Dash to the past: Juvenile crime is at an all-time low in Butler County, according to the 1924 circuit court. This is less true in 1974, when a teen burglar checks himself out of the hospital through a window.
100 years ago
Feb. 9, 1924
• Juvenile cases in the circuit court have dried up in the last six months, and local Judge Almon Ing is at a loss to explain it.
Usually the court tries offenses from “boyish pranks to malicious acts bordering on the crimes of hardened criminals,” the Interstate American explained. Ing called the situation “exceedingly grave” in prior years, but cases have since slowed dramatically and juvenile offenders out on parole are not relapsing. Ing theorized one or more ringleaders were apprehended.
75 years ago
Feb. 9, 1949
• Construction resumes on the Rodgers Theatre. A dispute between carpenters and plasterers over who held prerogative to install the celotex ceilings shut work down earlier this week. Unions from both ruled the carpenters would handle ceiling installation.
• A Pemiscot County man has disappeared, and police questioned two witnesses.
I.S. Gibson, a 37-year-old cotton gin employee from the Caruthersville area, vanished Sunday, Feb. 6, after leaving home with $33 to go to the store. His wife reported him missing the next day. Yesterday his hat, an empty billfold and several pencils were found on a levee near Caruthersville by searchers. His wife identified the hat as Gibson’s.
Police have questioned Henry Berryman and Herbert Edmonds, a fisherman and farm laborer from the same area, but no arrests have been made. Berryman said Gibson stopped by his house on the day of the disappearance and helped him raise fishing nets. Edmonds was also present. The men allegedly shared some drinks, then Gibson ran up the river bank and disappeared.
50 years ago
Feb. 9, 1974
• A prisoner checks himself out of the hospital this morning through the second-story window.
Terry Lee Hayes, a 19-year-old prisoner of the Butler County Sheriff’s Department, was admitted to Doctor’s Hospital in Poplar Bluff a week ago for hepatitis treatment. A guard outside his door discovered his room empty at 1:30 a.m. this morning. The window was open, but it was not reported how Hayes made it to ground level.
Hayes was being held on burglary charges and is reportedly wanted for burglary in Michigan.