REMARKABLE ALLEGATIONS OF FRAUD

Otautau Standard and Wallace County Chronicle, Volume XI, Issue 522, 18 May 1915, Page 7

REMARKABLE ALLEGATIONS OF FRAUD

Th© refusal of Surrogate Cohalan, of New York, to admit to probate the last will of Mrs Amelia Cutter, wife of the founder of the largest chain of chemist ■stores m the United States*, and worth £500,000, has disclosed a remarkable story of alleged fraud, and the apparent voluntary relapse, of Mrs Cutter from a position of social prominence m New York to one of squalor and obscurity. The Surrogate denounces three beneficiaries of the will as frauds and deceivers, each trying to outdo the other m getting the largest bequest, so that altogether Mrs Cutter was influenced to make three wills, first, favoring one adviser, then the other. Five cousins 'of the deceased now contest the will as being fraudulently obtained from Mrs Cutter under undue pressure and while she was m a semi-conscious condition from the use of drags.

The Surrogate, m sustaining the cousins' claima, tells the fashionable life of the Cutters from 1874 to 1904, when tlhey dropped out of sight. In 1913 Mrs Cutter was found living m two rooms on the second floor of their palatial house, all the other rooms being locked and deserted. Their wants were attended to by one decrepit old man, who was intoxicated most of the time. All the meals were prepared on a two-burner gae range situated m a dark passage-way between two rooms. Mr Cutter died at the age of 84, after a severe illness. The night before he died Mrs* Cvttcr insisted on sleeping with her husband, and she confessed later she was afraid that his ghost would haunt her because she kicked the dying man when he topsed about m delirium. The condition of the house gradually went from bad to worse.. Empty, unclean milk bottles, empty and partly-filled cans of old vegetables, scraps of food which had not- been eaten, used and unwashed dishes, soiled clothing,, old rugs, and unclean vessels were scattered about the T00n.6, whioh were never cleaned or swept. Mrs Cutter was averse to taking a bath or having her body touched with water. She wore the same dress and petticoat and the -Same nightgown for the last two weeks 'of ncr life. She wore her hair hanging uncombed and unkemht, and ate her food with her fingers. After Mr Cutter's death the man-of-all-work used to dress and undress Mrs Cutter. Much amusement was derived from the spectacle of the rival beneficiaries dodging each other m and out of the Ontters' house m their efforts to approach the widow secretly. "It is fairly evident," the Surrogate concludes. " that during the last months of her life tihe testatrix put m her will whoever procured and supervised the execution thereof."