A Dramatic Arrest and a 'Whisky Fit' at the Police Station
A suspect arrested for jumping a boarding house bill and passing bogus checks collapses in his wife's arms while in police custody.
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.
There was a general commotion in Chief Tackler's office when J. N. Jones, arrested for jumping a boarding house bill in Seattle and passing bogus checks in Tacoma, collapsed in a fit during a conference with his wife. As the woman embraced him, Jones shuddered convulsively and fell to the floor. Officers, believing the man had been drinking heavily, attributed his collapse to a 'whisky fit' caused by forced abstinence in the lockup. Jones, who was dressed in a bicycle suit at the time of his arrest, had previously claimed to be a world-traveling correspondent for the New York World to secure goods and cash from local firm Dege & Milner. He also falsely claimed to be 'Diablo,' the famous 'loop-the-loop' cyclist.
“As their lips parted the man shuddered convulsively and fell on the floor in a fit.”
This story highlights the era's reliance on 'moral character' evidence in legal matters. The casual use of medical terms like 'whisky fit' underscores how the justice system frequently pathologized addiction while simultaneously criminalizing minor economic crimes like 'jumping a boarding house bill.'
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