Logan Billingsley Saws His Way Out of Detention
After his sentencing in a high-profile whiskey graft trial, Logan Billingsley vanished from the immigration detention station using a hacksaw.
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.
Logan Billingsley, under sentence to 13 months’ imprisonment in a federal penitentiary for conspiracy to violate the federal laws by importing alcoholic liquor into the state of Washington, and the principal witness for the state in the recent whiskey graft trial at Seattle, sawed his way to freedom from the immigration detention station, where he has been held since he received his sentence last week, some time Saturday night. No trace of him has been found. A hacksaw was found in Billingsley’s cell when his escape was discovered.
“Logan Billingsley... sawed his way to freedom from the immigration detention station.”
Billingsley's escape highlights the chaos of the late-Territorial and early-statehood era's enforcement of Prohibition-era liquor laws. The 'whiskey graft' scandals were a recurring theme in the Pacific Northwest, mirroring modern debates about political corruption and institutional integrity.
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