The Gambler of University Street
A Seattle woman turns the tables on a local gambler who used threats of violence to bankroll his craps habit.
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.
W. B. Kerlin, who gives his occupation as gambler, was arrested at the Seattle post office, charged with obtaining money by extortion. Mrs. Norwood, residing at 522 1/2 University street, went before the prosecuting attorney and made a complaint, and several other women residing on University street who have been threatened by the man will be witnesses. For several weeks Kerlin, it is charged, has been calling at Mrs. Norwood's home and those of other women in the vicinity, demanding money, which he said he was going to play in a crap game located in the New York block. Saturday he demanded that Mrs. Norwood get him a certain sum. If she failed, he told her, it would not be well for her. This frightened the woman and she informed the police. She was told to tell Kerlin when he next came around that she had a money order and as soon as she got it cashed she would give him what he asked. She met Kerlin at the post office by appointment and the officers were on hand to place him under arrest.
“If she failed, he told her, it would not be well for her.”
This extortion case highlights the precarious safety of women in residential neighborhoods facing predatory men, a dynamic that remains a core issue in modern community safety discourse. The use of a police-staged 'trap' at a post office shows early 20th-century investigative techniques for handling neighborhood harassment.
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