A STIRRING POLICE STORY.

Cromwell Argus, Volume XLI, Issue 2206, 1 August 1910, Page 2

A STIRRING POLICE STORY.

INSPECTOR CAMINADA AND THE MANCHESTER CAB MYSTERY. One night a cabman, driving in Manchester, Was hailed by a passerby, who startled the man by telling him that one of his fares had jumped out while his cab was going, leaving the door open. The cabman leapt off his box. He saw that one of the men was huddled up in a corner. The passenger was dead ! There was no money in his pocket ; he had no jewellery. There was no suspicion of murder, the doctor detecting nothing but alcohol. The case was put in the hands of Inspector Caminada, who soon established the identity of the dead man. He was the senior partner in a firm of paper manufacturers who had offices in Manchester. After leaving his offices about one o'clock, he had arranged to dine at a restaurant with a friend at seven o'clock, but failed to keep his appointment.

THE MAN IN THE LIGHT CHECK CLOTHES. That he had been robbed was certain, as when last seen he had upon him a watch and chain worth over a hundred pounds, and a purse containing several sovereigns. Inspector Caminada discovered that a little before the hour he was expected by his friend he had been seen near the appointed restaurant with a young man dressed in light check clothes. Soon after he was noticed by a constable with the same young man.

The cabman had picked up his fares near the Oliver Cromwell monument. The younger man told him to drive to a public-house in Deansgate, where the two remained some twenty minutes. On coming out, the young man gave an address in the Stretford Road, towards which the cab was proceeding, when the episode of the open door and the flight of the young man happened.

The post-mortem revealed a startling fact—the gentleman had been poisoned by chloral ! The preliminary inquiries led to nothing. The address in the Stretford Road was a bogus one ; the landlady of the public-house in Deansgate could say nothing. By dint of perseverance however, the detective lighted on the track of a young man, dressed in a darkish-brown check coat and waistcoat, and had called at a certain beerhouse on the evening of the murder. He was wearing a valuable gold watch, and asked the landlord for refreshments at the same time pulling out a handful of gold, silver, and coppers. The young man drove off in a cab. ON "PIG JACK'S" TRACK. Gaminada hunted up the cabman who had driven the youth, and ascertained that he had taken him to the Locomotive Inn, a noted house for pugilists. At the Locomotive Inn however, they knew nothing whatever of the young man ; but it occurred to Caminada that the connection of the house with pugilism might indicate that the young man had tastes in that direction. He then remembered that there was a fighting man known as "Pig Jack," about whom there were ugly rumours.

"Pig Jack" was now living near the Locomotive Inn ; and this seemed to Caminada something more than a mere coincidence, for "Pig Jack" had a son about eighteen years of age. The fact that "Pig Jack" and his family had shifted their quarters after the inquiry was set on foot also looked suspicious. The inspector easily got upon their track, and arrested the youngster—Charles Parton. No sooner was Charles seen by the two cabmen than he was identified. The young fellow said that on the day in question he was in Liverpool.

Liverpool ! Was not a young man wanted by the Liverpool police for stealing chloral from a chemist's shop ? The facts were significant. Whilst the chemist was weighing out ten grains of chloral for his customer, the latter snatched up a bottle containing a pound weight of the drug, and made off with it. His description tallied with that of the prisoner, and the chemist subsequently identified Charles Parton. Caminada's memory was again at worki. A few weeks before, a grocer, charged with being drunk, said he had spent an hour or two at a Manchester "free and easy," and had enjoyed himself perhaps a little too much. A young fellow offered to see him home, and he got. unhesitatingly into a cab with the youthful Samaritan. This was the last the grocer remembered until he woke up to find himself in a police-station. Meanwhile, much had happened. After the cab had started towards the Oldham Road, the driver discovered the charitable young man had disappeared, the grocer was snoring inside the cab, and his pockets were turned inside-out.

This case was on all fours with the one Oaminada was investigating, and the grocer identified Parton. THE ELEVENTH HOUR WITNESS. Another startling discovery was to come. It appeared that a week before the grocer's adventure, a railway-porter from the same town had come to Manchester to see a friend. The two came across Parton arid a companion the latter pretending to be acquainted with the porter's friend. The four entered into conversation, and adjourned to a public-house. After a time Parton and the porter were left together, the other two going out.

On their return they found the porter in a stupor, and Parton assisted him into a cab. The friend took him in the cab to his home, and it was there found that he had been robbed of his watch and chain and money. In this case death followed. Caminada was induced to look for a person who was said to have been in the public-house in Deansgate when the deceased and the prisoner were there. The inspector discovered him in the person of a book-keeper employed in the neighbourhood. The book-keeper admitted that he was present when the two men called and said he saw the prisoner pour some fluid from a small phial into one of the glasses of beer. This book-keeper, discovered at the eleventh hour, was the most important witness at the trial, and the jury had no difficulty in finding Parton guilty.—"Answers."