Newspaper Articles for Shawnee County, Kansas

SHAWNEE COUNTY, KANSAS

COLLINS A SUICIDE?

The Startling Theory of the Topeka Mystery Advanced by the Man Who Captured Dr. Fraker

DID HE TAKE HIS OWN LIFE?

John Wilkerson Believes That He Did, and Is Forging a Chain of Evidence to Prove It

The Accident and the Life Insurance Companies Are at Outs Over Paying Collins' Policies

THIS CALLS OUT NEW FACTS

The Testimony and Actions of Young Collins and the Family Bear Out the Suicide Idea

The accident insurance companies, which carried $13,000 of insurace on the life of J. S. Collins, whose mysterious death in his home in Topeka, Kas., last Friday week has excited so much comment hereabouts, are trying to prove that he committed suicide. The old line life insurance companies, which carried $15,000 insurance on his life, will insist and attempt to prove that he was murdered, and by a member of the family. Between these two the mystery of the death may possibly be cleared up.

The laws provide that if the beneficiary of the assured murders him the insurance cannot be collected. John Henry Collins, son of the dead man, was a beneficiary to the extent of $7,000 of his father's life insurance. If can the life insurance companies can prove that John murdered his father they will not have to pay the insurance.

In the $13,000 worth of accident policies is the clause that if the assured commits suicide the policies are void. That is why the accident companies have united in an effort to prove that J. S. Collins was not murdered, but that he committed suicide.

THE LATEST DEVELOPMENT

Within the last few days and especially yesterday, many things came to light in this most remarkable case in support of the theory that J. S. Collins commited suicide. It has developed that instead of being wealthy, as nearly every one supposed, Collins was financially embarrassed to such an extent that he borrowed money right and left from friends, and it is even declared that in some instances he resorted to mispresentation to get it. His creditors were pushing him hard, he was worried about money matters so that he could not sleep at night. Those who believe in the suicide theory sa that the family knew he contemplated suicide and that was why the son, John, went home so often from the university at night, to watch his father and to prevent his killing himself.

John Wilkerson, former chief of police of Topeka, one of the shrewdest detectives in Kansas, the man who brought to justice Dr. G. W. Fraker, the notorious insurance swindler, has been working on the Collins case for four days. His theory of the death of Mr. Collins, as stated by him yesterday, is as follows.

WILKERSON'S THEORY

"After working on the case for four days, I believe the J. S. Collins killed himself and I believe that his widow, son and daughter knew it. I believe he was contemplating suicide for months. The reason was that he was practically bankrupt. He had been very wealthy. He had lived in splendid style, gave liberally to charity and church work and was a high spirited and very proud man. Through all his financial troubles of recent years he kept his head up and hid it from all except his most intimate friends. His real estate holdings shrank in value, but he kept up appearances. He borrowed whenever he could without immediate hope of repaying. Last January he borrowed $1,500 of Mr. J. S. Carpenter of Topeka and the Wednesday evening before he was killed she visited him in his office and demanded payment. He told her, 'Come here Friday morning and you will be satisfied'. Friday morning he was dead. Today there was a claim of $1,000 and another of $500 filed against the estate. Other claims will be filed.

"My theory of the death is this: He arose quietly in the morning without awakening his wife, took his shotgun from the closet and loaded it. Then he sat down on the bed, drew the cover over him with his bare feet sticking out below the comfort, held the muzzle of the gun in his right hand, put his toe in the trigger and as he sat up in bed pressed the trigger and shot himself in the left side of his neck. Then he fell back, the gun dropped from his hand, but the toe remained against the trigger, and as the muzzle dropped against his hip the second barrel was discharged, going into his side."

ACCOUNTING FOR THE GUN

"How do you account for the gun being found in the hall at the foot of the stairway leading upstairs?" was asked of Mr. Wilkerson.

"Mrs. Collins took it there. My theory is that she knew he contemplated suicide. What more natural than that she, in her first fright and horror of being aroused from sleep and not knowing that both barrels had been discharged, should grasp the gun and rush with it into the hall to call her step-son, John? The gun was found where, she says, she went to call upstairs to John that his father had been shot. At that spot she dropped the gun. Of course, the first impulse of the family would be to conceal the suicide."

"What about the two revolvers that were always beneath the pillows of Mr. and Mrs. Collins, but were missing after his death?"

"They were taken out by Mrs. Collins. If she knew he contemplated committed suidie what would be a more natural thing for her to do than to secretly take those revolvers out of the bed and hide them, so that if he should desire to kill himself during thenight he would not have a revolver to do it with?"

EXPLAINING JOHN'S ACTIONS

"I believe", continued Mr. Wilkerson, "that the suicide theory explains the actions of the son, John Collins, before and after his father's death. He knew his father might kill himself, but the boy was too proud to tell it to his college mates. He was going home almost nightly to prevent his father's killing himself, but he told his college chums that some one was shadowing his father, that he was going home to protect him. I think he told his sweetheart, Miss Frances Babcock, the truth about it and that explains his telegram to her immediately after the death: 'Father is dead. Tell nothing.'"

This theory of suicide outlined by Mr. Wilkerson, will undoubtedly be the one that the accident insurance companies will go upon in refusing to pay the insurance policies upon the life of the late Mr. Collins. There are many things which strengthen the theory. Last January Mr. Collins went to Mrs. Carpenter and asked to borrow $1,800 for a farmer who wished to make the loan. He refused to tell Mrs. Carpenter the name of the farmer. She finally let him have $1,000 and he gave three notes for $700, $500 and $300. She pressed him recently to pay her. He kept putting her off, persistently refusing to disclose the farmer's name. The Wednesday night before his death she visited Collins again and demanded the money. He gave her the answer: 'Come Friday morning and you will be satisfied.'"

MORE DEBTS COME TO LIGHT

Yesterday Mrs. Carpenter filed in Topeka a mortgage given her by Mr. Collins in 1893 for $1,000 which he had borrowed from her. The mortgage is past due, but she had not recorded it. Mr. Collins represented to her then that he was borrowing the money for Lavina Collins of Baltimore, Md.

Yesterday there was filed in the probate court at Topeka a claim against the Collins estate for $500 by Emma Peterson. It was money she had lent Mr. Collins.

Mr. Collins recently told Fred Miller, a real estate dealer of Topeka, that he did not see how he could carry the strain that was upon him. He told a real estate agent, a Mr. Fitzpatrick, that he would soon have to drop his old line life insurance, as he was unable to pay the premiums.

WALKED THE FLOOR ALL NIGHT

Mrs. T. J. Chapman, maitron of the Lake View club house, at which Mr. Collins was a frequent visitor, said when she heard of his death,

"I am not surprised. He walked the floor all night the last night he was here."

Mrs. Chapman was not a witness before the coroner's jury nor was any effort made by the police of Topeka to secure her statement in more definite form.

Lake View is five miles west of Lawrence and the Lake View club has a membership of 100 Topeka and Lawrence people who enjoy hunting and fishing. Many of the best families of both towns have their own boats on the lake and several own cottages. J. S. Collins was a member of the club and spent much of his time there. He was often accompanied by members of his family including his son, John Collins, and his step-son, Grant Meade. When seen at the club house yesterday Mrs. Chapman said, 'I think I had no thought of his being murdered. He belonged to the Lake View club and was here often. The last time he came he was going. Last the next morning, and we heard him walking about in his room several times during the night.

HE COULDN'T SLEEP

"I think he was here twice during the last two weeks of his life. The first time, just two weeks before he died, Mr. Davidson of Topeka slept with him and said that Mr. Collins slept very little during the night. I am not sure whether it was the night we heard him walking about in his room or the night he stayed with Mr. Davidson but the next morning after one of those visits he said he did not sleep an hour during the night.

I don't see how John Collins could have killed his father. They were here often together. Mr. Collins would wait for his son to go fishing with him in presence to strangers."

'Did the son show the same disposition as his father?'

'For all I know he did. It seemed that way to me."

Mr. Chapman, who has charge of the grounds says young Collins did not go to the club moreo than three or four times during the last year. The father and son had been in the habit of going together a year or so ago. Last summer and fall John Collins visited the family occasionally at the club house, but was not there very often. He went in a carriage from Lawrence with a young woman occasionally when the family was at the lake.

Mrs. Chapman said it was a matter of remark with visitors at the club that John Collins was exceedingly kind to his step-mother.

The boat owned by Mr. Collins floats idly in the lake half full of water. No one has claimed it.

Both Mr. and Mrs. Chapman declare that Collins was always nervous, but that he was much more nervous than usual during his last visit to the lake.

THE ATTORNEY SAYS LITTLE

A. A Goddard, attorney for Mrs. Collins and John Collins, declined to make any statement for publication until late yesterday afternoon. When he did talk it was more as a confidential friend of the family than as an attorney that he spoke. Mr. Goddard was formerly assistant attorney general of Kansas and is a man of very high standing in Topeka. He said last night:

"I know that John Collins did not kill his father. I am as sure of it as I am that I am living. In time the truth will be known and it will demonstrate that he is innocent. Much stress has been laid on the fact that to strangers he did not show grief for his father's death. It is true that he bore up well in the presence of those who are not his personal friends, but when the strangers were gone and the doors closed he was a very different man. Miss May Lange, a friend of the family who lived across the street from the Collins home, tells that the day after his father's death she found John lying on a lounge with his face down weeping like a child. She tried to console him bt it seemed to do no good. Finally she said, 'John you are the head of the family now. It falls upon you to care for the other members. You must brace up.'

"The truth is that the boys feels his misfortune more deeply than any stranger could gather from his conduct."

On the questionof a prospective fight over the insurance, Mr. Goddard said there might be a little delay, but it would not last long.

THE PHYSICIAN TOO

Dr. G. I. Mulvane, who has been an intimate friend of the Collins family for many years, and was the family physician when John Collins was an infant, is most positive that John Collins did not kill his father. He is living in Chicago now, but hs went to Topeka on a visit a short time ago. He is one of the most positive in his views of all the friends of the family.

The loyalty of the university students to John H. Collins is one of the striking features of the case. The young man has been a student at the state university at Lawrence for more than two years. He lived at the Beta fraternity chapter house. A reported for The Star went to Lawrence yesterday and talked with a dozen of the students of the university, including the young men who lived at the Beta chapter house. They spoke in highest terms of the manliness, condor and tenderness of young Collins. Howard Leonard, Wester W. Wilder, Frank W. Swett, Herbert Wing and V. O. Boone, young men of the best families in the state and members of Beta fraternity scout the idea that John Collins killed his father, said Mr. Boone.

HIS SCHOOLMATES DEFEND HIM

"John lived with us here and you know, if you have ever been at college, that young men living together in this way for two years get to know the innermost secrets of each other's lives. I know John thoroughly. I know his weaknesses and his faults and he has them as we all have. But he was the soul of honor and I know that he loved his father. There is his father's picture on the mantel there where John kept it. His father came here to the chapter house quite often to see John and he ate here with us and slept with John the nights he stayed here. We all liked John's father and often remarked that hey wer emore than chums than like father and son. I will admit that there were circumstances which looked dark against John but after the death I went to Topeka and took John into the parlor of his home and looked him squarely in the eyes, talked to him and questioned him about the affair. I came away as sure as I am that I am living that John is innocent."

That is the belief of all the students of the university who could be seen yesterday. Many of them called attention to the fact proved at the inquest, that John, while his father was dying, gazed into his face and then fell on his knees beside the bed and sunk his face into his hands.

ON THE STAND

The students point out too, that John, in the witness chair at the inquest admitted many things that, at first glance, seemed to be against him. He told that he knew where the shot gun and cartridges were kept and where the key to the closet was hidden. He was prompted to say that he believed a burglar killed his father. They say that if John had killed him he would not have done it without making some preparation to throw suspicion on some outside person. He would have left a door or window open as if the murderer had escaped that way. He would not have telegraphed his sweetheart to tell nothing and then refuse to say on the witness stand what that 'tell nothing' meant. He would not have admitted that he knew his father carried life insurance payable to him.

A rumor was started in Topeka yesterday that John Collins and Miss Babcock were secretly married several weeks ago. A search of the marriage records of Topeka and of Lawrence showed no license issued to them. Miss Babcock denies that she is married or that she was ever engaged to marry Collins. He accompanied her to many parties and entertainments, but there had been no talk of marriage.
(Kansas City Star ~ May 22, 1898)

BALLOONIST DROWNS

TOPEKA, Kan., July 16---Frank W. Jacobs, aged 23; a balloonist well known over the central west, was drowned last night while bathing in the Kansas river here. In 1910 and 1911 Jacobs piloted the balloon Topeka II in the national elimination balloon races. In the 1911 races Jacobs won third place.
(Salt Lake Telegram ~ July 16, 1913)