Escaped Prisoner Taken After Fierce Struggle

Manawatu Times, Volume 69, Issue 206, 31 August 1944, Page 5

Escaped Prisoner Taken After Fierce Struggle

AUCKLAND, Aug. 31. In a fierce struggle on a Kingsland resident’s front lawn the second of two prisbners who escaped from the Auckland gaol on July 10, by blasting a hole in the outer wall, was overpowered and arrested by Detective I. Jones to-night. He was John Henry Wilson, aged about 31. Unlike Herbert Harris Keith Maxfield, aged 34, who escaped from gaol with him and although in possession of a loaded pistol submitted quietly to arrest on July 23, Wilson was unarmed and put up a stiff resistance when near a tramcar. In Sandringham Road Detective Jones saw Wilson leave the tramcar and he apprehended the escaped prisoner who gave a fictitious name and jumped on to the lawn in front of a residence. Detective Jones caught Wilson there and a struggle ensued. The residents, who at first did not realise the detective’s identity, telephoned the Central Police Station. Constable Wilkes, who was dispatched from the Kingsland station, quickly arrived on the scene and assisted Jones who was by then holding Wilson down on the ground. The captured prisoner was brought to the Central station watchhouse in a police car and locked up. He will bo questioned in the morning, no statement regarding his whereabouts since his break from gaol being taken from him to-night. Wilson was fully clad Tin civilian clothes when arresfbd and was wearing rubber knee boots. Detective Jones returned to his home after delivering his prisoner, his clothes dripping wet after the struggle on the lawn. This is the scfipnd time Wilson has escaped from prison and been recaptured. He escaped from Paparua prison near Christchurch with another prisoner in 1937 and was caught shortly afterward. When he escaped from Auckland gaol he was serving a sentence of three years’ hard labour on charges of breaking and entering. Ho was first sent to gaol in 1941. Up till to-night when he was arrested, Wilson had not been seen since warders reported him in the vicinity of Epsom on the day of his escape. Wilson will appear in the Police Court in the morning.