An Unexpected Guest at the Sheriff's Door
A South Tacoma deputy spent hours searching for a fugitive only to find him knocking on his own front door.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
The sheriff's office received word from Lakeview last night that a man had been captured there. Deputy Sheriff Doten drove out, but when he arrived at Lakeview the man had escaped. The officer searched every bush and shack in the neighborhood until nearly 12 o'clock and then returned home. While sleeping peacefully at his home in South Tacoma, Mr. Doten heard a knock on the door and on opening it he found the man he had been looking for. Two citizens had thoughtfully brought him to the house instead of putting him in the South Tacoma jail. The man was locked up there for the night and brought to the county jail today. He is a Swede and had been working at Portman's dairy. The case appears to be one of too much bad whisky.
“While sleeping peacefully at his home in South Tacoma, Mr. Doten heard a knock on the door and on opening it he found the man he had been looking for.”
This incident highlights the informal nature of early 20th-century policing in Tacoma, where citizens often acted as extensions of the law. While modern police protocols are significantly more structured, the mention of alcohol-related issues in South Tacoma remains a recurring theme in the city's civic discourse.
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