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#Post#: 4631--------------------------------------------------
The Prince Street Murder in 1880
DIR By: HowBrown1953
Date: May 17, 2025, 2:02 pm
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As in the case of the 1836 murder of prostitute Helen Jewett at
a bordello at 41 Thomas Street, Tribeca, some 44 years earlier,
where the man initially arrested
was released, the 1880 murder of Annie Downey in a bordello at
111 Prince Street, Soho ( a 15-minute walk from Thomas Street)
had the same result with
the man charged for Annie's murder, Edward Tim, being released.
The lawyers for Edward Kim were Howe & Hummel...who some felt
would have defended Amer Ben
Ali had Judge Smyth not assigned House, Levy, and Friend in
represent him.
And like Jewett, Annie Downey applied her talents in a bordello.
Bob Wilhelm's latest edition of Murder By Gaslight covers the
case of the Prince Street Murder.
Bob spells Tim's last name as 'Timm', although all the articles
I've read spell 'Tim' with one m.
HTML https://www.murderbygaslight.com/2025/05/the-prince-street-murder.html
#Post#: 4632--------------------------------------------------
Re: The Prince Street Murder in 1880
DIR By: HowBrown1953
Date: May 17, 2025, 3:17 pm
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Thirty years after the Jewett and fourteen before the Downey
murder, a woman 'in the life' was murdered in Philadelphia in
1866
by the name of Mary Carney. In August 1866, the case was covered
from coast to coast in the United States.
The man charged with the murder, Newton Champion, 26, was a
young single engineer, recently (honorably) discharged from the
US Navy,
Champion's father, according to testimony from his mother at his
trial, was insane and housed at Pennsylvania Hospital.
Champion's mother said his father
was 34 when he began to exhibit peculiar behavior and had been
in and out of an asylum since 1838. The mother would go on to
say she noticed signs
of insanity in her son at an early age...as in his infancy!!.
His brother-in-law testified that his wife, Champion's sister,
was also insane and was in
The Government Insane Asylum in Washington, D.C. The mother
testified that all of her children were insane.
On November 2nd, 1866, he was found guilty......but in January,
after a lengthy examination ordered by the Governor, he escaped
the
noose and was sentenced to an asylum for life.
In 1870, he died of consumption and made a deathbed confession
admitting his crime while in Moyamensing Prison..
Champion was born in 1840. His dad was in and out of asylums
and mental homes since 1838...two years before he was born.
Not certain if his sister, also insane, was born after the
father began to display severe ( violence, threats of suicide,
etc.) mental instability.
I added a PDF in case anyone was interested below....the 1869
article is an interview with him in Moyamensing Prison. He was a
real space cadet by this time.
Typical of the times, this Philadelphia Evening Telegraph
article from August 14, 1866, omits the Champion family history
of mental illness, since Champion's
mother had yet to appear at the November trial.
HTML https://i.imgur.com/KdKStNq.jpg
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