George Frank KORCH
Sunday, September 25, 1949 Sunday Herald - Bridgeport, Connecticut

Parolee's Wild Ride Fails Him

George Korch Can't Convince State Cops He Had Been Asleep

George F. Korch, Jr., 25, a Cheshire parolee, tried some good tricks in his effort to avoid arrest by Sgt. Louis Marchese and Officer Thomas Smith of the Bethany State Police barracks.

He led the officers a merry auto chase over a path full of rocks and stumps that all but upset the low-slung police car.

Then he tried to make a get-away, leaving his pal, Claude Battles, 34, to take the rap of diz-driving the truck.

Then Korch got into bed at the farm of his Bethany employer and tried to make believe he had been there for hours.

Marchese and Smith told Korch the jig was up when they pointed out that his trousers were still wet from rushing through the dewy grass and brush.

Korch was held for violation of parole, reckless driving, operating without a license and operating while his license was suspended.

Battles, who was so drunk he hardly was able to stand, was charged with intoxication and breach of the peace.

Sgt. Marchese was riding with Officer Smith on Blueberry Hill in Beacon Falls, when a truck suddenly shut off its lights as it came toward them.

Smith, who has been called "Buck" since he captured a runaway horse while riding a motor cycle, swung the police car around and gave chase, as the truck speeded up, over the back roads of Beacon Falls and Bethany.

They got so close that they could see the younger of two men, who was hatless, was doing the driving.

But the driver lead them over such narrow and rough roads that they couldn't pass to make him pull over.

They felt like storm-tossed sailors as the truck, with high wheels that cleared the stumps and boulders, led them up the last path.

Smith grimly kept driving ahead until the truck turned into Fairwood Rd., across a lawn and into some bushes.

For the moment, the driver got away.

Battles, who was full of whoopee juice, was shackled and then the officers found Korch in bed, ready to give them a fairy tale.

When they proved they had him dead to rights, Korch said he tried to get away because he was a parolee and was breaking so many laws at one time.



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