This condition of affairs could not exist for long.  When the law fails to protect life and property, I have always observed that men find a way to protect them.  About a year and a half before the finale, a gentleman living in Lookout visited Alturas and detailed the many misdeeds of these men to me.  One in particular I remember.  Dr. Shearer, a wealthy stock man living some distance this side of Lookout, had employed some Indians in harvesting his hay crop.  Frank Hall had a grievance against the Indians, and during their absence from their camp went there and cut their wagons and harness to pieces.  The Indians trailed him to within a short distance of Halls, but were afraid to go further.  They complained to Mr. Shearer, who promptly sent word to Frank Hall that if he ever came on his ranch he, Shearer, would shoot him.  Some time after this Mr. Shearer found a saddle animal belonging to his wife cut and mutilated in a most shameful manner.  The horse, a beautiful animal and a pet, had his ears and tail cut off, while deep gashes were cut in his side and hips.  Mr. Shearer could not prove that Frank Hall committed the dastardly act, but was more than satisfied of his guilt.  This and other like acts were detailed to me, and I wrote an article for my paper detailing the grievances of the people of that section and ending by predicting that, unless it was stopped, “juniper trees would bear fruit.”  My prediction came true a year and a half later, only that the Pit River bridge and not the junipers bore the fruit.

Some time during the year of 1900 a man named Yantes came to the vicinity of Lookout and took up with the Halls.  Later he took Mary, the Indian woman, away from old man Hall, and lived with her on a ranch he had located.  He carried a big gun and posed as a bad man, and of course found genial companionship in the sons of the Indian woman.  The coming of Yantes seemed to add to the boldness and reckless conduct of Frank and Jim Hall and the half-breed boy Wilson.  Along towards the last of May, 1901, a burglary was committed in the neighborhood.  Of course the Hall crowd was suspected and a search warrant obtained.  At the Hall home several of the articles were found, as well as on the persons of the men.  The hides and meat of animals recently killed were found at the Hall and Yantes homes and the brands identified by the owner.  This discovery led to the arrest of the entire gang, including Hall and the half-breed boy Wilson.  They were taken to Lookout and a guard placed over them.

The Grand jury was in session at Alturas, and next morning R. E. Leventon and Isom Eades came to Alturas to secure the indictment of the men.  The proof was positive, and they felt that at last a conviction could be secured.  But unfortunately the Grand jury adjourned that morning.  They then applied to the District Attorney to go to Lookout and prosecute the criminals.  But Mr. Bonner had a case coming up at Lake City, and the Justice refusing to postpone it, could not go.  The matter was finally arranged by the appointment by Mr. Bonner of C. C. Auble, an Adin attorney, as a special deputy to prosecute the cases.  The appointment was made out and given to Leventon and Eades, but Mr. Bonner, a young lawyer and serving his first, term, made the fatal mistake of instructing Mr. Auble to dismiss the charge of burglary and rearrest the men for petty larceny.