CRUCIFIED.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 223, 20 September 1938, Page 10

CRUCIFIED.

HORRIBLE FATE.

EX-CONVICT'S STORY.

WANTED TO GO STRAIGHT. MAN-HUNT FOR TORTURERS. (From Our Own Correspondent.) SAX FRAXCISCO, .September 1. There was a wave of horror when it was learned that an ex-convict had been nailed to a rude croft* in one of the nio*t bizarre criinee in the history of Western America. Armed posses tracking: rujrfred country out of Reno, Xevada, believed they had picked up the trail of the two torturers of 27-year-old Kdward Collins, who was nailed to the wooden cross and left to die in agony.

Colli])*, a former convict who had withstood torture because he wanted to go eitraifiht, and refused to join his two former pals in crime, lay in a hospital in Reno critically mutilated, but physician* believed he would ultimately recover. Officers leading the hnnt for the cruciflers reported tlyit after an all-night search they had picked up the trail, and thet it led through L'aixon City and up the Clear Creek jrrade leading to Lake Tahoe in Northern California. Other por*dble motives were l>ei!ijr checked a*s a possibility for tlie ghastly torture. Several Theories. While Col line told the police he was crucified because ho would not join his former priVon pals in nome "jolw" they were planning. in\ e<tis<itors were trying to learn whether the torture may have been in retaliation for '"double eroding ,, someone in prison, or that Collins may have been "holding out , ' on the hiding place of loot. One remote theory that Collins had tortured himself in the hope of arousing sympathy tr> land a job was di-credited, although the police were puzzled by the yoiinyr man's statement that lie forgave the torturers. Collins was carried to the hospital in Reno on the cross after horrified rescuer* discovered his bodv. He had lieen released from the world's penitentiary. San Queirtin Prison, near San Francisco, three weeks previously. Astounded ruirpeon* swiftly anaesthised the former convict, removed the tenpenny nail* from his feet and sutured the rrapinp wound*. They announced he would live. Imrrinjr possible, complications from infection.

From hw hospital l)ed Collins capped the, weird story of h'u crucifixion to the police. He named his won Id-be killers «* two men he had met in San Francisco and known to hi:n only a« "l)a»i>" and "Swede." Neither had served time with him, but Collins «aid he had been their partner in several burglaries. On several occasion* they attempted to lure him back into a life' of crime.

"We've pot some swell jobs lined up," they told him. "I don't want any jiart of them or you,"' Collins replied. "I'm going fitraight."

The two criminals confronted Collins apain. this time in front of the Baptist Church in Mono. Halting their ecdan motor car they stepped up to him with new demands that he join them in rol>l>eries.

"Listen, you guys, and get it right." Colli n* naid. "I'm going straight, <iiid I mean it." Thereupon the man identified as "Swede" drew an automatic, snarling: "All right. If you want to go straight, we'll teach you how to go "straight— get in that oar!" Get Timber. They drove him through darkened streets to a timber yard, where he wan thrust from the car* and told to "pick up some lumber." Collins lo(ike<l puzzled, but the man known as "Swede" explained: "Ifts going to be for your own muse. Those two one-by-tliree" look good."'

Still covered by the automatic. Collins lifted the designated lumber and. while one of the men prodded him in the ba-k with a gun. carried it 12 blocks to the Washoe County garage.

There Collins watched "D«go" set the wood crosswise on the concrete floor and nail it together. While he (screamed in terror, Collins was forced at gun-point to lie on the ero*e. Then two nails were driven through his inste|*s. two more hammered through the palm* of his hands. Mercifully unconscious by this time, he was carried outside, where his torturers left the cross standing upright against a w«ll.