Atlanta Daily World

Kansas City Woman
Trio of Kidnaping

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (ANP)-

Possessing unusual presence of mind under perilous circumstances which finally led to her own safety and the capture of three kidnaping bandits, Mrs. Helen Trigg Mullins 2306 E. 20th street, played the star role in a spectacular daylight payroll holdup here Wednesday morning at the exclusive Kline Department Store of men's, women's and children's apparel, 1112 Walnut street, where she is the elevator operator.

The story told by Mrs. Mullins and verified by others who witnessed the holdup follows: 10:30 a. m. Wednesday while morning customers were entering the exclusive Kline department store, three bandits entered the elevator and got off at the floors between the main and 5th floors. The bandits told her on entering they wanted to go to the fifth floor. Not knowing they were bandits, and thinking them to be customers she attached no significance to their desire to get off on the fifth floor. It is on the fifth floor that the cashier's department and the telephone switchboard are located. After all the women customers had left the elevator, one of the bandits pushed a gun into her side and made her their prisoner before reaching the fifth floor. On reaching the fifth floor, they cooly commanded her to open elevator door and made her walk directly to the cashier's cage which was some 25 or 30 feet from the elevator entrance on the fifth floor. She had been told, "You'll have to go with us; if you try to get away, we'll bump you off." On reaching the fifth floor one of the bandits jumped over into the cage and held a gun on the lady cashier, scooped up all money in sight, while another jumped over the telephone switchboard where two young women were and covered them. The bandits compelled Mrs. Mullins and the three white women to enter the elevator, and at the point of a gun forced Mrs. Mullins to lower the elevator to the main floor.

On reaching the main floor, the Negro woman was compelled to open the elevator door and one of the bandits said, "You're going with us, and remember if you try to get away, you will be filled full of lead," said one of her captors. Notwithstanding the large number of morning customers on the main floor, no one noticed anything unusual, the bandits working cooly and talking in a soft voice that was not detected by anyone nearby.

Meantime, as they began to walk away from the elevator toward the automobile which awaited near the door, one of the bandits turned in another direction; and, Mrs. Mullins, realizing this as her sole opportunity, dashed off in the crowd of morning shoppers before the bandits knew it and made good her escape.

Meantime, the three white women were rushed into the automobile with their captors, who took them and the money to Meriam Highway west of Kansas City, Kansas, where they ran into a ditch being pursued by two 19th station officers in a flying squad automobile who had picked up the trail on a tip from the radio a minute or so after the robbery and the abduction had been announced.

The police trailed the car over a wide area, and did not fire into the car because they saw the three women through the rear window of the fleeing car, and did not want to endanger their lives nor kill innocent people. All of the payday money taken in the daring daylight holdup was recovered by the capturing officers.