Gastonia, N.C., March 1—The Gaston county sheriff’s office today was rounding up suspects in the long unsolved mystery surrounding the slaying of John Ford, who was killed near here November 7, 1920. Simultaneously with he return of Arthur Crowder, who officers say has confessed and named accomplices, two women and a man, companions of Ford o the night he was killed, while out automobile riding were arrested and held without bail as material witnesses.
Effie Grice of Kings Mountain and Essie Beattie of Gastonia and Random Killian of Lincoln county were arrested last night. The Grice girl is a daughter of Bob Grice, who with John Carswell, his brother-in-law, was tried a year ago on the charge of killing Ford but who were released on bail after the jury had disagreed as to their guilt. The Beattie girl, who was seriously wounded in the shooting that resulted in the killing of Ford, a year ago accused Bob Grice and Carswell of being the slayers.
Officers here today said a number of warrants had been issued for persons named in Crowder’s alleged confession and that arrests might be expected at any time. They declined to say for whom they had been issued or where the suspected persons were thought to be, however.
Crowder, who is badly crippled with rheumatism and walks with a crutch, was returned here yesterday and placed in jail. He has retained an attorney and talks freely with reporters and officers about the case. He told reporters he left Gaston county on December 10, last, and went to Huntsville, Alabama, and later to Decatur, where he was arrested.
Crowder told newspaper men that “Influences” were being brought to bear to discredit his story. He asserted that a prominent North Carolina lawyer had visited him at the jail in Decatur. One of the persons named in his confession, he also said, visited him in the Alabama jail.
From the front page, Durham Morning Herald, Sunday, March 2, 1924
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