MURDER IN A CHURCH

Waihi Daily Telegraph, Volume XVIII, Issue 5964, 15 July 1920, Page 2

MURDER IN A CHURCH

SURGEON SHOT BY MANIAC. , Dr. James Markov, a well-known Now York surgeon, was shot and instantly killed while collecting the offering at tihc Sunday morning service at St. GeorgeL Episcopal Church, one of New York’s most fashionable churches, by a maniac named Thomas Simpkin, who escaped from an asylum. In a struggle with the madman folio will g the shooting, Dr George Birewcr, another ,surgeon and a colonel in Hie Medical Carps of the American Expeditionary Force, was also allot in the thigh, but his woufad is not dangerous. When the sermon concluded Dr Mnrkoe, who is one of the veutrymen, le.iL his wire in the gallery and wont to the ’ ground floor to auslst in taking the collection. He politely extended the plate before Simpson, who was huddled in the corner of the pew. With a sliriek the niadinat.i leaped to his feet, drew a revolver from inside his coat, and fired, hitting Dr, Markoe above the left eye. Still jitandishing his pistol, hp fired' two more shots into the congregation and made hi.i escape through the main entrance, running in the direction of StuyVcsaiit Park. Several of the worshippers Atom the church led in the chase, calling to a number of young men in the park to stop the assassin. Simpkin was surrounded and seized, and during the struggle his pistol went off for the fourth time, wounding Dr. Brewer. Dr. Markoe was for many years the personal physician of the late Mr J. P. Morgan, and by a strange coincidence ho attended th e , younger Morgan when 1 the latter’s life war. attempted by a 1 Sunntic in strikingly similar cireum- : stances in 1915. !