C.O. Champion, Who Shot G.E. Gibson at Charlotte Speedway, Former Inmate at Broad Oaks Sanatorium, Aug. 25, 1926

Champion Late Asylum Inmate. . . Mooresboro Man, Held in Jail after Wounding Speedway Spectator, Holds Silence, but Kin Bare Past Weakness

Charlotte Observer, August 25th

The speedway shooting took a spectacular turn yesterday when it was learned that C. O. Champion of Mooresboro, who shot and wounded G. E. Gibson of Gibson was a recent inmate in Broad Oaks Sanatorium, a private institution at Morganton.

Relatives of Champion in Charlotte yesterday were reported as having informed county authorities that Champion had been sent to Morganton to cure him of excessive use of alcohol.

It was learned at the sanatorium that Champion was released on July 5th. Dr. Erastus Taylor, head of the institution, declined to make public las tnight anything about the man’s mental condition.

Champion, himself, refused to make any statements. He was seen in the cell at the county jail and doggedly evaded his questioners.

“I have no statement to make,” was his constant reply.

Only once did he give any intimation of how he felt. When asked about Gibson’s statement that he had never seen Champion before yesterday, Champion looked up and smiled.

“Is he able to talk yet?” he asked, seemingly insinuating that Gibson could tell a few things if he would.

The prisoner denied that he had said what he was quoted as saying about making a future statement.

“I didn’t say what they had me saying,” he asserted. “The only thing I said was that I hoped Gibson lived.”

Gibson was reported at the Presbyterian Hospital as being in a serious condition. He was feverish, hospital attaches said, and had spent a very restless day.

The shooting occurred during a lull between the races at the speedway Monday. Gibson was eating at a lunch counter when Champion walked up and shot him.

Champion was arrested by Deputy Sheriff Avery B. Johnston a few moments later and was taken to rural police headquarters in an intoxicated condition.

Immediately after the shooting he told officers that Gibson was responsible for domestic difficulties. He denied this later.

Gibson told his physician that he had never seen Champion before the shooting.

Editor's Note: Shooter's last name was spelled "C. O. Chapman" in a previous article. From page 3 of the Concord Daily Tribune, Wednesday, Aug. 25, 1926

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