A fatal encounter on a cold December evening in 1945 brought an end to the life of Erik Johansson, a 48-year-old male liquor store clerk in Minneapolis, Minnesota. His death on December 12, 1945, was the first in a series of violent crimes committed by George Sidney Sitts, a man whose subsequent actions would spread terror across multiple states.
The night of the murder, Sitts entered the liquor store where Erik was working with the intention of robbing it.
During the botched robbery, Sitts shot and killed Erik. The initial investigation led to Sitts's capture just 60 miles from the city. In a move to avoid a harsher sentence, Sitts pleaded guilty to second-degree murder for Erik's death. The court accepted his plea and sentenced him to life in prison. He was held at the Hennepin County Jail in Minneapolis, awaiting transfer to a state prison to begin his sentence.
However, Sitts's time in custody was short-lived. After three weeks of meticulously sawing through the bars of his cell with a smuggled hacksaw blade, he and three other inmates escaped on January 20, 1946, the day before he was scheduled to be moved to Stillwater State Prison. This brazen escape launched a multi-state manhunt and marked the beginning of a new, more violent chapter in Sitts's criminal career.
Now a fugitive, Sitts's desperation and brutality escalated. On January 24, 1946, near Spearfish, South Dakota, he was stopped at a roadblock. In a cold-blooded attempt to evade capture, he shot and killed two law enforcement officers: Special Agent Tom Matthews of the South Dakota Division of Criminal Investigation and Butte County Sheriff Dave Malcolm. After the double homicide, Sitts fled to Wyoming, kidnapping a gas station attendant along the way, though he later released the man unharmed.
The extensive manhunt finally came to an end on February 5, 1946, when law enforcement captured Sitts near Lysite, Wyoming. He was extradited back to South Dakota to face justice for the murders of the two officers. His trial for the murder of Tom Matthews began in March 1946. The jury found him guilty, and he was sentenced to death. Given the death sentence, the state chose not to proceed with a separate trial for the murder of Sheriff Malcolm.
George Sitts's criminal history began long before his deadly rampage. Born in Le Roy, Minnesota, in 1913, he was involved in crime from the age of 19, with convictions for carrying a concealed weapon, receiving stolen property, and burglary, for which he had previously served prison time.
On April 8, 1947, at the South Dakota State Penitentiary in Sioux Falls, George Sidney Sitts was executed in the electric chair. He was the only person ever to be executed by electrocution in the state's history. Before his death, he reportedly joked to the witnesses, "This is the first time authorities helped me escape prison." His execution brought an end to a violent crime spree that began with the tragic and senseless murder of Erik Johansson in his Minneapolis liquor store.
