GENIUS AND MURDERER.

Alexandra Herald and Central Otago Gazette, Issue 1210, 3 December 1919, Page 2

GENIUS AND MURDERER.

LIFE PRISONER'S AMAZING DUAL CAREER. An amazing Jckyll and Hyde career lias been led by Robert F. Stroud, who is about to appeal. to the U,S. Supromo Court for a new trial. Idiot, genius and murderer in one, Stroud is at present serving a Jif-e sentence in Leavenworth Penitentiary. He lias killed two a:?!} unci has made efforts to kill others. One would say that a tiger loose on a city street eould be hardly a greater menace to .society tkun Stroud. [Looking on the other side of this remarkable murderer one would bo equally inolined to believe that, properly developed, he might have been proved a mathematical or musical genius.

Stroud's iirst criminal venture Mas made when he was at school in Seattle, where lie was born. .He was arrested for stealing opera glasses, and was released on account of his youth. At seventeen he went to Juneau, Alaska, ami became, cook in a restaurant. Shortly afterwards there was a food, famine in Juneau, aud Stroud got possession of the restaurant. He was able to sell food when it was almost unobtainable elsewhere, and did a tremendous business, until the police, investigating his source of supply, discovered that he wits getting his provisions from a gang of thieves. Then followed a gaol flentoneo.

On his release, he foil in lovo with a dan.ee hall girl; and when, ho found that she had another lover ho went to the man's eottage_a-fr6tjyljcd him. He dec'a'retf "{lTat: the killing of a fight and escaped with a twelveyear sentence. While in gaol he >va3 discovered smuggling drugs into the institution in company with another convict. The latter had made a h'lunder which led. to detection. Stroud attempted to kilt tht man,, and was removed to Leavenworth.

Arrived there, one of the iirsfc uels was to make a .saw out of a ea'se knife, which he -used to dig his -way i:i the direction of a '.nam sewer arid liberty. After this a close watch was kept upon him. }»ut this did not prevent him secreting a spoon, which ho fashioned into a dagger. With this weapon he sprang upon and stabbed to death Andrew F. Turner, a prison guard, at tho noon-day meal, and in the presence <>f 1600 convicts. Stroud said that Turner had called him a vile name. This is the crime for which Stroud was given a life sentence, against which he is appealing, and it was while the trial was in progress that criminologists everywhere were interested in the problem presented by Stroud. That he was a. man- of dual personality was , clearly established by his letters to his mother. One would refer lo the crime in terms of the greatest horror and loathing. Tho nest would speak of it casually and jocularly as though the murderer were in the custom of kiUing'somebody every other day. .

lii Leavenworth Strand has continued to baffly. Iris warders and the experts, who have come to examine him. Knowing no music, but getting hold of a -violin and a guitar, he became «n export performer in three weeks. Through a correspondence course he earned two degrees from the- Kansas State Agricultural College, ono requiring a profound knowledge of mathematics, (he other of engineering. Vet nobody saw him rending except at odd moments. As a. mathematician he is said to be remarkable, as a. lightning calculator, and in solving'' problems of mental arithmetic. Stroud's own explanation is that: these gifts of mathematics and music just 'como to him on waves.' ...

He lias studied thcosophy, and claims to be able to release his astral body at will. That- is one side of him. Theother, the idiot side, is iii. his ignorance of what is due others. When a little kindness is shown, lie is.iu doubt whether to say thanks or to prostrate himself before his benefactor and burst into tears. J?or any slight or injury, oji the other hand, ho immediately begins to plot murder, a man's life blood, in his opinion, being necessary to wipe 'out the memory/ of tho most genial insult.

An a final illustration -of Stroud's gifts may be mentioned the fact .that through correspondence, limited as it is to two letters a. week, strictly ecnsored, ho has been able to interest outsiders who have furnished the several thousand dollars necessary to have his case brought before the Suprome Court.