Three Masked Men Knew Where the Grocer Kept His Money
A Steilacoom storekeeper is robbed of $137 at closing time, and police first look to twenty men just released from McNeil’s Island.
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.
TACOMA, July 15.—[Special.]—Charles Declerk, a Steilacoom grocer, was held up in his store last night by three masked men and robbed of $137. The men entered about closing-up time, shortly before 10 o’clock, and, covering Declerk with pistols, commanded him to produce his money, which they seemed to know he had secreted about the premises. He complied, and later telegraphed to Tacoma requesting the police to arrest the robbers, giving as their description simply “three masked men.” He came to town today and is working with the police in attempting to capture the men. At first it was thought some of the twenty Commonwealers who were let out of McNeil’s Island penitentiary yesterday did the job, but the masked men all had big pistols, which the Commonwealers would not have been able to secure on such short notice.
““He complied, and later telegraphed to Tacoma requesting the police to arrest the robbers, giving as their description simply ‘three masked men.’””
An armed robbery in a small-town store, with police chasing a vague description and suspicion falling on recently released prisoners, shows how quickly crime scares harden into convenient theories. Steilacoom’s 1894 holdup could be a template for modern “known to police” speculation before evidence.
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