BOY TURNED BANDIT.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 29, 4 February 1928, Page 3 (Supplement)

BOY TURNED BANDIT.

HICKMAN'S CONFESSIONS.

CAREER OF CRIME.

William E. Hickman, the nineteen-year-old youth who is charged with the kidnapping and brutal murder of a twelve-year-old Los Angeles girl, in a reported "confession," since repudiated by Hickman, revealed a startling career of crime that carried him through many cities of the Eastern States of America before he came to the Pacific Coast and became involved in the kidnapping of little Marian Parker, daughter of a Los Angeles banker. Hickman boasted of his deeds of outlawry as he told of skipping from city to city. In some of the cities, he said, he got "fine write-ups." As he calmly discussed his travels he remarked: "My brain must be warped, or I could not have thought I could go through with this."

Following his return to his mother's home in Kansas City last July after being paroled from his conviction for forgery in the bank at Los Angeles, Hickman said he stole an auto. It was a Chrysler coupe, but not the one that figured in the recent kidnapping. He took it from an Independence mau in Kansas City late one night after the man escorted a young lady up a step to her home. "I crawled into the seat on the opposite side and when he came to get into the car I pressed the gun against his stomach and told him to get out. I drove directly to Chicago, where I paid 11 dollars as a week's rent for an apartment at the Paradise Arms, on Washington boulevard." He left Chicago. "I did not know just what I wanted to do. After going through Pittsburgh I picked up a member of the Pennsylvania State police. He rode with mo more than 20 miles."

Hickman then related how he had visited Washington, D.C., Baltimore, Jersey City, where he ferried to Manhattan. He stayed in New York three days. He said he had committed robberies iu Kansas City, Chicago, Columbus, Ohio and St. Louis, but did not think that he had committed any in the other towns he had passed through. He doubled back. He dodged Pittsburgh and headed for Columbus, where he rented an apartment in Broad Street. "On October 31 I held up three places in less than 30 minutes, and I think I set a record for the town," he said. "There was a good write-up about me in the papers the next morning. The next night I robbed two places, and at one of them I just missed running into the chief of detectives who had not left the place more than two minutes before. It would have been funny if I had run into him."

He passed through Indianapolis and went to St. Louis, where he said he held up several people. One ni.sht while leaving St. Louis he fired a shot in a drug store just to convince the proprietor that the gun was really loaded. He returned to Kansas City. Then went to California. While in the Imperial Valley he was stopped by federal officers looking for mail thieves. He went directly from Los Angeles to San Diego, but did not stop and went to San Francisco. In that city he endeavoured to find an apartment near Golden Gate Park, but finding none, he returned to Los Angeles. He is positive this was on November 23.

On Thanksgiving Day lie went to San Diego, ami on the return trip he said he picked up Andrew Cramer and June Dunning, and when he let them out he understood they were going to an hotei. Before leaving, Cramer made arrangements to meet him two days later at his apartments, where plans were made for a series of robberies. "I was lonesome and wanted to get someone's company. You see. I have had everyone against me fcr so long. I have not had a date with a girl for over a year. \ou can sec how easy it would be for me to be fooled by him."