De Jong, the alleged murderer, who is now in prison in Amsterdam, bids fair to baffle the authorities and go scot free.
It is morally certain that De Jong has caused the disappearance of several young women, but whether he has murdered them or sold them to the managers of certain houses of vice, nobody knows but himself, and possibly his victims and their keepers. The prisoner has been remarkably successful in persuading women to leave their homes to follow him from place to place, and in every instance the girls have disappeared. The Amsterdam officials fear that they will have to release the accused. They say that is it not enough to prove that a person is simply missing. Some overt act that would result in the death of the person must be proved to make out the crime of murder. Holland has been thoroughly searched, but no trace of the women has been found, and it is impossible to say whether they are living or dead. De Jong has been questioned time and again, and every device has been employed to throw him off his guard, but he remains the same smiling mystery. He laughs at his prosecutors and predicts his speedy discharge. It is the theory of some that he is the famous Jack the Ripper who committed the Whitechapel butcheries, but no facts have been brought forward to sustain it.
It is quite probable that the suspected man will soon regain his liberty and resume his secret work of decimating the female population of Holland.
