Another Casualty of Prohibition

Prohibition came early to the Northwest, with three states – Idaho, Oregon, and Washington – passing “dry laws” that went into effect at the start of 1916. Montana and Wyoming would follow, also before national Prohibition arrived with ratification of the 18th Amendment. For true believers, Prohibition was not just an attempt to improve America’s health and productivity. No, it was an impassioned campaign to exorcize “Demon Rum.” This at a time when many, perhaps even most, people felt sure that demons and other malign spirits were real.

Thus, some officers sent to enforce the dry laws embraced their job as a sacred crusade, with few limits on their behavior. In the fall of 1919, a police officer in Pocatello shot and killed a moonshiner during a raid on his still shed. He claimed self-defense, although the unarmed victim was just trying to escape. Then, in the spring of 1921, another Pocatello officer tried to arrest a man who was a bit tipsy and perhaps had a liquor bottle on him. He too tried to run away and was shot in the back, dying a few days later. The officer claimed it was an accident. Juries did not convict either shooter of anything.

Moonshiners and bootleggers surely took note of these (and other) events, but there was simply too much money to be made. Around Idaho Falls, Idaho, it was widely believed that Bill Wilson was one of those bootleggers. He was said to be quite familiar with the preferred routes to the Canadian border. And his large touring car – used as an “auto taxi” – would be able to haul a considerable load.

William C. Wilson was born June 16, 1875 in Weber County, Utah, near Ogden. At some point, he moved to Montana and, in 1903, got married in Billings. By 1910, he was serving as an apprentice plasterer in Idaho Falls. Then he and his father invested in the theater business. That did not last long, however, and by 1918 Wilson mostly drove a taxi. During lulls, he worked as a farm laborer. He had, indeed, been arrested and fined for minor “possession” offenses, but had never been caught transporting a load of liquor.

Nevertheless, in late May of 1924, authorities issued a warrant for his arrest on a bootlegging charge. (News reports never did explain the basis for the accusation.) At that time, Wilson was in Salt Lake City. When he returned, an informant told Deputy Sheriff Neil Simpkins. On June 2, 1924, the deputy retrieved the warrant and drove to Wilson’s house to serve it. Unfortunately, Simpkins and Wilson had butted heads before.

Neil Simpkins. Family Archives.

Cornelius “Neil” Simpkins was born February 1, 1873 in a village located about 18 miles southeast of Glasgow, Scotland. The family immigrated to the U.S. in 1888 and settled in Rock Springs, Wyoming. It’s unknown when Neil moved out on his own, but in 1899, he got married in Idaho Falls. At that time, he drove a delivery wagon and sometimes acted as an express messenger. Like Wilson, he was a member of the Mormon church, but neither seems to have been active in that organization.

Around 1911, Simpkins also began to serve as an Idaho Falls constable. Over the next decade, he apparently spent less and less time in the delivery business and more in law enforcement. Neil became a deputy sheriff around 1921. Newspaper accounts suggest that he had a particular interest in enforcing Prohibition.

In 1922, he had appeared at Wilson’s door and demanded the right to search the premises, although he had no warrant. Wilson, unworried, let him in. A thorough search turned up one bottle of prescribed “medicinal” alcohol. Yet Simpkins took Wilson to the police station, where he had to post bail to avoid spending a night in jail. Prescription booze was perfectly legal under the Volstead Act, so that charge was almost certainly dismissed. However, Simpkins also searched Wilson’s car and either (illegally) confiscated a pistol, or allowed a third party to steal it.

Exactly what happened when Simpkins arrived at the Wilson place on June 2nd cannot be assessed with certainty. Mrs. Dora Wilson met him, by herself, in the yard. Some neighborhood witnesses, who could not have seen very well, claimed that she “scuffled” with the deputy and that he may have struck her with his pistol. There was general agreement that the wife at least argued with the officer, perhaps on the order of, “Would you leave my husband alone?”

Then Wilson backed his car out of the garage. (There’s a good deal of evidence to indicate that Bill didn’t even know the officer was around.) Deputy Simpkins immediately fired into the back of the vehicle. Wilson found himself staring down the barrel of a gun and fully expected another bullet, so he threw up his own automatic and shot back. Later, he couldn’t recall how many times he fired, but three empty shell casings were retrieved from inside the car.

Witnesses gave confused testimony as to how many shots they heard, with some claiming as many as six from Wilson. That was not impossible, given that Wilson might have extended the weapon outside his window. In any case, he quickly fled the scene in his car. Examination showed that Simpkins had indeed tried to fire again, but his gun jammed. Hit twice, the deputy stumbled against a tree and fell. He died on the way to the hospital.

Wilson soon discovered that Simpkins’ shot had punctured the gas tank, and he tried to plug the hole with a willow stick. But he finally parked the car at a friend’s house about ten miles north of Idaho Falls. He caught a ride and then fled on foot into rough country about ten miles further north.

Officers and volunteers began scouring the countryside, and Wilson surrendered three days after the shooting. Searchers discovered he had discarded his pistol before walking across a field to give himself up. He was charged with first degree murder. Mrs. Wilson was charged as an accessory, but that was eventually dropped. No liquor was found in the Wilson house or in the car.

Criminologist Luke S. May logged this case as a firearms investigation, but the county apparently chose not to pay his fees to appear on the witness stand. Wilson had admitted shooting the deputy, but claimed it was self defense. May could have perhaps elaborated on how the deputy’s gun jammed, but that might have only weakened the prosecution’s case.

Besides the self-defense claim, Wilson’s attorneys also asserted that Simpkins could not, legally, act as a deputy. They noted that he was not a U.S. citizen. Born in Scotland, he had never applied for naturalization. Moreover, he had resigned from his (illegal) position a couple months before the shooting after a dispute with the sheriff. The sheriff agreed that they’d had a “slight difference” of opinion, but denied that Simpkins had actually resigned. And the prosecution cited precedents that waived Simpkins’ lack of formal citizenship.

Still, the sheriff’s admission did bolster the defense’s contention that Neil Simpkins was a man of uncertain, sometimes testy, temperament. That added to other testimony along those lines, including the account of the arrest for legal alcohol and the missing pistol. Still, the jury rejected the self-defense plea. They found Wilson guilty of second-degree murder, and a judge imposed a ten to twenty year prison sentence. After failed appeals, Wilson was transferred from the Bonneville County jail to the Idaho Penitentiary in February of 1926.

Deputy Simpkins left a widow, Della, and eleven children. Della did not remarry, but held the family together as the children grew up and got married. She moved the core to Boise around 1933. Her second-oldest son, Cornelius, remained with her until her death in August 1940. Cornelius returned to Idaho Fall, where his mother was buried.

William C. Wilson was pardoned and released after less than six years in the state Penitentiary. He maintained a home in Pocatello for six or seven years, then the family moved to California. By 1940, they were living in Fresno, where Wilson died in 1953.
                                                                                

References: Sean Beienburg, Prohibition, the Constitution, and States' Rights, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, Illinois (2019).

“Killings Resulting from Prohibition Enforcement,” Congressional Record – Senate, January 18, 1930, Volume LXXII, Part 2, United States Printing Office, Washington, D.C. (1930).

Luke S. May, Luke S. May Papers, Special Collections, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington (1969).

“[Simpkins-Wilson News],” Post-Register, Idaho Falls, Daily Post, Idaho Falls, Times-Register, Idaho Falls, Idaho Republican, Blackfoot, Bingham County News, Blackfoot, Idaho Statesman, Boise, Idaho; Salt Lake Tribune, Standard-Examiner, Ogden, The Telegram, Salt Lake City, Deseret News, Salt Lake City, Utah; Fresno Bee, California (November 1919 – October 1953).

Jump to Cases List

An Abundance of Evidence

Despite much testimony, newspapers never did report what occasion prompted the beer party on the afternoon of Thursday, September 20, 1934. Clarence Arnold, a seed company employee, hosted the get-together at a cabin near Bozeman, Montana. We also don’t know how many men were there, although probably at least six to eight. Most likely they had gathered to chew the fat about hunting. Seasons were open for a wide variety of game, although some were restricted to specific days.

With so much beer flowing, an altercation seems almost inevitable: James Deskin, a farm hand and part-time auto mechanic, called visitor William Kelly a “vile name.” When the epithet was repeated, Kelly slapped Deskin in the face, twice. Kelly, although somewhat disabled and over 47 years old, was a big man, easily dominating Deskin, who was about 36. Then Clarence stepped in as a peace-maker and the two seemed to put aside the dispute. They even shook hands.

Shortly before 4:30 p.m., Deskin suggested that he, Clarence, and Kelly hunt grouse at a place he knew just south of town. The day was chilly – in the high forties – but fair and sunny. The light snow that had fallen the previous evening had melted and the soft ground should show any fresh tracks.

Ruffed Grouse.
U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service.

About a mile and a half south of downtown Bozeman, Deskin pulled to a stop on a secluded track – known locally as a “lovers’ lane.” Clarence stayed in the back seat while Kelly got out to take a look. Deskin circled behind the car, stepped up behind the big man, and fired his shotgun into his victim’s head and neck. Kelly was killed instantly, and Deskin growled, “No [blankety-blank] can slap me and get away with it.”

William J. Kelly was born in 1887 in Lakeville, Minnesota, about 22 miles south of Minneapolis. He was working at a flour mill when he enlisted in the Army in 1918. His unit, the 330th Machine Gun Battalion, fought in the Meuse-Argonne offensive that helped capture the vital railway hub at Sedan just before the Armistice. He was shot in the face, but recovered enough to stay in the Army for some time after his return. Kelly also had a disabled foot, but it’s not clear whether that was battle-related or happened in his later service.

His whereabouts for over a decade are difficult to reliably trace. He next appears in September 1931, when he was cited for a liquor law violation in Butte, Montana. He later had a couple of liquor violations in Helena. Then, on April 18, 1934, the Fort Harrison veterans’ hospital in Helena, Montana admitted him as a patient. There, he met Clarence Arnold.

Clarence Sylvester Arnold was born in 1891 in southwestern Missouri. He moved to Montana some time after 1910 and got married in Bozeman in late 1916. Clarence served briefly in the U.S. Navy during the World War but apparently did not see action. After that, he had various jobs in and around Bozeman. He suffered from Raynaud’s Syndrome, a rare circulatory disease that may have adversely impacted his heart. Clarence and his family were in Bozeman for the 1930 census, but he apparently traveled to the veterans’ hospital for periodic checkups and treatment.

James Deskin also lived in or near Bozeman, although we don’t know how he and Clarence were connected. He too was born in Missouri, in 1898, but not anywhere near where Clarence grew up. Born James Lloyd Dennis, he adopted his stepfather’s last name after his mother remarried some time before 1910. The family moved to Bozeman between 1910 and 1914. He enlisted in the Army but, like Clarence, served only briefly during the war and did not see action (or even leave the U.S.). Deskin married in 1926 and the couple had a daughter the following year. In 1929, he was arrested for car theft in Livingston, but spent only four months in jail. He and his family were back in Bozeman for the 1930 census.

As noted above, Clarence invited Deskin and Kelly, along with several others, to his beer party. Medical personnel stated that Kelly was “on furlough” from the hospital at the time. After his body was found, officials at first thought he had been a robbery victim. For reasons that never made the news, Clarence did not immediately report the shooting. He told his story only after he, Deskin, and two or three other men from the beer party were arrested.

By this time, criminologist Luke S. May had processed over two hundred death cases, including nearly twenty in Montana. Five years earlier, he had presided over the “most successful” annual meeting of the Northwest Association of Sheriffs and Police … which was held in Missoula. Somehow his teachings found their way to the officer in charge, Sheriff Lovitt I. Westlake.

Westlake was a typical sheriff for his time and place. Born in Iowa in 1896, he was farming near Bozeman when he signed up for the draft in 1917. He served with a veterinary unit in France during the War, then returned in April 1919. He continued in farming until voters elected him Gallatin County sheriff, his term starting in 1933. (He held that job for fourteen years, then served two terms in the state legislature.)

Early on, Sheriff Westlake had the presence of mind to call for May’s help. He and his deputies ended up with valuable physical evidence to support what Clarence said happened. Prosecutors charged James Deskin with first degree murder just four days after the shooting.

The trial began in Bozeman on November 21. As usual, the prosecution began with a review of the events on the day of the murder, suggesting means, motive, and opportunity. The shotgun wound was the obvious means, and the slapping incident provided the motive. Opportunity came with the notion, proposed by Deskin, to do a little hunting. Testimony from the coroner and from party guests – significantly, not including Clarence Arnold – confirmed these facts about the incident.

Next, in an interesting “tactical” move, the prosecution began presenting their “circumstantial” – that is, physical – evidence. Splatters were detected on Deskin’s car and on his shoes, and analysis proved them to be human blood. A footprint cast was very similar to one of Deskin’s shoes, and tire prints at the death scene matched his car. Last but not least, Luke May took the stand to testify that an empty shell found at the scene had been fired by Deskin’s shotgun.

Finally, Clarence gave his eye-witness testimony about the shooting. Oddly enough, news reports say nothing about the cross-examination by the defense. Presumably they did cross-examine him, but that apparently produced no fireworks. When their turn came, the defense countered with a witness who claimed to have seen the victim in downtown Bozeman an hour after the time of the shooting. That sighting could not be corroborated, however.

They next called Mrs. Grace Deskin as a witness. Under oath, she testified that after the party her husband had been with her either at home or “uptown,” all evening. The defense didn’t seem to bother with the matching footprints at the death scene. Nor did they address the spots of human blood on Deskin’s shoes. They perhaps hoped that the jury would consider all this new-fangled stuff too strange, and just ignore it.

James Deskin.
Montana Prison Records.

Oddly enough, the wife did attempt an explanation for the blood spots and tire prints that placed their car at the scene: Arnold and another party guest had borrowed the vehicle after they had all driven to the Deskins’ home. The empty shotgun shell? Well, any number of people could have borrowed the weapon from their home, or the “real” perpetrator could have planted the shell at the scene.

The jury didn’t buy any of the defense claims and took perhaps four hours to reach a “guilty” verdict. They did not, however, recommend the death penalty requested by the prosecution. Deskin was sentenced to life in prison. The wealth of evidence in this case led Luke May to do an “as told to” article for True Detective Mysteries magazine in its issue for February 1936.

Not quite three years after the trial ended, Clarence Arnold passed away at the Fort Harrison veterans’ hospital. Cause of death was listed as a heart attack, with Raynaud’s Disease as a contributory factor.

Some time before the summer of 1936, James and Grace Deskin divorced, although available records do not show exactly when. But in July 1942, Deskin’s life sentence was commuted to 20 years. He was almost immediately released from prison, having served less than eight years on the first-degree murder conviction. Grace and James remarried little over a month later, and soon moved to Wenatchee, Washington. Grace died in the summer of 1965 and James married again two years later. He passed away in 1979.

Although the veterans’ hospital had basic “next of kin” information for William Kelly, there’s no evidence that authorities in Bozeman made any attempt to contact the family. He was buried in the Sunset Hills Cemetery in Bozeman.
                                                                                

References: Brief History of Divisions, U.S. Army, 1917-1918, Combined Arms Research Library, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas (1921).

“[Kelly-Deskin News],” The Missoulian, Missoula, Montana Standard, Butte, Independent-Record, Helena, Great Falls Tribune, Billings Gazette, Montana (September 1931 – November 1949).

Luke S. May, Luke S. May Papers, Special Collections, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington (1969).

Jump to Cases List

A Death In The Family

A large extended family felt the pain when Benjamin Franklin “Frank” Blankenship was shot to death on September 9, 1933. His mother had died ten months earlier, but that left his father, a wife and daughter, and eight siblings. Beyond that, there were a host of Blankenship relatives living in southwest Washington, especially in Lewis County, where the shooting took place.

Family memories trace the roots of the Blankenship exodus to the state back to the Civil War. At that time, Blankenship relatives lived all over Virginia, including the part that would become West Virginia. Thus, Blankenships served on both sides. After the war, a family friend who had fought on the Confederate side fled Reconstruction and ended up in Washington. Over the years, he wrote back to extoll the wonders of his new home.

Although coal mining had brought prosperity to several counties in southern West Virginia, the financial “Panic of '93” brought job losses and reduced wages. Thus, that summer, sixty hopeful “pioneers” – including several Blankenship families and in-laws – boarded a train for Centralia.

Over a span of weeks, families scattered around the region, buying property or claiming homesteads. Several settled near the town of Riffe, about 40 miles southeast of Chehalis. (The town site is now covered by Lake Riffe.) They would have had some sense of home because the area was similar to mountainous Appalachia where they had started.

Near Welch, West Virginia.                                                                     Near Riffe, Washington.
Library of Congress.

The 1893 expedition did not include Frank Blankenship’s immediate family. He was born in West Virginia in 1903, a year or so before they moved to Washington. (His grandfather died in August 1908 and was buried near Mossyrock, a few miles west of Riffe.) Frank apparently alternated between work as a logger or farm laborer. But life was hard, and the family went back to West Virginia at least twice. Still, in March 1926, Frank was in Lewis County, where he married 19-year-old Garnet Lenore Perkins.

She was the older sister of Cad Byron Perkins. As it happens, the Perkins family also had West Virginia connections, even though Cad and Lenore had been born in northwest Virginia. In 1910, the family lived across the state line from McDowell County, West Virginia, where the Blankenship family had roots. They moved to Lewis County around 1912 and settled near Riffe. By the time of his sister’s wedding, Cad had found work as a logger and lumber mill worker.

However, the Crash of 1929 and resulting Great Depression made it hard to find steady work. Perkins managed to hang on, but Frank, Lenore, and their young daughter were living with his family back east at the time of the 1930 U.S. Census. Frank finally managed to scrounge work on a public road crew, so he and Lenore were in Washington in the summer of 1933. (It appears that their daughter Wanda was still living with relatives in the East.)

However, times were still tough and, in desperation, Blankenship may have resorted to cattle rustling. In fact, Cad later claimed that Frank had tried to lure him into helping steal range stock. (That assertion could not be corroborated, however.) Testimony also showed that Frank envied the relative prosperity of his still unmarried brother-in-law. Cad did have an “understanding” with a local divorcee, but it’s not clear if the two were formally engaged.

Matters came to a head when a calf disappeared from a herd in the area. The rancher began to ask around, and Blankenship said (paraphrasing varied testimony), “That had to be my wife’s no-good brother, Cad.” He repeated that story around the area. To reinforce the general idea, he also accused Cad’s 18-year-old sister of “playing around with everyone.”

Naturally, Cad was outraged when rumors began to float around that he was a stock thief, and that his sister was a tramp. But Frank was believed to carry a ready knife, and had even boasted about his ability to take care of himself with it. Thus, before confronting his brother-in-law, Cad borrowed a pistol, a Luger automatic. Then he also borrowed a car and drove out to the road site where Frank was working.

He drew Frank off for a private talk, and demanded that he stop spreading lies about him and his sister. Frank’s response: He was sure Cad was a rustler; he “had too much money for a common man.” Then Frank took it to another level, asserting that the sister had even fooled around with him.

Frank Blankenship. Family Archives.

“You’re a *#!*#*! liar,” Cad retorted. At that point, Cad testified, Frank seemed about to pull out his knife or at least try to punch him, so he fired the Luger. He’d meant it more or less as a warning, but thought the bullet had hit Frank in the chest. Realizing how much trouble he was in, Cad drove into Chehalis to surrender to the sheriff. As it happened, a telephone call had already summoned Sheriff John A. Blankenship. They passed on the road, but Blankenship didn’t know the car Cad was driving. The Chehalis police chief took Perkins into custody.

Sheriff Blankenship was related – a third cousin – to the victim. He was born in 1881 in Webster County, West Virginia. He was twenty years old when his family moved to Lewis County. The Blankenships ran to large broods … John would eventually have eight brothers and sisters. In 1907, John returned to West Virginia long enough to marry a school teacher and bring her out to Washington. Their family was not quite as large, “only” six children after seventeen years of marriage. John ran a farm until about 1927, when he was appointed as a deputy sheriff. Then he was elected sheriff starting in 1931.

Perhaps a week or so after the shooting, the Lewis County prosecutor hired criminologist Luke May to help with the case. May logged it as a “firearms” case, but that evidence was minimal. Frank had not been hit in the chest. Instead, the fatal bullet had hit him in the side of the neck and exited on the far side of this throat. The slug was never recovered. Still, in the prosecutor’s view, the wound pattern negated Cad’s self-defense claim. He tried Perkins on a charge of first degree murder and demanded the death penalty.

So far as we know, May did not appear on the stand at the trial. However, he and his agents found sixteen prosecution witnesses who testified about the bad blood between the brothers-in-laws. One heard Cad say, “My day is coming, and I’ll get Frank yet.” The self-defense plea was further undermined by the fact that the sheriff found no knife on or near Frank’s body.

The defense countered with twenty-six witnesses of their own. They agreed that Cad was angry with Frank. But he had good reason, since Blankenship had indeed been spreading nasty stories about Cad and his “little sister.” Testimony apparently also offered strong circumstantial evidence that Frank himself had stolen the calf that brought the issue to a head. But no butcher in the region admitted to buying the animal, so Frank had perhaps kept the meat for his own use.

After deliberating for an evening and part of the next morning, the jury found Perkins guilty of the much lesser charge of manslaughter. He received a sentence of 10 to 15 years in prison.

Lenora (Perkins) Blankenship remarried in May 1937. She and her new husband, but not daughter Wanda, were living in Centralia at the time of the 1940 census. Cad Perkins spent less than five years in prison. He married divorcee Mabel (Bradley) Crouse in December 1938. He was employed as a logger west of Olympia at the time of the census.
                                                                                

References: “[Blankenship – Perkins News],” Daily Olympian, Olympia, Seattle Times, Chehalis Bee-Nugget, Bellingham Herald, Washington; The Oregonian, Portland, Oregon (May 1927 – December 1937).

Luke S. May, Luke S. May Papers, Special Collections, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington (1969).

Alma Nix, John Nix (Eds.), The History of Lewis County, Washington, Lewis County Historical Society, Chehalis, Washington (1985).

Buddy Rose, ‪Stories from Riffe, Wash., ‬Gorham Printing, Centralia, Washington (2013‬).

Jump to Cases List