Distant cousin took his life of crime from cradle to grave.
Two beat cops were patrolling a neighborhood in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, when they noticed a broken window at the Grain Belt Distributing Co. When they cast their lights on the building, William Alious Papst ran out.
At the time, Papst was 53. He’d spent most of his life locked behind bars. When he wasn’t incarcerated, Papst was trying to commit another robbery. The night of Sunday, July 28, 1957, wasn’t any different.
Police made chase after Papst, according to newspaper reports. One fired a warning shot over his head and ordered him to stop. But old Papst wasn’t about ready to give up.
The state pen parolee and janitor at the former Fillmore Elementary School hurried toward the railroad tracks. Officers fired three more warning shots, then Papst reached the tracks.
But a passing freight train blocked his path. Panicked, Papst turned south, down the tracks, in a desperate attempt to escape. Instead, he ran into the arms of a waiting patrolmen.
Then, Papst collapsed. Police rushed him to St. Luke’s hospital, where he was pronounced dead upon arrival. An autopsy revealed Papst had a heart attack. It was a dramatic end to a life that included armed robbery, at least 22 years behind bars, a prison escape, a jailhouse alibi, and more than one shootout.
Man on the Run
I first wrote about William Papst when I discussed the escapades of his nephew, Francis Virgil “Harper” Bethers. Francis was the son of Papst’s sister Marie. He and his sister are my second cousins, two times removed. We are all descended from Aaron Poole and Hannah Going.
While being deposed, Harper swore that Papst was not in town on Sept. 17, 1934, when four men robbed the Iowa State Bank at gunpoint. But Papst already was trying to appeal a life sentence, and Francis was awaiting his own trial for bank robbery. Harper was careful not to say too much, anyway. Investigators had their eye on him, too.. Otherwise, how could he have known Papst wasn’t there?
The Iowa Supreme Court upheld a decision out of Cass County and ordered him back to the penitentiary. Papst’s life sentence would stand. That wasn’t the final word, though. On Aug. 27, 1952, Papst got his wish of freedom, according to the Des Moines Tribune. Iowa Gov. William S. Beardsley commuted his sentence the year before from life to 50 years. That made William eligible for parole, and for a second chance on the outside after 17 years in the state penitentiary.
Denver Detour
Except for the four months he was on the run. Papst escaped from Fort Madison penitentiary (now part of the historic Iowa State Penitentiary) on Sept. 4, 1948, according to the Council Bluffs Nonpareil. FBI agents found him in Denver, Colorado, In January 1949, he was charged and arraigned for escaping, for which he was unable to post bail. Agents returned William to Fort Madison.
Apparently going AWOL did not have an adverse effect on his ability to be paroled after nearly two decades. Although there’s no explanation for the governor’s actions, Papst failed to gain the parole board’s mercy when he applied for parole just a year before the governor made his pardon.
There are many gaps throughout Papst’s life. His time on the run remains a mystery, as does his youth. The earliest known report is from November 1928, which was well after he Papst was an adult. Multiple reports from newspapers throughout Nebraska and Iowa say he had a juvenile record.
Too Close for Comfort
Law enforcement seemed to have learned something from his early misdoings. Police had a special interest in Papst. In fact, they followed him everywhere he went.
But police also pushed their limits. During one of the occasions where Papst was given another chance, a judge rebuked Omaha police for following him and even dismissed new charges against him for vagrancy. By then, Papst had served a sentence of at least five years in prison for robberies. Reports indicate he stole from several grocery stores in broad daylight and stole cars, too. In fact, he stole a taxicab, according to the Nov. 27, 1928, edition of The Grand Island Daily Independent.
Judge Sophus Neble was not favorably impressed. The Omaha Evening Bee-News quoted the jurist as saying:
Those tactics do not seem fair. This man has paid the penalty, and he ought to be helped. Until it is proven he is not leading the right kind of life, he has as much right to freedom as the police themselves.
Judge Sophus Neble
Back on the Job
In that Jan. 12, 1933, article, Papst said that police pulled him out of bed. They didn’t have to wait long for a reason to drag him from his slumber again. In September 1934, Papst robbed the bank in Cumberland of about $20,000 in today’s money. He didn’t run. Investigators found him in his hometown of Council Bluffs and he stayed in the Pottawattamie County jail after a Cass County grand jury returned an indictment against him. Cumberland, the county seat of Cass County, is about 35 miles southeast of Council Bluffs.
But no matter how many times they tried to lock him away, Papst kept finding another way out. Such was the case when Gov. Beardsley released him when Papst was in his late 40s. Yet the man who faced dying in behind bars came dangerously close to doing just that after he got a get-out-of-jail-free card.
A ‘New’ Life
For four years after Papst was released from prison, he lived in Cedar Rapids. The reason is anyone’s guess, but there are a couple of reasonable possibilities. Papst’s brother, George Robidoux, was living in Cedar Rapids by that time. Robidoux had an early start in prison. He changed his name from Papst to Robidoux in what appears to be an effort to start over. Papst was 11 ½ years younger than Robidoux, but newspaper clips around that time indicate that Robidoux may have had an early criminal relationship with Papst.
Another possibility was his wife. In The Gazette, a Cedar Rapids newspaper, Lucille Papst is listed as a descendant. She was not his wife when he was younger. At one time, he had been married to Emily Howell. It’s unclear if he knew Lucille before or after he was paroled. If before, that could have persuaded him to move there. She is listed as his wife in the Cedar Rapids, Iowa, City Directory, 1954.
If Papst was looking to lead a quiet life there, he failed to find that. Every time that he was offered a chance at a life outside of prison, he found the temptation of theft too great to ignore. In a way, he died doing what he loved.
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