[2] On the night of December 5, 1873, while walking with two of his brothers to the church in Dorchester, Piper suddenly told them that he wasn't feeling well and wanted to go back home.

[3] The brothers went inside the house, with Thomas claiming he was going to go to bed, but instead went down to the kitchen, grabbed the shaft and began walking after Landregan.

In the middle of the night, Thomas suddenly woke up and, noticing that his companion was asleep, he grabbed a hammer-like object and struck Tyner several times on the head with it.

[3] On May 23, 1875, a 5-year-old girl named Mabel Hood Young was attending a service in the Warren Avenue Baptist church, where Piper worked as a sexton.

After the service ended, he sent away the boys playing in the vestibule, and lured the young Mabel to the tower with the promise of showing her the pigeons.

Thomas intended to rape her, thinking that Young was dead, but when he realised she wasn't, he moved the badly-injured girl to another place, where she was soon found.

[8] The motive for the crime was suggested as being pure lust for bloodshed and, under pressure from the whole ordeal, Piper confessed to Young's murder.

[10] Following his execution, Piper's family asked that Thomas's written and detailed confession of the crimes, which was given to Sheriff John M. Clark, not be released to the public.

Clark agreed with the plea, as the majority of Piper's crimes were already known to the public and nobody wanted to further horrors to the terrible deeds of the murderer.