The Chambermaid Who Foiled a Newport Crime Spree

The police nabbed two of the smoothest sneak thieves last Saturday that have visited Newport in a long time. The parties gave their names as Roland Cummings and Benjamin Ashton and claimed that they came from Butte, Mont.

Nearly every store handling gents' furnishing goods suffered as a result of the raid of the thieves. Their modus operandi was to enter a store together. While one of the pair engaged the clerk's attention, the other, who wore a large overcoat, would slip a few pairs of pantaloons or other goods under his coat and then call for his confederate to come along as they did not care to buy anything there.

This scheme was worked so nicely that the pair accumulated about 20 pairs of pants, a coat and vest and a large quantity of shirts and like wearing apparel. The pair stopped at the Miller rooming house on Union avenue and Third street. It was there that the first intimation as to their character was obtained. The chambermaid was engaged in making a bed in a room adjoining the one occupied by the thieves. She heard them talking quite loudly and began listening. The elder man told the younger man to 'Hit him hard when you do hit him and fix him so that he will not say anything more.' She learned that the party that the speaker referred to was the night bartender at the Doherty saloon in Oldtown. They intended to make a raid on that saloon during the early hours of the following morning and relieve that person of his bank roll.

She notified the police and a posse comitatus was formed consisting of Marshals Mills and Kirkpatrick, Deputy Sheriff Hynes, Constable Newsom, of Idaho, and one of the telephone employees as a special officer. The posse descended on the Miller place and captured their prey without any trouble. They were taken to the city jail and a search made in other quarters for other plunder. The pair confessed to the police that they were guilty. They were given a hearing before Justice Long. It was thought that they might be held on a charge of grand larceny but it was believed to be safer to try them on a petit larceny charge and held them in jail until it could be learned whether they were wanted at any other place. They were sentenced to 30 days each in the county jail and were taken there by Deputy Sheriff Hynes.

Special Officer Hindman of the Northern Pacific railroad secret service arrived in the city Monday to try and identify the prisoners. He was pretty certain that the older man was an old offender and believed that the pair were recently in the Missoula, Mont., county jail and escaped there near the first of the month when a general jail delivery occurred. He wired the sheriff of Missoula county and asked that an officer be sent to try and identify the prisoners. Up to the time of going to press the officer had not put in an appearance.

The police also made another arrest for shoplifting on Monday. Robert Moore, a lumberjack who gave his residence as Milan, Wash., picked up a bunch of logger's socks at the Farmers' Co-Operative store and hid them in the livery barn of Charlie Storms. He was suspected of the crime and after the goods had been recovered confessed. He was taken before Justice McDonald and fined $25 and costs, which he paid.