Police Reports

 

    A production company out of England wants to come to Idaho to obtain video footage of the Fremont County courthouse for an episode of a TV series. 

    Off the Fence Productions, Ltd will air the episode on "Unearthed, Ancient Murder Detectives" sometime next year.

    The episode features local infamous murderer and mysterious death and disappearance and discovery of Joseph Henry Loveless. Loveless, a bootlegger in Dubois Idaho in 1916, went to jail for murdering his wife with an axe. He spent time in the St. Anthony jail awaiting the end of his trail but managed to escape by sawing through the bars with a blade in his shoe. 

    Although authorities searched all over nobody ever found Lovelace and all assumed he escaped to freedom. However, in 1979 a headless body was found in a cave just north of Dubois. Two years ago forensic scientists discovered the identity of the mysterious body and the mystery of what happened to Lovelace was partially solved. 

    Below is a poem written by Bob Jackson, grandson of the sheriff in charge when Lovelace was arrested.

The Mystery of the Bootlegger's Grave

Do I have personal knowledge?

I'd never admit that no.

But at the time in question

My great grandpa was sheriff you know.

 

So listen to my story

But don’t ask me how I know

About murder, mystery, and mayhem

In Dubois, Idaho.

 

It started in a bootlegger’s cabin

A block or two off main.

The product was good, and business was booming

In the year of 1916

 

Born Joseph Henry Loveless.

Though known by other names.

Raised by Mormon pioneers.

He brought the family shame.

 

He led a life of petty crime,

Moving all around.

Then fate would lead him down the road,

Right here to Dubois town.

 

Then came a time one Saturday night

The city held a dance.

Mrs. Loveless longed to go.

Joseph said, “Not a chance.”

 

A heated argument then ensued,

Though no one knows all the facts.

Mrs. Loveless died three days hence,

From wounds caused by an axe.

 

The bootlegger was taken to St. Anthony jail

Until the trial was through.

But he sawed through bars, and escaped in the night,

With a saw blade he kept in his shoe.

 

Now John Lockhart Jackson the sheriff

The night the bootlegger ran

Was none other than my great grandfather.

He helped search the desert sand.

 

But they never caught up with that bootlegger.

Or did they? I don’t know.

But one hundred and four years later

In a cave here in Idaho

 

Treasure hunters made a grizzly discovery

In a cave way in the back,

Was the bootlegger’s dismembered torso

Wrapped up in a burlap sack.

 

Though the arms and the legs were found later,

The missing head remains

Wrapped up in a cloak of mystery

Of the unknown killer’s domain.

 

So, as I near the end of my story,

I share with all in this room,

Passed down from my great grandfather

THIS TERRIBLE FAMILY HEIRLOOM!