­ Frank Ross, diminutive Italian sportsman, was today fined
$100 or an alternative of six months in jail when he pleaded guilty
before Judge Carpenter to a chare of aggravated assault.
Evidence indicated Rossą car had been in collision with one driven by
Earl Stewart, Dundas, on June 4. Following an argument Stewart was
alleged to have called Ross a łwop˛ with a łprofane prefix˛ in the
words of Crown Counsel Harry F. Hazell, and Ross countered with a right
to the chin, which loosened two of Stewartąs teeth.

NB: The designation łsportsman˛ when a sporting activity did not
follow was newspaper code of the day for well-known local bookies and
bootleggers, which might be why this story made the front-page.
Š

INSTRUMENTS STOLEN
RECORD HOP DELAYED

Nope. Not what you might think.
Itąs about aircraft instruments and an attempt at a flight record.
Now, if this were the 1950s Š
Š

WHAT IS A HOODLUM?
POLICE CHIEF ASKS

łI asked the question what have the police done regarding hoodlums in
the park for the past two years,˛ said Mayor Stewart Š łand the chief
constable wants to know what a hoodlum is.˛
A hoodlum is defined in Funk and Wagnalląs New Standard dictionary as:
łOne of a class of ruffians or street rowdies in San Francisco and
other cities of California, hence generally a ruffian, rowdy or bully.˛
NB: More fuel to the argument about where the word originated ­ this
California version is new to me.
Š

Widow and Children of Slain
Tenant Form Dramatic Setting

Penetang ­ gnawing nervously at her fingertips, the somber-garbed widow
of the slain Harvey Barnes, Elmvale farmer, was in court today to see
Mrs. Rose Cadeau plead not guilty to a charge of murder at the
preliminary hearing before Magistrate George E. Copeland.
Mrs. Barnes, dressed in plain black and white, sate tense and
white-lipped beside her golden-haired daughter Gloria, aged four. The
oldest son, Rodney, 13, took a seat beside the accused slayer of his
father, Mrs. Cadeau, but did not once look at the woman.
Ms. Cadeau walked swiftly into the crowded courtroom a few feet in
advance of her uniformed escort, Sergeant Cox and Constable W.H. Stark
of the Ontario Provincial Police, and took her proper seat at the rear
of the counsel table.
Her rose-colored silk rayon dress hang loosely on her matronly figure
and was badly wrinkled at the back from the shot ride from Barrie Jail.
She wore a small black straw hat, low black shoes and black cotton
hose.
She showed no emotion but turned to gaze curiously at the crowd which
surged behind her.
F.G. Evans, crown attorney, asked the woman if she understood the
nature of the charge. łNo,˛ she replied.
łI do,˛ said Frank Regan, Toronto, counsel for Mrs. Cadeau. łShe pleads
not guilty.˛

NB: all those old murder trial stories were big on how the deadly widow
was dressed in the prisonerąs box. Women always wore a hat to court Š
and in a newspaper office one could always tell the women columnists,
fashion columnists and Womenąs Page editors from the secretaries and
other female serfs: they were the only ones allowed to wear hats.
Š

TWO YEARS FOR TRUCK THEFT

Hamilton ­ Pleading guilty to the theft of a truck, the property of the
Honorable S.C. Newburn, William Agnew was today sentenced to two years
less a day and two years indefinite in the reformatory.

NB: Uh, oh! This poor shlub went for a joyride in some big shotąs truck
and heąs been handed the maximum reformatory sentence Š a possible four
years. They donąt give his age but I suspect heąs a teenager or heąd
have gone to the pen.
Š.

The Toronto Daily Star
FRONT PAGE
May 28, 1934

WONąT TAKE PETS
FROM UNEMPLOYED

Winnipeg ­ People who have no money will not have their pet dogs taken
away for want of a $3 license tag, Magistrate Graham declared when 40
men, women, boys and girls appeared before him for failing to take out
1934 license tags.
łHave you your license yet?˛ he asked a wistful boy about 15.
łNo,˛ he replied. łI donąt see how I can get it with my father out of
work and not being able to get a job myself.˛
łWhat about it?˛ asked the court, turning to the pound-keeper.
łStay proceedings,˛ advised the official, thereby earning the applause
of those in court.
Š

INDIANS ARE ACCUSED
OF SLAYING OFFICER

Merritt, B.C. ­ The body of Frank Gisorne, Indian Department constable,
lay in a morgue here today, grim evidence of the startling sequel to
the investigation of a stabbing affray at the Ganford Indian
reservation.
Wire nettings were thrown across he Nicola River, which yielded the
body of Gisborne, while searchers patrolled the river banks in search
of the body of Provincial Constable Thomas Carr, co-investigator of the
wounding last Wednesday night of Mrs. Enos George, Indian woman.
Enos and Richardson George, Indian brothers, were in Kamloops Jail,
charged with the murder of both constables. A third brother, Joseph
George, is in a custody and a fourth Indian held as material witness.
Š.

The Toronto Daily
FRONT PAGE
June 29, 1936:

Motor Car Mix-Up Injures Two
In Antipathy to Telegraph Poles

Two automobiles went roaming over the roadways last evening and ended
up by attempting to knock two telephone poles from their foundations,
which resulted in the cars being badly damaged and the drivers severely
bruised and cut by flying glass.
Š.

Buns and Cakes and Dollar Bills
Come into Unhappy Conjunction

Tearfully pleading his innocence, an eight-year-old boy was arrested by
Detective Donaldson today. The youngster, police say, yielded to
temptation yesterday afternoon and stole eighteen dollars from a young
sales girl.
Steaming buns and luscious cakes beckoned to the little waif from the
window of a cake shop on Queen Street east so he wandered into the
emporium to sniff at the luscious delicacies. While he stood around on
one foot and the he other he noticed a roll of bills in a salesgirląs
purse. When she walked to the other end of the store to wait upon a
customer he was unable to resist he temptation and quickly stuffed the
roll of eighteen dollars into the ragged pocket of his coat.
Eighteen dollars meant a lot to the little girl whose money he had
stolen so she notified the detective office that she had been robbed,
and an officer was sent out to investigate. At first the boy sobbed and
said that it wasnąt so but he will appear in juvenile court, and the
whole matter will be threshed out.

[spo...@petitmorte.net]

Hownow <how...@cogeco.ca> wrote in
news:091120020558165143%how...@cogeco.ca:

> Part 4:

Bravo!

Thanks, Howard. These old gems were both entertaining, and enlightening.

--
The power alone stored in my little hand
Could melt the Eiffel Tower
Turn the Sphinx into sand

http://www.petitmorte.net/fuckingpigs

[DedNdogYrs]

These show how different crime was back then or maybe it seems that way because
it's in Canada. You don't hear about things like the Carr Brothers or the
Manson Family in Canada. That seems to be slowly changing though to some
extent.

Dogs & children first.

[Michael Snyder]

Hownow wrote in message <091120020558165143%how...@cogeco.ca>...
>Part 4:
[snip]

>NB: all those old murder trial stories were big on how the deadly widow
>was dressed in the prisonerąs box.

Possibly because the female readers were interested?

> Women always wore a hat to court Š
>and in a newspaper office one could always tell the women columnists,
>fashion columnists and Womenąs Page editors from the secretaries and
>other female serfs: they were the only ones allowed to wear hats.

Umm... excuse me -- "female serfs"?

[Michael Snyder]

Well don't get TOO uppity -- Canada did, after all, bring us Bernardo/Homolka.

[spo...@petitmorte.net]

dednd...@aol.com (DedNdogYrs) wrote in
news:20021110090359...@mb-mj.aol.com:

The much smaller population in Canada probably has more to do with that
than anything else.

The US has 10 times the population of Canada, logic says that means 10
times as many loons, committing 10 times as many atrocities.

[Hownow]

In article <Xns92C3A1FBF69...@petitmorte.net>,
<"spo...@petitmorte.net"> wrote:

> dednd...@aol.com (DedNdogYrs) wrote in
> news:20021110090359...@mb-mj.aol.com:
>
> > These show how different crime was back then or maybe it seems that
> > way because it's in Canada. You don't hear about things like the Carr
> > Brothers or the Manson Family in Canada. That seems to be slowly
> > changing though to some extent.
>
> The much smaller population in Canada probably has more to do with that
> than anything else.
>
> The US has 10 times the population of Canada, logic says that means 10
> times as many loons, committing 10 times as many atrocities.

And to list a few of the one-tenth of Canadian crime that attracted
serious attention:

The Port Coquitlam Pig Farm Murders.
Serial killer Clifford Olson.
The gangland torching of a Montreal bar that took 13 lives.
The Albert Guay insurance plot bombing of an airliner.
Evelyn Dick, the torso killer -- her husband and a newborn son.
The American Landlady Killer of at least a score who killed two in
Winnipeg before being nabbed and hanged.
Homolka and Bernardo, of course.
RC Priest Father Adelard who beat the rap but certainly did shoot his
half-brother to death in an insurance/inheritance scheme.
The Butter Box Babies.
And aside from the countless wacko mass killers who wiped out their
families, bosses, co-workers and passersby, a gaggle of killers who
tried to coverup their deeds by dismembering and littering the
countryside with body parts -- a method of disposal that no longer
disturbs me all that much since one Torontonian logically explained why
he did it: "She was a large woman and her body would not fit into the
Volkswagen."

By the way, Spooge, a personal story from B.C.
I covered the first ever murder trial presided over by Tom Berger in
his first year as a Supreme Court judge. It was in Cranbrook.
Defence counsel was Harry Rankin, who inherited the Top Vancouver
Criminal Lawyer title when Berger gained his judgeship.
It was a domestic murder. A backwoods guy from the East Kootenays had
shot to death his wife.
The thing was, though, in 1963 there was only one penalty for murder
and that was hanging -- although this guy was not really a candidate
for it and his sentence would have been commuted.
The jury, however, had only two verdict choices -- the capital murder
or manslaughter.
Paddy Colthorpe (also out of Vancouver) summed up for the Crown and
sought a murder conviction.
Rankin made his case for manslaughter.
Then Berger summed up the case for the jury. And it was obvious that
Berger, sitting on his first sessions, wanted no part of having to
pronounce a death sentence. He did everything but tell them to return
manslaughter.
And they did ... in about twenty minutes.
"He summed up my case up better than I did," Rankin told me later.
I agreed.
Berger sentenced the guy to ten years, as I recall.
- hm

hm

[spo...@petitmorte.net]

Hownow <how...@cogeco.ca> wrote in
news:111120022028078598%how...@cogeco.ca:

I met both Berger and Rankin at different times years ago. Harry was quite
a character, he was the social(ist) conscience voice on Vancouver City
Council for years and years.

Tom Berger is still considered one of the most humanitarian men to have sat
on the bench in this area.

Did you ever visit the vancouver City Police Museum? It was housed in the
basement of the old Coroner's Office on Cordoba Street. It isn't open to
the public, tours are arranged via the BC Justice Institute and the VPD.

The most compelling exhibit is a row of pictures of all of the men that
were hanged at the old BC Pen in New Westminster. The frame around each
picture is the noose used to hang them in the elevator shaft that served as
the gallows in the Pen.

The Pen is now long gone, however the front gates/turrents are still
standing as the entrance to the rather pricy condos that now stand on that
site.

[Hownow]

In article <Xns92C3C7744E4...@petitmorte.net>,
<"spo...@petitmorte.net"> wrote:

I might make a small correction here.
They didn't hang people in the pententiaries in Canada.
It was all done in the county jails and provincial jails.
I forget the name of the one outside Vancouver but in Manitoba
executions took place at Headingley, in Quebec at Bordeaux in Montreal,
in Toronto at the Don Jail and elsewhere in Ontario at the county or
district jails where the trials were held.
All the old county jails in Ontario are now stamdomg em,ppty or been
turned into inns, restaurants and regional office buildings. I was in
Norfolk County recently and the old jail hanging area there is now part
of a children's library-media centre.
A couple of months ago I saw TV-doc about a bank robber/killer who was
hanged in Norfolk County around 1951, and there was a scene with his
son visiting his grave in a Simcoe cemetery, which I thought strange
because hangings in Canada followed the old British tradition of
burying the condemned in an unmarked grave at the jail. The newness of
the grave marker is what tipped me off that the bodies in all
likelihood had been disinterred by the new regional government and
reburied in the Simcoe cemetery.
Hangings were a provincial reponsibility and the provinces had
considerable say in whose sentence would or would not be be commuted by
thw federal cabinet -- one reason why only one woman was ever hanged in
Alberta ... in 1923.

- hm

[Hownow]

In article <111120022316247296%how...@cogeco.ca>, Hownow
<how...@cogeco.ca> wrote:

> district jails where the trials were held.
> All the old county jails in Ontario are now stamdomg em,ppty or been
> turned into inns, restaurants and regional office buildings. I was in
> Norfolk County recently and the old jail hanging area there is now part
> of a children's library-media centre.

Here's an url for an old Ontario County Jail converted to an Inn and
resstaurant.

http://www.cobourgjail.com/

I found it last year when looking for out-of-town restaurants for some
Toronto dining web pages I was doing -- but there were some shots taken
during renovation that gave a good idea of what the joint looked like
in the old days.
I note, too, the site now has a link to some Corrections Guy's pages
that contain photos of a couple of dozen old Ontario jails-- all
exteriors, though, and no shots of gallows chambers. His site also
features US corrections stuff.

- hm

[spo...@petitmorte.net]

Hownow <how...@cogeco.ca> wrote in
news:111120022316247296%how...@cogeco.ca:

Ah hell... now I have to rack my brain to remember where the hangings took
place.. I was certain it was the Pen, but obviously not. There was also a
big Provincial Jail also in New West, likely because New West was the
Provincial capital before Victoria got the nod. New Westminster still
"advertises" itself as 'The Royal City'. As I recall, the Provincial Jail
was called Oakalla. And that is where the executions took place.

A Vancouver Courier story about a court reporter who attended the
executions at Oakalla:

http://www.vancourier.com/06501/news/06501N1.html

Here is a very interesting link about the BC Pen:

Convict Deaths in the British Columbia Penitentiary, 1875 - 1916

http://www.rootsweb.com/~canbc/conlist.htm

From that page this one entry lists an execution at the BC Pen, all of the
other 23 (as of that date) are noted as being done in New West, obviously
at Oakalla:

Sessional Book Year: 1914
Joseph SMITH
CRIME: Assault, With Intent To Steal
Place of Conviction: Vancouver, BC
Date of Death: 31 Jan 1913 Age: 24
Cause: Executed for murder of a guard
Place of Birth: England
Remarks: Death Registration: B13091, 90,419. Sailor. He had been in
prison since 8 Mar 1911. Buried in the BC Penitentiary Cemetery.

Daily Province, Vancouver, 7 Oct 1912, pg.1:
GUARD KILLED BY DESPERADOES WHO TRY ESCAPE:

H. Wilson and Joseph Smith tried to escape. They first struck Guard W.F.
Craig over the head with a hammer and then disarmed three other guards.
Another guard opened fire on the pair and a gunfight followed in which
Wilson was wounded and Guard J.H. Joynson, who was shot twice by Wilson,
died.

Smith was sentenced a year ago to a ten year term for squirting acid
in a man's eyes during a Main St., Vancouver jewellry store robbery.

Daily Province, Vancouver, 1 Feb 1913, pg.32:

States that Joseph Smith was hung. He was the 23rd person executed in New
Westminster and the first at the penitentiary. On 5 Oct 1912 Smith and
Herman Wilson had tried to escape but in a gunfight that ensued a guard was
killed and Wilson was wounded.

Wilson died 29 Oct 1912.

***

And a page about the BC Pen buildings:

http://www.city.new-
westminster.bc.ca/cityhall/planning/Main%20Framework/2_4%20Publications/Her
itage/Descriptions/65%20Richmond.html

> All the old county jails in Ontario are now stamdomg em,ppty or been
> turned into inns, restaurants and regional office buildings. I was in
> Norfolk County recently and the old jail hanging area there is now
> part of a children's library-media centre.
> A couple of months ago I saw TV-doc about a bank robber/killer who was
> hanged in Norfolk County around 1951, and there was a scene with his
> son visiting his grave in a Simcoe cemetery, which I thought strange
> because hangings in Canada followed the old British tradition of
> burying the condemned in an unmarked grave at the jail. The newness of
> the grave marker is what tipped me off that the bodies in all
> likelihood had been disinterred by the new regional government and
> reburied in the Simcoe cemetery.
> Hangings were a provincial reponsibility and the provinces had
> considerable say in whose sentence would or would not be be commuted
> by thw federal cabinet -- one reason why only one woman was ever
> hanged in Alberta ... in 1923.

--

[spo...@petitmorte.net]

Hownow <how...@cogeco.ca> wrote in
news:121120020002130321%how...@cogeco.ca:

Wonderful stuff. Thanks, Howard.

[Hownow]

In article <Xns92C3D865ED1...@petitmorte.net>,
<"spo...@petitmorte.net"> wrote:

It might be that at one time they did hang people in the pen for
murders committed inside the walls. Jurisdiction likely changed with
some fed/provincial conference or other.

Yes, Oakalla, that's the one I was trying to remember.

Reading the piece on the old court reporter and the stench of the
clothing.
That was quite normal in all murder cases involving blood.
Blood-soaked clothing to be presented as evidence was usually kept in
thick plastic bags.
When the bags were opened, the unusual pungent smell of stale dried
blood permeated through the courtroom. It would often clear the
spectators gallery.
I've read old crime stories where the author would try to leave the
impression that the sight of the victim's clothing in the courtroom was
so emotional it prompted the judge to call a recess.
It was, uh, the odor that prompted the recess ... to clear the air.

- hm

[spo...@petitmorte.net]

Hownow <how...@cogeco.ca> wrote in
news:121120020056499389%how...@cogeco.ca:

[...]

I was thinking the same. Based upon the bits from the contemporary news
items it makes sense.

> Yes, Oakalla, that's the one I was trying to remember.
>
> Reading the piece on the old court reporter and the stench of the
> clothing.
> That was quite normal in all murder cases involving blood.
> Blood-soaked clothing to be presented as evidence was usually kept in
> thick plastic bags.
> When the bags were opened, the unusual pungent smell of stale dried
> blood permeated through the courtroom. It would often clear the
> spectators gallery.
> I've read old crime stories where the author would try to leave the
> impression that the sight of the victim's clothing in the courtroom
> was so emotional it prompted the judge to call a recess.
> It was, uh, the odor that prompted the recess ... to clear the air.

Ick... on three ocassions I had the "pleasure" of dealing with paper
currency/documents that had been recovered from dead people. In one case
the $ had been buried with the victim for several months, the other
involved cash that had been on the person when he had met a grisly demise
at the hands of another person. The third involved a plane crash.

In the first instance it was an olfactory overload, the second it was
simply... messy... the third was both. The smell consisted of burnt
paper/melted plastic and fuel, then there was some bodily fluids...

[DedNdogYrs]

<Ick... on three ocassions I had the "pleasure" of dealing with paper
currency/documents that had been recovered from dead people. In one case the $
had been buried with the victim for several months, the
other involved cash that had been on the person when he had met a grisly demise
at the hands of another person. The third involved a plane crash.
In the first instance it was an olfactory overload, the second it was simply...
messy... the third was both. The smell consisted of burnt paper/melted plastic
and fuel, then there was some bodily fluids...>

What do you do for a living?

--

Dogs & children first.

[Alan Hope]

Speaking earlier on the alt.true-crime show, Hownow said:

>And to list a few of the one-tenth of Canadian crime that attracted
>serious attention:

>The Port Coquitlam Pig Farm Murders.
>Serial killer Clifford Olson.
>The gangland torching of a Montreal bar that took 13 lives.
>The Albert Guay insurance plot bombing of an airliner.
>Evelyn Dick, the torso killer -- her husband and a newborn son.
>The American Landlady Killer of at least a score who killed two in
>Winnipeg before being nabbed and hanged.
>Homolka and Bernardo, of course.
>RC Priest Father Adelard who beat the rap but certainly did shoot his
>half-brother to death in an insurance/inheritance scheme.
>The Butter Box Babies.
>And aside from the countless wacko mass killers who wiped out their
>families, bosses, co-workers and passersby, a gaggle of killers who
>tried to coverup their deeds by dismembering and littering the
>countryside with body parts -- a method of disposal that no longer
>disturbs me all that much since one Torontonian logically explained why
>he did it: "She was a large woman and her body would not fit into the
>Volkswagen."

Howard, you have an unseemly interest in all that sort of stuff, man.
Get help.

Oh no wait. That's what this ng is supposed to be about, isn't it?
Slipped my mind for a second.

I take it all back. Carry on.

--
AH

[Alan Hope]

Speaking earlier on the alt.true-crime show, spo...@petitmorte.net
said:

>dednd...@aol.com (DedNdogYrs) wrote in
>news:20021110090359...@mb-mj.aol.com:

>> These show how different crime was back then or maybe it seems that
>> way because it's in Canada. You don't hear about things like the Carr
>> Brothers or the Manson Family in Canada. That seems to be slowly
>> changing though to some extent.

>The much smaller population in Canada probably has more to do with that
>than anything else.

>The US has 10 times the population of Canada, logic says that means 10
>times as many loons, committing 10 times as many atrocities.

Assuming the *proportion* of loons is constant, and I don't think
anyone believes that.

--
AH

[spo...@petitmorte.net]

dednd...@aol.com (DedNdogYrs) wrote in
news:20021112065538...@mb-cs.aol.com:

At the time, I was an investigator with a financial institution.

[spo...@petitmorte.net]

Alan Hope <ah...@skynet.be> wrote in
news:d3s2tu4q7tlk617h9...@4ax.com:

You're probably right, the number likely goes up exponetially...

Loon cubed must be a big number.