BULLET IN BACKBONE

Evening Post, Volume CXV, Issue 40, 17 February 1933, Page 7

BULLET IN BACKBONE

MR. CERMAK'S CONDITION

ATTITUDE OF ASSAILANT

(Received February 17, 10 a.m.) MIAMI, February 16. Physicians on Thursday said that Mr. Cermak has a more than fifty-fifty chance of recovery. His condition is regarded as dangeronß • but not immediately critical. ■ .The bullet evidently traversed the diaphragm and lodged in the body in the eleventh dorsal vertebra. Surgical intervention is deemed unwise unless the patient's condition becomes worse. .. Lying in hospital, Mr. Cermak said to Mr. Eoosevelt: "I am mighty glad it was me instead of you. I wish you would be careful; The 'country needs you." A deep expression of agony showed on the-, sun-tanned face of the Presidentelect as he bent over the bed replying: "We need you, and men like you." Mr. Roosevelt held the Mayor in his lap.en route to hospital in the Roosevelt car. -.',.. The condition of Mrs. Joseph Gill, who was shot in the abdomen, took a turn for the worse, and is described as most critical. The three others injured are believed to be out of danger. . . Newspaper clippings found on Zangara repoj-ted the movements of Mr. Roosevelt. The police . said that one clipping told the story of the assassination of President McKinley. It was a woman, Mrs. W. F. Cross, of Miami, who grabbed at tho arm of the assassin. As Mr. Cermak sank to the pavement and Mrs. Gill fell, the victims appeared stunned. It was the bystanders who did the shouting and screaming. ' ■ Mrs.) Cross gave tho following' Etc-

count: "When the President-elect stood up to speak, so many , were in front of me that I could not see, so I stood up on. a bench. This man stood up with me, and the bench almost folded up. I looked around then, and .saw he had a pistol, and he began shooting towards, the; President-elect. I grabbed his. hand which held the pistol, and pushed it into the air. Tom Armour also grabbed his hand: Wo held it up. By that time some men were choking him." .'.;.:"" ' The police are convinced that; the attempt was a one-man job. _ The penalty for attempted assassination in Florida is life imprisonment, and for assassination death. ' * ZANGARA EXAMINED. Giuseppe Zangara, with bulging eyes dilating as he talked with severe interrogators in the Dade Country gaol on/Thursday, said that he had tno regrets for the attack on Mr. Roosevelt. The prisoner answered questions by Sheriff Hardie in broken English. ;. "Why do you want to kill? Did you want to kill the policeman who caught you?'? Hardie asked. "I no care to kill police," Zangara replied. '' They work for a leeving. A.s a man! 1 like Meester Roosevelt; as President I want to 'him. I want to keel all Presidents. In Italy/ten years ago, 1 want to keel the King, but I cannot get to heem." "Are you an anarchist?" was the next question. ; ■■-/.■ . "1 do^ not belong to any society," said Zangara. "lam not an: anarchist. Sometimes I get beeg pain in stomach too, and then I want to keel these Presidents who oppress working men." There is a Seep sear on Zangara's abdomen. '• .' He has been in the United States about nine years.-.' He is understood to be a naturalised citizen. '