Poisoning the Pecks of Grand Rapids

by Tobin T. Buhk

  That afternoon, Frank Waite went to see his baby brother for the last time. Waite dined on a light supper of eggs and toast while the brothers chatted about the old days when they spent hours tobogganing down the gentle slope that ran from their neighborhood to the edge of the Grand River.

  When he stood up to leave, Frank broke down and began to sob. “I’m going now, Arthur. Goodbye,” he managed to utter. He took a few gasps. After a few seconds, he regained his composure. “Is there any message—anything I can tell anybody—anything?”

  Arthur shook his head. “Goodbye, Frank. Don’t worry for me. I shall not suffer. There is no message to anybody.”216 He reached out and grasped Frank’s hand, shaking it like a man who had just sealed a business deal. Frank Waite darted out of Sing Sing with tears streaming down his cheeks.

  After his brother left, Waite spent much of the evening on the literary pursuits he had developed during his incarceration. He read poems by Keats and attempted to pen one of his own but couldn’t manage to finish it. Instead, he wrote a note to Dr. Squire, folded it and slipped it inside an envelope. He scribbled “May 19, Private” on the front of the envelope and sealed it. He placed the envelope inside a second envelope, sealed it and scrawled “to be opened after my death” across the front.

  As the fatal hour approached, Waite felt conflicting emotions. It couldn’t come fast enough, yet he hoped time would slow down. He flinched as his cell door opened with a metallic shriek at about 9:00 p.m. As Waite noticed the familiar figure of Dr. A.N. Peterson, the prison chaplain, standing at the cell door, he felt weak in the knees and became aware of a slight trembling in his hands. Despite his desire to expedite his own execution, Waite felt his pulse beating in his neck. He was terrified. Nevertheless, he managed a smile as the chaplain entered his cell.

  Peterson and Waite spent the next two hours in prayer. As the hour hand neared eleven, Peterson asked Waite if he could deliver any last messages. “Arthur, is there any message you want to send to anybody?”

  “No, thank you, Doctor, I have nothing to say to anyone on this earth.”

  “But your mother—”

  Waite interrupted Peterson. “To nobody on this earth,” he repeated in a slow, firm tone. “Frank told me about mother’s illness, but it is not as bad as reported. I have nothing to say to her.”217

  Just before 11:00 p.m., Warden Moyer appeared and asked Waite if he had any last statement he wished to make. Waite shook his head and turned to Fred Dorner, the head keeper in charge of death row. “Well, Mr. Dorner, are you ready? Is it time?” Waite asked as he stood up. He followed Dorner and Dr. Peterson out of the cell. He felt his knees buckle slightly but took a deep breath, which seemed to temporarily steel his nerves.

  As Dorner escorted Waite through the death house with Dr. Peterson following on their heels, Waite’s death-row neighbors stood at their cell doors to say farewell. Three of them whispered, “Goodbye, Arthur,” in hushed tones through the black curtains traditionally hung over the death-row cells on the date of an execution.

  “Goodbye, boys,” Waite remarked with his best attempt at a cavalier, nonchalant tone of voice. “God bless you.”

  At 11:03 p.m., Waite passed through the infamous “green door,” which long before had faded to a burnt brown color. A small group of reporters and witnesses watched as prisoner No. 67281 shuffled into the execution chamber. The color drained from his face as he eyed the chair.

  Once again, Waite put on a stoic façade. “Is this all there is to it?” he asked and threw a quick smile at the witnesses that seemed eerily familiar to the New York Times correspondent. “Waite,” he noticed, “wore to death the same grin that marked him when he made his confession upon the witness stand a year ago.”218

  Sing Sing’s electric chair, circa 1915. The “little green door” leading to the death house cells is at the right. From the Library of Congress.

  Waite felt his knees grow weak, but he didn’t lose his nerve. He stared at the floor, walked straight to the chair and fell into the hot seat.

  Dr. Peterson opened his Bible to the bookmarked page and began reading the twenty-third Psalm as two guards wearing blue uniforms began fastening Waite’s arms and legs to the chair. They tossed a black leather strap across Waite’s knees, pulled it taut and buckled it. They repeated the procedure, fastening a strap across Waite’s ankles, another across his wrists and then another across his chest.

  “The Lord is my shepherd,” Peterson began, “I shall not want. He maketh me lie down in green pastures; he leadeth me beside the still waters.”

  Waite focused on the prayer as the attendants finished pinioning him. They slipped a black leather cap over his head, fastened a leather strap across his forehead that covered his eyes and attached the electrodes to his temples. They worked fast. The entire process took just two minutes.

  “Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.” Dr. Peterson paused and closed his Bible.

  At 11:05 p.m., Warden Moyer asked Waite if he had any last words, but he had nothing more to say.219

  Dr. Squire nodded, and one of the guards threw a switch that sent two thousand volts surging into Waite’s body.

  Waite’s body jerked against the straps, and a sickly sweet odor of burning flesh began to fill the chamber. The initial blast lasted for a minute and fifteen seconds.

  Dr. Squire leaned down and placed his stethoscope against Waite’s chest. He heard a slight murmur, so he stepped back and gave the signal for a second blast. Once again, the attendant threw the switch, sending another wave of two thousand volts into Waite’s body at 11:08 p.m.

  After the second five-second jolt, Dr. Squire placed his stethoscope against Waite’s chest. This time, he heard nothing but silence. At 11:11 p.m., he pronounced Arthur Warren Waite dead. Dr. Perry M. Townsend, a New York physician on hand to assist Dr. Squire, concurred.

  The New York Times correspondent who witnessed the execution provided a fitting epitaph in the paper’s May 25 edition: “2,000 volts ended the life of one of the most remarkable individuals in criminal history.”220

  Back in his office, Dr. Amos Squire opened the envelope Waite had left for him. Inside was a solitary sheet of paper containing a single statement, a quote from a letter by Robert Louis Stevenson: “Call us with morning faces, eager to labour, eager to be happy—Stevenson.”221

  In the days following Waite’s execution, people and the press alike continued to speculate about his mental state. The Day Book—a periodical published in Chicago—ran an item under the title “Are Eyes of 2 Insanity Pleaders Alike?” Below the headline were close-ups showing the eyes of Waite and Harry Thaw, who infamously murdered architect Stanford White over a beauty named Evelyn Nesbitt. Like Waite, Thaw tried an insanity gambit, but unlike Waite, it worked; the jury found him criminally insane, and the court sentenced him to a stint in Matteawan.

  The Day Book writer found a clue in the eyes of the two villains. “Alienists generally agree,” the Day Book writer noted, “that in insane persons more of the whites of the eyes are visible than in those of normal mind. Thaw’s large, peculiar eyes attracted much attention at his trial. Waite’s eyes are smaller than those of Thaw.”222

  Harry K. Thaw, who murdered wealthy New York architect Stanford White. Newspaper reporters didn’t fail to miss several parallels between Thaw and Waite. Both enjoyed playboy lifestyles. Thaw, like Waite, fell for a chorus girl after watching her perform. After the first trial ended in deadlock, the jury at Thaw’s second trial found him not guilty by reason of insanity. He was sentenced to life at Matteawan State Hospital for the criminally insane. Following a third trial, Thaw was judged sane and freed. From the Bain News Service, Library of Congress.

  Thaw’s siren, Evelyn Nesbit. She married Thaw in 1905 and testified in his defense at both trials amid rumors that Thaw’s family paid her for her favorable comments. She divorced Thaw in 1915. Photograph by Gertrude Käsebier, circa 1900. F
rom the Library of Congress.

  Others contemplated possible brain damage as the source of Waite’s malignant motives and cited a peculiar discovery during the autopsy conducted after Waite’s execution. The brain tissue showed signs that at some point during his youth, Arthur Warren Waite suffered from meningitis—an infection that can lead to a high fever. This finding was consistent with the symptoms of a childhood illness that Waite described to Dr. Karpas.

  Something else Waite said during one of his sessions with Dr. Karpas also fueled speculation. Waite told Dr. Karpas that when he was in college, he fell down a staircase and “was out of his head.”223

  Arthur Warren Waite continued to be the talk of New York for years after his execution. As late as 1952, the Coliseum elevator operator—a gregarious fellow named Tony—still told the story of the doctor who wasn’t.224

  On June 8, 1918, Arthur’s mother, Sarah J. Waite, died of hyperthyroidism and myocarditis just days before her sixty-first birthday. The attending physician didn’t include a contributory factor on the death certificate, but the emotional strain of Arthur’s trial and subsequent execution had caused her health to erode. She was buried in Fair Plains Cemetery in Grand Rapids next to her husband, Warren.

  Clara Louise Peck didn’t spend the rest of her life pining over Arthur Warren Waite. On June 1, 1920, she wed her childhood sweetheart, John Caulfield, in Pasadena, California. She died in 1964 at the age of seventy-six.

  Percy Seaman Peck devoted countless hours to Liberty Loan fundraisers during the First World War. After suffering from a stroke, he died on September 13, 1944, at the age of sixty-five. He was interred at Woodlawn Cemetery in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

  Catherine Peck, who survived Waite’s scheming, which included ground glass mixed in a jar of marmalade and probably typhus, diphtheria and who knows what other dangerous germs, died of natural causes in Grand Rapids on February 21, 1927, at the home of Percy Peck. She was eighty-one years old.

  The Reverend Dr. Alfred Wesley Wishart continued to helm the Fountain Street Baptist Church. When the structure burned down in 1917, he spearheaded the campaign to build a new church, which opened in 1924. In 1928—three years after the Scopes Monkey Trial—Wishart staged a public debate with famed attorney Clarence Darrow.

  Characterized by investigators and reporters alike as a Sherlock Holmes who played a major role in exposing Waite’s crimes, Wishart died on April 25, 1933, at the age of sixty-seven. The New York Times wrote a glowing obituary for the Grand Rapids native. The article praised Wishart for his role in solving one of the city’s most infamous cases but erred in the degree of his zealousness by stating that “he and Dr. Perry Schurtz, a physician, stole the [John Peck’s] body from its grave.”225

  NOTES

  INTRODUCTION

  1. Direct examination of Arthur Warren Waite, The People of the State of New York v. Arthur Warren Waite, New York Supreme Court trial transcript, Trial #3241, May 22, 1916, Stenographer No. 2679, Reels 400–01, Crime in New York 1850–1950, Special Collections, Lloyd Sealy Library, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, City University of New York, 641–765. Hereafter, People v. Waite.

  2. This version of John Peck’s final moments was based on Waite’s trial testimony. However, John Peck’s cause of death was hotly debated in court. The state contended that Waite smothered his father-in-law with a pillow on top of a chloroform-soaked rag to prevent his moans from waking Clara, which Waite subsequently admitted, but Dr. Otto Schultze testified that Peck died from arsenic poisoning. Waite’s statements in court clearly indicate his belief that he smothered John Peck, but it is possible Waite didn’t apply enough pressure or apply pressure long enough to suffocate his victim, and instead John Peck died shortly after from the aftereffects of poison. It is also possible that, given Waite’s defense strategy, he lied about smothering Peck in the first place.

  CHAPTER 1

  3. Warren and Jennie Waite also had a daughter, Edith. Born in 1875, Edith married Frank W. Davie in 1896.

  4. Hannah Carpenter was John E. Peck’s second wife. His first marriage, to a Newburg, New York wagon maker’s daughter, ended in divorce.

  5. Biographical sketch, Grand Rapids Herald, March 16, 1916. Also, Grand Rapids and Kent County Michigan: Historical Account of Their Progress from First Settlement to the Present Time, Vol. 2. Edited by Ernest B. Fisher (Chicago: Robert O. Law Company, 1918), 288–89.

  6. Cross-examination of Clara Louise Peck, People v. Waite. Clara gave this account of her courtship with Waite during her trial testimony.

  7. Grand Rapids Herald, March 25, 1916.

  8. Ibid., March 24, 1916.

  9. Percy passed the Michigan Bar in 1900 and graduated from the University of Michigan’s school of pharmacy in 1903.

  10. State of Michigan, Department of Public Health, Vital Records, Michigan Death Indexes 1867–1914. Return of the Deaths of the County of Kent for the Quarter Ending December 31, 1896, 55–56. Entry for “Bessie Peck,” Record No. 5160, filed May 19, 1897. Microfilm Reel 5, Library of Michigan. Bessie Peck died on February 10, 1896, at age fifteen. Her death record gives “heart trouble” as the cause.

  11. Percy gave a lengthy statement about the case in the Grand Rapids News, March 27, 1916.

  12. Direct examination of Arthur Warren Waite, People v. Waite. It is possible that Arthur wanted to delay the wedding until he could acquire bacteria cultures to poison the Pecks. He later testified to beginning his study of bacteriology in August, but the evidence suggests that he didn’t acquire most of the cultures until October.

  13. Percy married Mary Ellen Ferris in 1902, but she was familiarly known as “Ella.”

  14. Grand Rapids News, September 10, 1915.

  CHAPTER 2

  15. The telegram was sent at 8:44 a.m. on Monday, March 13.

  16. At the trial, “K. Adams” did not state why she chose this pseudonym, but she later commented to the press about having a recently married friend by that name.

  17. Grand Rapids Herald, March 24, 1916. Evidently, “K. Adams” wanted Percy Peck to believe the message emanated from a resident of the Coliseum. It is possible that the sender dictated the message to the clerk as a further way of ensuring her anonymity. Based on the loose scrawl of the handwriting on the original document, Wishart and later Swann both believed an elderly man wrote the message, and according to news reports, Western Union records indicated that a man filed the message for sending, which led to all sorts of speculation. According to testimony at the trial, a woman did in fact send the message but was most likely prompted by an elderly relative.

  18. Direct examination of Dr. Perry Schurtz, People v. Waite. Dr. Schurtz described the autopsy during his testimony.

  19. Direct examination of Joseph Sprattler, People v. Waite.

  20. Sun (New York), May 24, 1916. The subsequent news coverage of the case contains several versions of this statement. While the wording varies slightly, the meaning is consistent. Waite wanted to block the autopsy on John Peck’s remains.

  21. New York Tribune, March 24, 1916.

  22. According to several news accounts, a team of guards stood watch over the grave to ensure that no one would steal John Peck’s body. Apparently, they suspected that Waite would attempt to break open the vault and either destroy or dispose of the remains.

  23. Grand Rapids Press, March 24, 1916.

  CHAPTER 3

  24. The March 25, 1916 Grand Rapids Press contained an interview with Wishart, who detailed his New York investigation.

  25. Even after Dr. Vaughn discovered arsenic in John Peck’s stomach, both Drs. Moore and Porter made public statements standing by their diagnoses. Portions of their statements appeared in the March 23, 1916 edition of the Grand Rapids Herald. Dr. Moore was the physician on call for the Park Avenue Hotel, where Catherine Peck lived. He entered the case when she asked him to look after her brother.

  26. Sun (New York), March 24, 1916; Grand Rapids Herald, March 25, 1916.

  27. Grand Rap
ids Herald, March 13, 1916.

  28. These quotes attributed to Waite were repeated by Percy and Ella Peck to a Grand Rapids Herald reporter from memory and subsequently appeared in the March 25, 1916 edition.

  29. Sun (New York), March 28, 1916. Clara recalled this statement to Mancuso when he interviewed her in Grand Rapids. Mancuso subsequently rehashed it in a public statement.

  30. Directory of Directors in the City of New York (New York: Directory of Directors Company, 1915). In 1916, the Schindler National Detective Agency was one of the best-known and most prestigious groups of private investigators in the United States. The organization was run by Raymond C. Schindler, president, treasurer and director; Walter S. Schindler, secretary, manager and director; and John F. Schindler, vice-president and treasurer. Their offices were located at 149 Broadway.

  31. Grand Rapids Press, March 25, 1916. Accounts conflict about when Swann first became involved in the case. According to Rupert Hughes’s biography of Raymond Schindler, Swann was reluctant and didn’t believe the evidence gathered by this point was sufficient to warrant an investigation of Waite. Wishart, however, told the Grand Rapids Press that Swann became involved on Friday, March 17. Contemporary news accounts also suggest Swann opened an official line of inquiry at about the time Waite returned from Grand Rapids.

  32. Raymond C. Schindler, “The Bogus Doctor Who Wanted to Be Rich,” Buffalo Sunday Courier Magazine, July 9, 1922, 6. Schindler was the only one involved with the case to write about it. His one-page article presents an interesting account of the early investigation.

  CHAPTER 4

  33. Schindler’s account conflicts with contemporary newspaper stories about this initial search of the Coliseum apartment. Most newspaper accounts have Swann’s men conducting an official search, while Schindler’s suggests an unofficial sweep.