AN EXTRAORDINARY CRIMINAL CAREER.

Otago Witness, Issue 2808, 8 January 1908, Page 80

AN EXTRAORDINARY CRIMINAL CAREER.

In Jbis long imprisonment, Oliver 0. Perry has been , forgotten by the publ : c that years ago marvelled at his exploite as' a train robber and shuddered over the manifestation of his abnormal wickedness. An interview with the prisoner of this day lifts him again to public recognition. Perhaps nothing is gained nor a purpose served in- thie recalling of him to the memory. But, at least, a consideration of the man in his latter stage is interesting. He was a monster in crime; he is a monster in prison. Victor Hugo, in his novel "Las Mi&erables," in describing the products of the French prison system he attacked, never presented a more ingenious, skilful, and! reckless votary of crime. The predatory creatures, more beasts than- *raman, who, placing their backs agamst the angle of walls, by the use of the muscles of their arms and legs, could reach the roofs of buildings, were more than matched by Perry, who, dangling from the end of a Tope, dropped to the roof of an express car of a train moving at the rate of 50 miles an. hour, hung from the side while he broke in the. glace of the door, through which he covered the messengers with a revolver, and with his other hand unloosed" the fastenings, obtaining an entrance to rob. As marvellous as were his robberies, in his escapes he rivalled the" feat 6of Jack iSheppard. For a time it seemed impossible to hold him in captivity, as it was difficult to capture him. In all that he did there was originality in, design and ■ uncanny skill and recklessness in execution. Indeed, such were the manifestations of this man's genius for crime that the law pronounced mm insane, and immured him as an "insane prisoner at Matteawan. •" To the students of criminology Perry was, and is, a problem of great force of character and extraordinary will, moved by the criminal impulse. In prison, when finally, and safely confined, he displayed .alt the characteristics that had made him different from other criminals. In the beginning he was vicious.. If he was to be detained as a crazy criminal, he determined that he would receive all the consideration due to a crazy and irrespon- . sibie person. So he was a. constant source of trouble. Because his family refused to have anything, to do with him — would not visit him — he put out his eyes. In. doing , , this all the originality that had marked' . his deeds of crime were employed. He made a machine which, when heated, dropped sharp pointed weights into his eyes. To escape the pain he took opium. , Awakening, he was blind. In 1903, declaring that prison fare gave him dyspepsia, he refused to eat. He has not eaten since. When the physicians found that liis extraordinary will was at work they fed him. by artificial means through a tube. He does not resist the, physicians, however, and says that he has lost all desire to eat. A week later he tore his prison suit of clothes to shreds, and since has worn only the blankets of his bed. He is as extraordinary a prisoner *9 he -was- a criminal. Blind and naked, and eschewing food, he sits in dreary solitude, awaiting the passage of the years Mr W. J. Fuller, J.P., storekeeper, EtendelsTiain, S.A., writes :—" Some hide ;ime ago I was called in to see a neighbour who was suffering from severe cramps. Mid who Teally thought he was past help. [ took a bottle of Chamberlain's Colic, cholera, and Diarrhoea Remedy with Trie, md gave him three doses, according to lireetions, and in a few hours h©- had juite recovered. I have frequently used it n my own family, and am so well sati3tral is to its merits that I make a. ptoint of lelling it to my customers on a positive guarantee." For sale everywhere.

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that in the end .will bring the death he disdains ,to> force prematurely. A monster in criminal activity, and a monster within his guarded walls, he is a study who will take rank with the celebrated prisoners of his~tory and romance. He is not insane, but abnormal. Arid he is treated as ofcly his abnormality can bY treated:— Brooklyn jJEagla. v „ ' ' " '- : -