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Sheriff Fay F. Brown’s Badge: Arlington Bank Robbery Trial

February 25, 2020 by Jim Potter 1 Comment

https://jimpotterauthor.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/Sheriff-Fay-F.-Browns-Badge-Episode-14.mp3

· Sheriff Fay F. Brown’s Badge:

Arlington Bank Robbery Trial

The Citizens State Bank of Arlington, Reno County, KS, was robbed January 2, 1927, and the bandit was caught and charged. On April 11, the jury was selected. 

*

Reno County Sheriff Fay F. Brown walked to the witness stand in district court, prepared to testify about the attempted robbery of the Citizens State Bank of Arlington which had occurred over three months earlier, on Sunday, January 2, 1927.

Sheriff Brown knew that the defendant, Delos “Jack” DeTar, 39, of Greensburg, Kansas, was guilty. But he also knew that the parents of the accused were prominent in Kinsley, twenty-five miles up the road. They were certainly wealthy enough to hire the best attorneys money could buy to defend their son. Every bone in their bodies shouted: “This is a misunderstanding. Jack doesn’t belong behind bars.”

Sheriff Brown studied everyone in the courtroom, especially the DeTar family. He marveled at the scene. Delos DeTar sat with lowered head, occasionally raising his eyes. He kept his false left hand thrust deeply into his coat pocket.

At the defendant’s left was his mother, while his wife and three-year-old daughter were at his right. The little girl, with her long curly hair and brown eyes, drew pictures and talked to her mother, unaware that her father was being tried on a charge that could send him to prison for many years.

*

Being a Sunday morning, the bank was closed, but DeTar and an unidentified accomplice had broken inside. At 8:15 o’clock, they were surprised to hear someone entering the bank. It was Julian Eaton, 70, bank cashier, who was planning on answering his mail and reading the newspaper, not interrupting a crime-in-progress.

Eaton gave a detailed account of the crime to the jury. Besides attempted bank robbery, DeTar was charged with the crime of assault with intent to kill. He had repeatedly slugged Eaton on the head with a short piece of gas pipe after the cashier had unlocked the small safe for the bank robber and put the $350 into the intruder’s briefcase. The gold and silver coins, and big bills, were in the vault, inaccessible to the intruder because of its timing mechanism.

Upon being slugged on the head, Eaton escaped, running out the bank’s front door, alarming the local citizens outside who had gathered to discuss the recent discovery of an oil field north of town. Eaton yelled: “Get your gun! The bank’s being held up.”

DeTar, wearing a mask, dropped his gun by the vault and ran upstairs to the roof. He hid under a pile of cottonwood leaves on the adjacent building, but he was quickly discovered by the posse. Until the citizenry learned that Eaton wasn’t seriously hurt, there were shouts from the crowd to lynch the bandit, to “string him up.” It was 1927, not the pioneer days, but some in the crowd were in favor of frontier justice.

*

“Did any operators from the Penaloosa telephone-exchange testify?” Cora Brown asked her husband, Fay, after the first day of the trial. She knew that Reno County Attorney Charles Hall was attempting to show DeTar’s prior planning of the crime involving an unknown accomplice.

“Yes,” answered Fay, “Ray Van Riper, exchange manager, and Winnifred, his wife. They verified the phone number and the man who DeTar had tried to reach the night before the bank robbery. When no one answered the call, an operator asked DeTar if she could keep trying the number. The Greensburg businessman replied, ‘No, if he’s not answering, I know where he is. No need.’”

“Was there any evidence of the man he called being the accomplice?” asked Cora.

“No,” Fay answered, “supposedly DeTar was calling about oil leases.

“Oh,” he continued, “guess who’s on the jury from Langdon?”

“J. D. Potter,” answered Cora with a knowing look.

“How’d you know?” asked Fay.

“I have my sources,” replied Cora.

“Telephone girls or Jess?” asked Fay, referring to her cadre of friends at Southwestern Bell and to Jess Blanpied, their county jailer.

*

After the posse got DeTar off the roof, they handcuffed him to the city’s fire truck and waited for the sheriff to arrive. When Sheriff Jess Langford and Undersheriff Fay Brown showed up, the two lawmen took charge of the prisoner and investigated the bank robbery. DeTar told the officers he wanted to help but he couldn’t remember anything that happened from the previous night to the moment he awakened in the bank. Then, once arrested, DeTar refused to answer further questions.

DeTar was in deep trouble, and after the county officers searched him and discovered a bottle of nitroglycerin and tools for cracking open safes, his case went from bad to worse.

*

Tuesday, the second day of the trial, the defense revealed their strategy. They didn’t deny that DeTar had attempted to rob the bank or that he had slugged the cashier. Instead, they called a long list of people who explained that Delos DeTar didn’t know what he was doing. He was insane. His parents, doctors, and friends explained that ever since Delos had lost his arm in a workplace explosion two years earlier, he had spiraled downwards.

When Mrs. Laura DeTar testified about her husband’s mental state, she was obviously a bias witness, but the jurors didn’t blink an eye as they listened to her testimony.

“Prior to his injury, he had a sunny disposition and was always kind and good to me and the children,” she said. “After the accident, he had no patience with the children, was very irritable, and nervous. He certainly was insane. No sane man could do the things he did.”

That afternoon at 4:40 o’clock, the case went into the hands of the jury. An hour later they were excused for the night.

*

At 9 o’clock on Wednesday morning the jury went back into deliberation. At 10:10 o’clock, the bailiff was informed the jury had reached a verdict, but DeTar and his family could not be located.

Judge Fairchild issued a bench warrant for DeTar’s arrest. Bailiff George Duckworth and Sheriff Brown continued their search until in short time, the sheriff located DeTar and his family at the Stamey Hotel, a half-block east of the courthouse.

Upon their return and after the DeTar’s took their courtroom seats, Duckworth carried the verdict from the jury foreman to the recording clerk.

Sheriff Brown watched DeTar. The defendant showed his nervousness, pivoting his right foot back and forth on his knee, his left leg crossed on his right knee, but as the guilty verdict was read, there was no display of emotion from the defendant, his wife, or mother.

No mention of insanity was contained in the jury’s verdict.

After the verdict had been read, the defendant’s father, Dr. DeTar, held a whispered conversation with attorney Shafer.

*

“Did Judge Fairchild sentence DeTar?” Cora asked her husband.

“No,” answered Fay, “he didn’t pronounce sentence but he plans to do so within days. It’s expected that DeTar’s attorneys will file a motion for a new trial; they have three days.

“What’s your guess on the length of his sentence?” asked Cora

“The bank robbery charge carries a penitentiary sentence of from ten to fifty years,” said Fay, “and the simple assault count embraces a penalty of about a year. Unless his attorneys can win on appeal, by the time DeTar’s released, his little girl, Luann, will no longer be playing with dolls or drawing pictures.”

*

Until next time, happy writing and reading.

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Filed Under: Blog posts Tagged With: Arlington Kansas, Citizens State Bank of Arlington, Delos DeTar, Fay Brown, Jim Potter, Judge Fairchild, Julian Eaton, Kansas Authors Club, Ray Van Riper, Reno County Attorney Charles Hall, Reno County Sheriff, Sheriff Fay Brown, Sheriff Fay Brown's Badge, Southwestern Bell, Undersheriff Fay Brown, Winnifred Van Riper

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Denise Low, author of Jackalope (Red Mountain Press)

Jim Potter is a cop, retired, but he brings deep understanding of this job to his novel Taking Back the Bullet: Trajectories of Self-Discovery. This layered novel has literary dimensions as characters explore crisis situations. Congratulations to this fine writer for his debut novel.

Rebecca from Proud Police Wife

Taking Back the Bullet is an emotional, yet captivating novel. Jim Potter does a superb job of intertwining each character and putting their individual identities on display. All law enforcement storylines are a true reflection of Potter’s years as a police officer because they are realistic and relatable. This is a book I highly recommend.

Dennis Perrin, educator

Masterful storytelling, exquisite character development, so real as to HURT and HOPE, a real page turner. Begs for stage, screenwriters, and visual episodic development a.k.a. TV series . . . Thanks Jim Potter for telling it like it is AND providing us visions of how it could be. Well done!

Rebecca Schillaci

As a former law enforcement officer, I found the story very relatable as it details the life of a law enforcement officer and the struggles some face throughout their careers. . . Taking Back the Bullet is a journey of understanding, respect, and forgiveness . . .

Sheryl Remar

I enjoyed the different stories of this book because Tom, James, and Suanna, the three main characters, represent in their own way the different struggles with themselves and society’s idea of what is normal.

John & Cindy Morrill, 20 years Air Force retired, 17 years law enforcement

I enjoyed your book. When I am looking for a new read, I always read the first page, last page and choose a random page somewhere in the middle before I decide to buy it. You had me on all three pages. I also like reading a book where you can relate to the characters and the settings in which they live and work. It makes a story more realistic if you can say, I am familiar with the area; I know where that town is or I have traveled that street. It was easy to relate to the characters. In one way or another, I have met them all somewhere in my journeys.

Judy Hawk

. . . I was impressed with the Native American information as well as the depth of character development . . . .

Wynona Winn, PhD, retired school superintendent

Three main characters walk different paths but with the same destination – each coping with his or her self-discovery, self-identity, and self-realization. Much like their earlier counterparts – Huck Finn and Holden Caulfield – their journeys are often joyous, often tedious and often tragic.

Diana Dester

Good story line, building the characters along the way. Great job!

Deb Theis, LSCSW, clinical therapist/hypnotherapist

Jim Potter has done it again! After his book, Cop in the Classroom: Lessons I’ve Learned, Tales I’ve Told, Jim has written another great work. In Taking Back the Bullet: Trajectories of Self-Discovery, Jim Potter takes us on an insightful journey into the lives and relationships of numerous characters. Jim is such a talented storyteller that the reader quickly becomes immersed and has a ‘bonding experience’ with each of the characters, feeling their joy, fear, passion and pain. Jim’s novel speaks to the empowerment of persistence with the characters as they work through their trials. As a therapist, I appreciated the heartfelt struggles from each of the characters and their diversity. I also found value in the novel’s understanding of society’s misunderstanding of both mental health and other conditions in which people struggle. The novel contains rich exposure to various realities that many of us do not know about . . . but should. When I finished this captivating novel, I was wanting to read the sequel! It was an honor and a wonderful, mesmerizing experience reading this book. Congratulations, Jim!

Jane Holzrichter

I finished it last night around midnight. What a great piece of work. It kept me intrigued all the way to the end.

Sean McArdle, Winchester, England

Retired police officer Potter’s novel centres on very disparate characters and through the tried and tested means of gradually introducing each one, builds a sense of anticipation about what is going to happen to them. This often used methodology is not easy to do well but is superbly handled by Potter who knows how to give enough detail to bring the characters to life, yet not too much so as to slow down the pace of the developing story. A climactic event affects the main characters and it is at this point Potter’s deep knowledge of people and police procedures really hits home; page by page we read how a seemingly simple, though terrible occurrence, can have huge consequences. To Potter’s credit the story does not have a completely conclusive or simplistic ending. Instead it leaves the reader thinking about how the events of a single minute can affect lives forever. I would whole heartedly recommend this book not as a crime novel or even as a novel about crime but as a beautiful and positive affirmation about what it is to be human and how ultimately it is relationships which matter more than events.

Morgan Penner

Taking Back the Bullet is a novel that provides the reader with a window into the world of law enforcement. As the novel unfolds, the reader is able to see how split-second decisions alter the lives of the main characters in the story. Taking Back the Bullet also explores how humanity is impacted by mental illness. One of my favorite quotes from Taking Back the Bullet is “We’re all just a critical moment from being disabled or mentally ill, and we don’t want to think about it.” The novel also provides the reader an opportunity to gain a better understanding of how mental illness impacts the individuals, their family, friends, and society. Taking Back the Bullet is a story of forgiveness and overcoming life’s struggles and tragedies.

Steve Becker

I’m impressed. It was an excellent read. . . . I hope you continue with more projects in the future.

Larry Kruckman, anthropologist

Jim Potter displays ethnographic skills in Taking Back the Bullet: Trajectories of Self-Discovery, creating vivid scenes and fascinating characters. The Greeks had a word for subcultures and people’s behavior: ‘ethos,’ or ‘ways of being.’ In colorful, sometimes marvelous detail, this novel captures various people and settings . . . the ethos of rural Kansas: a jail, art fair, powwow, rehab center, courtroom, albinos, and even someone in the throes of postpartum depression. So detailed are the descriptions that they must be drawn from the author’s personal experience. Besides the artfully created characters such as the struggling jailer and husband Tom Jennings, local artist Jesse Thomas, and Native American Joe Morningcloud, there is a tight story line that grabs your attention and won’t let go. Human tensions, love, conflict, joys and sorrows are all there. Magically, all the many pieces come together in a final crescendo, giving hope that even when we find ourselves in big trouble we can survive. This is a novel I highly recommend!

Larry Kruckman
Anthropologist
Karleen Wilson-Moon

Terrific story relevant to today’s social issues . . . well written . . . likable characters . . . insightful perspective from an insider in law enforcement.

Karleen Wilson-Moon

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