CONDEMNED MAN’S SUICIDE

Greymouth Evening Star, 11 December 1937, Page 7

CONDEMNED MAN’S SUICIDE

DIVE TO STONE FLOOR

TO AVOID HANGING

[BY CABLE —PRESS ASSN. —COPYP.TGHT.]

BOISE (Idaho), December 9/ After farewelling his mother and father in the condemned cell, Douglas Van Vlack/thirty years of age, made a desperate attempt to cheat the gallows, on which he was scheduled to die at midnight, for murdering his wife and two policemen. Van Vlack was standing, outside, of the cell as his mother left. He leapt and seized a projection from a tier of cells above, and ascended, hand over hand, to the third , tier. Finally, he scrambled oh to‘ a crossbeam.' The prison guards ran for hets, but Van Black cried: “You will never see me swing on the end of a rope! I have a right to choose the way . I die. I will not come down unless reprieved.” ■ He then dived from the beam, smashing on the stone floor, head-first. LATER.Van Vlack died half an hour after the time fixed for his execution, not regaining consciousness. ' The warden was unable to carry out the hahging Sentence,"due to the law forbidding an execution of Either, the insane or the unconscious. Ironically, death is attributed to a broken neck, but he died in a bed instead of oh the ' ' Unknown to Van Vlack, his attorney had obtained a writ of habeas corpus. The hearing would have been, held seventeen minutes: after'the fatal leap. The warden said to- the Press:' I would haVfe hanged hiffi, if conscious even for a few minutes, even if it had been necessary to carry him to the gallows. ■