On
March 21, Alexander Marr, an old man of parsimonious habits, living
on his farm at Clio, Michigan, was found dead in bed.
The local doctor said, as he
viewed the body, "Heart failure."
But the undertaker, Mr. Abe
Goodfellow, who is also a mixer of drugs, said "Foul
play." He had found a bottle
labelled chloroform on the floor of the house.
The bottle he identified as
one he had sold previously to one William Spears, who was a
journeyman paperhanger, with headquarters at Clio. This was
Tuesday.
On Friday Spears left Clio.
At Birch Run he was arrested and lodged in jail.
Marr is said to have once
lived at Norfolk, Ont., where his wife and daughter reside. It is alleged that Marr had
a separation from his wife. This
document and $40 are missing from Marr's house.
It stated that Spears knew
Marr in Norfolk, and one theory for the supposed crime is that
Spears chloroformed Marr to get the papers of separation, but
undercalculated the dose.
Spears was examined at
Flint, but denied all knowledge of the crime.
The police declare that they
have evidence that Spears was in Marr's house the night the rig was
seen before it, and that a piece of the label of the bottle was
found in Spears' pocket and identified by the druggist.
Spears is said to have been
formerly of Georgetown, Ont., and was well known in Halton County.
The Marr
Mystery
The mystery surrounding the
death of Alexander Marr at his farm near Clio, Michigan, has not
been cleared up yet.
Wm. Spears, who is held at
the county goal at Flint to await the result of enquires, has quite
a number of friends who are working on his behalf.
He says he did not know Marr
in Canada, and he was at Marr's place three or four times trying to
get a job painting a barn.
The dispatch says Marr came
to Clio from the County of Norfolk, Ont., last December, and bought
a farm from his brother-in-law, a Mr. Fisher, who says Marr had
about $5,000 worth of property in Ontario, besides a wife and
daughter.
They had trouble, and he got
$1,200 in cash, signed a bill of separation and came here. He paid
$1,100 down on the place.
It appears now that Spears
had an injury to one ankle, and he was in the habit of buying
alcohol and chloroform to treat it.
Spears stoutly denies being
at Marr's the night he died. The general impression is that Spears
is innocent.
