Morris, John

Peculiar odor from a room in the Redlinger rooming house, Third and Picher avenue, Picher Oklahoma, led to the discovery of the decomposed body of John Morris, a Picher Oklahoma, miner, at 7 o'clock Wednesday night. Emmett Griffith, proprietor of the rooming house, while passing the room occupied by Morris, scented a peculiar odor and forced an entrance into the room. He found the body lying on the bed and in a bad state of decomposition. A gas stove in the room was burning full blast. Blood was found on the sheet, but the body was in such a condition that it was impossible to ascertain where the blood came from. An empty whisky bottle was found near the bed. It is believed that he had been drinking and had laid down upon the bed and fallen asleep, suffocating from the gas fumes. He was seen to enter his room at noon yesterday, but the persons who saw him were unable to say whether he was drinking or not. The body was removed to the morgue of the Todd undertaking company of Picher, and an effort will be made to preserve it until relatives are notified. Papers found in his clothes shows he had a daughter, Edith Morris, living in Cushing Oklahoma. It is thought that he had lived in Webb City prior to coming to Picher several months ago, as numerous letters were found addressed to him at Webb City Missouri. He was employed at the Manhattan Mine. A registration card of September 12, last, was found.

Undertaker must Answer Charge of Improper Burial - Warrants for the arrest of Grover H. Todd and Maud A. Todd, who conduct an undertaking establishment at Picher, were issued Tuesday morning in the Ottawa county Oklahoma court. Mr. and Mrs. Todd are charged jointly with violation of Section No. 2447 of the Revised Laws of Oklahoma for 1910. The complaint sets out that they failed to decently bury the body of John Morris, a miner, who was suffocated to death in a Picher rooming house on the night of Dec 24, 1918. The complaint was signed by Mrs. Lloyd Everett, a daughter of the dead man. Mrs. Everett, accompanied by her husband and her mother, Mrs. Judith Carns, divorced wife, of the dead man, and Mr. Carns came to Miami from their home at McCurtain, Haskell county, Oklahoma, Monday and arranged with a Miami undertaker to exhume the body of Morris which had been buried in the G.A.R. cemetery, Miami. The Miami undertaker and one of his assistants, went to the cemetery Monday afternoon and directed the work of having the earth removed from the grave. An attempt was made to lift the rough box from the grave but on account of it being packed into the sides of the grave and being almost covered by water, this they informed the daughter and her mother, they could not do. Mrs. Carns, however, insisted that the box be taken up, but after additional efforts the undertaker said he could not do it. The lid was removed from the rough box and it was found the body had not been buried in a casket but only laid in the rough box. The rough box was filled with water and excelsior had been packed around the remains. The body was badly decomposed. Only a shirt was on the body it was said. The body was removed from the rough box and placed in a casket and taken to the Mitchel-Fleming undertaking parlors, where it was prepared for shipment to Haskell county. Following the removal of the body, Mrs. Everett and her mother, accompanied by their husbands, went to the office of the county attorney, where they conferred with Assistant County Attorney Chestnut. It was learned following the conference, that Mr. Chestnut and Newt Cox, deputy sheriff, had been called to the cemetery to view the body before it was taken from the grave. A second conference was held in the county attorney's office Tuesday morning and at 11 o'clock it was announced that the county authorities proposed to proceed against Mr. Todd. The following complaint was drawn up and signed by the daughter: It states that "On or about the fifth day of January, 1919, the defendants committed the crime of violating Sepulcher and remains of the dead in the manner and form as follows, to wit: "That on said day and date, in said county and state, they, the said Grover H. Todd and Maud A. Todd, then and there being, did then and there, have in their care, custody and control, the dead body of John Morris, a human being, for burial, and they, the said Grover H. Todd and Maud A. Todd, willfully and unlawfully failed and neglected to decently bury the said John Morris, within a reasonable time after his death in violation of section 2447, Revised Laws of 1910." While Mr. Chestnut and the daughter were in the county court room, Mr. Todd appeared at the court house, but remained only a minute. He left and went to the office of his attorney, Jesse A. Harp. Fifteen minutes later the warrant was served on Mr. Todd in his attorney's office by Deputy Sheriff Ed Lee. Judge Wortman set the bonds of each at $250. According to the story related to the county authorities by Mrs. Everett and his mother, the father was employed at the Manhattan Mine near Picher, and that on the night of Dec 24, 1919, he fell asleep in his chair, leaving the gas on his small heating stove. Later, other roomers entered the place and one by one they turned off the gas in their rooms and as a result the pressure became greater in the room occupied by Morris and the escaping fumes suffocated him. Mrs. Morris informed the county authorities according to D. H. Cotton, county attorney, that Mr. Todd had informed her when she came to Picher that her husband had been buried the day before. She said that Todd informed her that her husband had $40 in cash, and a $50 Liberty bond. The workmen at the Manhattan Mine, Mrs. Carne said, Todd had informed her, had also given the undertaker $25 with which to help meet the burial expenses. She said, the county attorney said, that Todd had informed her that her former husband had been buried in a $100 casket. It was said in the county attorney's office Tuesday morning that W. W. Green, former employee of Todd, had informed Mrs. Carne of the manner in which her former husband had been buried. Green informed Mrs. Carne, the county attorney said, that the body was taken from Picher in the night of Dec 29 and buried. Newt Cox, the deputy sheriff who was at the cemetery Monday, said the sexton in charge of the burial ground, stated that the burial took place in the day time. Mr. Todd came to Miami Tuesday morning. He said he had learned a warrant was to be issued for his arrest and that caused him to come here. In a statement he said: "The prosecution is being ribbed by a competitor of mine at Picher. There is absolutely nothing to the charges other than an effort to try and hurt my business. The body referred to was given as good a burial as its condition would justify at the time of the burial and the body was given as good a burial as the finances available at the time would justify." The county attorney's office said that the offense did not prescribe any fixed penalty, but the maximum punishment, for such an offense as is charged in the complaint is a fine and one year imprisonment in jail and the minimum is a fine and a month's imprisonment in jail.

Suit for $20,487 was filed in district court against Grover T. Todd and Maude A. Todd, Picher undertakers, by Edith Everett. The petition names two counts, $10,000 being sought on one count and $10,487 on a second count. The suit was brought by the daughter of the late John Morris, who was asphyxiated in a Picher rooming house on Dec 24, 1918. She claims that her father was not given a decent and respectable burial, alleging that the Todd's misrepresented to her in regard to the casket in which he was buried. She seeks $10,000 on that count. In the second count, she alleges that on exhumation of the body, she found that her father had been buried in a rough box, filled with excelsior and that finding the body in that shape caused her to become ill and has ruined her health. She seeks that judgment be given her against the Todds for the cost of exhuming the body, besides seeking punitive damages for $10,000. Several weeks ago, on complaint of Mrs. Everett, warrants were issued from the county court, charging the Todds with failing to give Mr. Morris a decent burial. The case will be heard shortly in that court.