VIENNA TRAGEDY.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVIII, Issue 234, 2 October 1937, Page 18

VIENNA TRAGEDY.

GANGSTER CHIEF'S DEATH. BURGLAR AND HIS WIFE. VIENNA. The death is announced here of Heinrich Beer, once the most famous gangster of Vienna. Before the war the name of Heinrich Beer was known to everybody in Vienna. He was an interior decorator liv profession, but was better known as the head of the "Beer-Platte," the Beer-gang. His burglaries and robberies often completely puzzled the police; he was feared by the lawful citizen; and his band certainly set up a record in burglaries in. the banking and commercial quarters of Vienna. When the war broke out Beer enlisted as private in a crack Vienna regiment, and was repeatedly praised for his great heroism. The feared head of the Vienna underworld became an excellent soldier and obtained the highest decoration pro. curable by a private. After the war, however, lie went back to his old life. The band, or gang, was again brought into existence, and Beer once more became not only the most dreaded burglar in Vienna, hut also the most quarrelsome nuisance in the inns of the underworld. He not only terrorised merchants; he bullied his own gang and his fellow-gangsters.

Then, some years ago, the police discovered that Beer had turned over a new leaf. He fell in love with a woman who persuaded hiin to give up his career of crime and to live peacefully with his fellow-beings. Beer married the woman and became a useful member of society. Some weeks ago his wife died. This sudden deatli of Mrs. Beer affected the former gangster so much that he found that life was no longer worth living, and he decided to commit suicide. The picture of his beloved wife was before him when the police forced the door of his flat and found him dead.