Crime Detection.

Manawatu Standard, Volume 3, Issue 36, 8 January 1883, Page 2

Crime Detection.

An American paper to hand by the 'Frisco mail contains a sensational account of how an incendiarist was "bowled ont" aud brought to justice. The extract is as follows: -"Justice Willis, who set fire to a houss at Put* man, RJ., was caught with difficulty. There was at first only a detective's vague suspicion againsc him, resting upon no evidence. It would not have done to arrest him, for he was a man of good standing, and so much of a politician that he expected to go to the next State Legislature. A plot was therefore laid to make him convict himself. A woman was sent to board m the samr house with him. She pretended to be a bookncanvasser. After gaining his confidence, she told him that she really belonged to a gang of thieves who had a large amount of Governor* bonds to sell. Willis eagerly proposedto act as agent for the purpose. He went with the woman to Boston, where she introduced him to several men who personated the band of robbers. They affected to doubt his sincerity. Fear* ing that he was about to miss a profitable bit of business, he tried to win their confidence by telling them of crimes which he had committed. He had stolen from various persons, and once m a bank, when counting money alongside a man who was doing the same, he slyly clapped the other's pile on his own, and it was supposed that a sneak thief had disappeared with the missing notes. This exploit fairly delighted the listeners (it turns out to be a true story), and they led him into a confession of the incendiarism. A concealed short-hand writer took down all he said, and bis arrest followed.''