MANIACS AT LARGE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LX, Issue 18460, 25 July 1923, Page 9

MANIACS AT LARGE.

ESCAPE FROM 1 , ASYLUM. FIERCE BATTLE WITH GUARDS ; / : r 25 ELUDE PURSUIT. ■', ; PANIC IN COUNTRYSIDE. By'; Telegraph—Press 'Association— Copyright. -"' '. V" (Received 5.5 p.mO . A. and N.Z. \ . ; NEW YORK, July .23. '■:■:■: Twenty-six criminal lunatics, among whom are many murderers, escaped from the : Illinois Hospital for the Criminal Insane, and 25 are still: at ' large. The majority; • are believed to be armed and all are desperate characters. ; Business has been suspended in all the neighbouring towns and armed guards patrol the streets. Shops and dwellings are barricaded. Large forces are scouring the hills in search of the missing men. Two guards were stabbed and one maniac shot dead in the battle preceding the escape. It is admitted that 227 insane convicts participated in the not. The inmates of, the hospital were in an enclosed, open-air exercise ;area when the trouble began. They attacked the guards with wooden benches; and { wrenched the bars of the cage apart. ; ' : Other guards who rushed to the scene prevented wholesale escapes, but 26 eluded pursuit, and only one has been since recaptured.