In 1927, 26-year-old Alex Runion, a World War veteran and criminal with charged in three states, was charged with the murder of automobile salesman Louis Riley near Newport, Kentucky. It was alleged by local police that Runion “fired the fatal shot after Riley had been ‘taken for a ride’.”
A year later in 1928, while on his cot in the Newport Jail, Runion attempted to end his life by slashing his throat with a safety razor he used to shave with. According to officials, Runion’s wife occupied a room on W. Fourth Street, just opposite her husband’s cell, so that she could be in close contact with him. His wife, Fannie, reported that they had an argument. Fannie said that Alex had a temper and she wanted to cure him of that so when he would call for her, she ignored him. Runion’s wound was only superficial, and he returned to the jail the same night after treatment at the Speers Hospital. Fannie remained steadfast to her husband, despite the charges.
In 1929, while being held at Central State Hospital (Lakeland), Runion and three other hospital inmates escaped the institution. According to Superintendent Dr. Fox, the inmates pried off a door to a service elevator in a small attendants’ room and lowered themselves to the basement. They forced an outside door and fled down an embankment into the open field to the rear of the hospital. The other two inmates were 36-year-old Dale Mills, charged with killed a constable and 22-year-old Holt Smith who was being treated for feeblemindedness after a vagrancy charge in Fayette County. Dr. Fox noted that hospital guard Ernest Lockhart, age 50, allowed the men to get into the small room at their own request and had locked the door on them. Lockhart, who had a stellar record, as well as experience at the prison in Eddyville and one in Lima, Ohio, said he had forgotten about the “dumb waiter” from which the trio escaped.
Upon his last escape from Central State Hospital in 1929, Hamilton, Ohio authorities eventually spotted Runion. Four Hamilton Policemen received a tip that Runion was posing as a salesman. They parked their automobile ahead of the man, leaped out and leveled a machine gun and three pistols at him. According to the officers, Runion feigned surprise and even claimed to be a Mr. Calman, insistent that they made a mistake. Once the police took Runion to Police Headquarters he revealed his name to be “Smart Alex” Runion. He promptly boasted to having married seven women without a divorce, stolen 200 automobiles, shot three men, killing one, and escaped three times from Kentucky insane asylums. Indeed, Runion did kill a man and escaped three times from two Kentucky institutions. Three Cincinnati alienists testified in court that Runion was insane, and a jury adjudged him as such.
In October of 1929, Central State Hospital Superintendent Dr. James Fox along with three attendants traveled to Hamilton to retrieve Alex Runion and bring him back to his place of escape. Dr. Fox was adamant that Runion was, indeed sane, despite previous findings of three Ohio alienists and a jury. Commonwealth’s Attorney Roger Neff of Newport said that once Runion was returned to Central State Hospital and was, indeed, adjudged sane, he would be tried for the murder of Louis Riley.
In February of 1931, Alex Runion was acquitted of killing Louis C. Riley. The Commonwealth had a start witness, Emmett Snyder, who testified that Runion killed Riley because he was there. However, Runion claimed Snyder had framed him. While the Commonwealth contended that the murder of Riley was deliberate, a jury determined otherwise.
The acquittal was not the end of Runion, however. In 1935, for example, Runion shot his way out of a rock quarry trap near Lexington to escape authorities on additional automobile theft charges. Shortly thereafter, Runion surrendered quietly to a United States Marshal in London, Kentucky. Runion was sentenced in London to a total of four prison terms totaling 20 years. Later, Federal Judge H. Church Ford ruled that the federal court was empowered to invoke consecutive terms and held that all four of Runion’s counts were good.
Final Thoughts
Runion, a native of Clay County was a U.S. Army veteran. He was reportedly gassed and wounded in combat in France. Upon his discharge from the U.S. Army, Runion made Newport his home. Little else is known about the remainder of Runion’s life after he was sentenced to 20 years in a federal prison. Save for a lone obituary in the 1970s, with the same name, nothing else has been definitively confirmed. There are a number of questions of which still have no definitive answers. Was Runion truly mentally ill? Was Runion’s criminality a product of his experiences during The Great War? Though extensive, was his criminal career hyperbole or actually true? Did Runion actually murder Mr. Riley or did his partner play a more significant role? There are likely dozens of others questions that you, reader, are left to ponder.
Special note: should updates become available on the latter years of Alex Runion’s life, they will be posted here.
Contributed by Shawn Logan | contact@kyhi.org
⁘ Works Cited ⁘
- The Kentucky Post and Times-Star, 14 November 1928
- The Courier-Journal, 7 October 1929
- The Paducah-Sun Democrat, 18 October 1929 *PHOTO
- The Owensboro Messenger, 20 February 1931
- The Kentucky Post and Times-Star, 21 December 1934
- The Kentucky Post and Times-Star, 17 January 1935
- The Courier-Journal, 17 January 1935
- The Owensboro Messenger, 18 January 1935
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