Legacy

For Sheriff John Frazier of Brown County, Kansas it wasn’t exactly what one would call “all in a days work”, or not exactly that is.  Actually it was Sheriff John’ day off.  Now Sheriff John’s office was in Atchison, Kansas just across the line from Missouri.

The Missouri River separated Kansas from Missouri.  Atchison was a river town and back in the thirties quite a commercial Carp fishing center as the river was full of Carp and people ate a lot of Carp in those days, even though Carp wasn’t any where near the top of the desirable fish list.  Also much of it was processed into pet food.  Just across the bridge on the Missouri side were a number of small stores making a good living selling mostly liquor and cigarettes,

You see there were no state taxes on those products in Missouri, which is why so many Atchison residents went over the bridge to for example buy ten cartons of cigarettes at a time, the maximum the law would allow in a single purchase.  The savings for the average person was equal to almost a day’s salary.  That much savings certainly was an incentive to spend five minutes going over the bridge.

Sheriff John was a  not a drinking man, but he did have the nicotine habit, and he was as money conservative as the next person so he’d cross the bridge for cheap smokes also.  Of course it wasn’t prudent to do s on duty.  So Sheriff John would wait for his day off.

It was on one of those days that Sheriff John had crossed over to make a purchase.  He’d pulled up got out of his car and was heading into the store.  He passed another man on the way in who had just come out carrying a paper sack.  Nothing alarming about that of course.  But as Sheriff John stepped in he was greeted by a grisly sight.  The lady clerking the store lay dead in a pool of blood.  Apparently had her head bashed in and the cash register cleaned out.

Sheriff John knew immediately it had to be the man he passed going in, so Sheriff John rushed out with the intention of nabbing him.  Now apparently a silent alarm had been set off by the clerk earlier in the process of things, because as Sheriff John rushed out two cars of Missouri State Troopers pulled in and the real murderer and robber had barely gotten into his car.

That fellow being sly as a fox immediately pointed at Sheriff John and screamed he did it, I saw him.  In the blink of an eye the two Missouri State Troopers pounced on Sheriff John  and took him down.  Of course Sheriff John protested and tried to tell them who he was and that they had the wrong man.  They wouldn’t listen, just got smart mouthed and stuffed him in the back of one of the Troopers vehicles and handcuffed him to the security post in the back.

Sheriff John heard them talking and they decided that it would be better to take him all the way to St. Joe, Missouri where the jail was bigger and more secure from mobs.  They figured a lynch mob would be forming at the closest small city jail before they even got there.

So down the road they went, it would be about an hours ride.  Sheriff John tried talking to the trooper telling him who he was.  All that got him was smart aleck retorts like, yeah! And I’m the King of Siam, my fathers, Santa Claus, and my Mothers a movie star.  No one was interested in listening.  Sheriff John thought what a bunch of smart aleck know it alls.  About half way to St. Joe the trooper had to make a pit stop; nature was calling; so the trooper pulled into a filling station.

The trooper exited the vehicle, left the engine running and said to Sheriff John, don’t go away, I’ll be right back.  Well for what ever reason, Sheriff John always kept a spare handcuff key in his wallet.  So with his free hand he retrieved his wallet, took the universal cuff key and freed himself.

As the Trooper was coming back from answering natures call he saw Sheriff John driving away in the Troopers Missouri State vehicle. He noted that Sheriff John was heading back the way they had come.  As Sheriff John got in sight of the  bridge back from Missouri to Atchison on the Kansas side, he could see he was expected as the bridge had been road blocked off.

At that point Sheriff John knew he’d have to get back on foot somehow.  Would not be an easy task in any case.  Sheriff John exited the Troopers borrowed vehicle and went into the cornfield just a step or two from the drivers side.  Now Sheriff John, being a Sheriff knew that it wouldn’t be long before someone showed up with dogs to track him, which is why he urinated on the corn stalks, took a step or so and nailed another corn stalk; he knew the strongest scent for any animal to pickup was the scent of urine.

Sheriff John then took a left turn in the cornfield and headed back away from the bridge.  He stayed on that path for about a hundred feet and took another left turn and crossed the highway into the cornfield on the other side.  Sheriff John knew he probably had a twenty minute head start on the dogs.  He also knew the dogs would quickly go to the scent of his urine establishing in the minds of the searchers that it was that cornfield he’d disappeared into.

Sheriff John knew that it would probably take them an hour to figure out they had been misdirected again, just like the real murderer/robber had misdirected them.  By that time he figured he’d have a fairly good chance of hitting railroad tracks and following them over the railroad bridge that he knew was about two miles upstream from the other bridge.

That worked out well, and as he crossed the bridge he could hear the dogs baying in the distance.  It would take dogs a long time to cross the bridge as they weren’t built for easy negating the stepping from one railroad tie to another.

As good fortune would finally happen, Sheriff John ran into a couple of his own deputies who had been alerted to watch for the escaped killer.  When he told them he was the alleged escaped killer, they thought he was joking with them.  He soon convinced them he wasn’t.

Missouri side Troopers and Deputies were watching through binoculars when the spotted Sheriff John and his two deputies.  They of course still didn’t know who they were really looking at.  So they rejoiced in what they thought was his recapture and figured he would be delivered to them shortly.

Well shortly it wasn’t, it actually took about an hour and a half.  Sheriff John went by his home first and got back into his uniform, resplendent with sidearm and all. Then over the bridge they went, and I don’t mean to Grandmothers House, but into the arms of the Missouri law enforcement people.

The first thing the Missouri law enforcement people said is “well where is our suspect?”  Sheriff John’s two deputies pointed at Sheriff John and said here he is.  That wasn’t funny; nor what they expected to hear.  They almost looked cross eyed having heard it, like in, oh! No! But it was oh! Yes!

Then Sheriff John said by any chance is that smart mouthed won’t listen trooper with an attitude problem anywhere near by?  If he is, I’d like to chat with him.

The Captain in charge of the Missouri side law enforcement group said no he wasn’t, he was back at headquarters explaining how he let you borrow his vehicle.  The Captain then said, I bet you are very angry.  Sheriff John replied, let’s just say I’m less than happy.

Sheriff John then suggested the John Doe want and warrant sheet describing him be burned and the ashes flushed as the whole mess was very embarrassing to both sides.  Sheriff John however being a professional; gave them a good description of the man and vehicle they really needed to find.

As this tale ends, there is only one more interesting thing to note.  That being for some strange unknown reason, Sheriff John quit smoking.