Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1883-08-06
BLUEC0AT AND BLACKLEG
TWO CALLINGS WHICH GO HAND
IN HAND IN NEW YORK.
The Charge as illustrated in the Nugent
Case-BluecOats Guzzled with Free
Beer and Tipped by Cut-Throats and
FaIIen Women-PO1icemen as Perjur-
ers-New York by Gaslight.

MIN 10 have long been professional high
Wayman and thief, and his subsequen
experience OF Jersey Justice, causes one tt
| wonder whether there are other criminal,
VINO still wear the police uniform to com
NIT burglaries in. A review of Nugent'.
career inclines us to answer this question
IN the Affirmative. For seven years ht
was member of the New York police
force. During that time, ON several oc
caslons, burglaries were committed on
MS "beat," in the very premises he was
PAID to protect. Although he was more
than once arrested for completely in these
burglaries, he not only managed to escape
conviction, but still preserved his position
as policeman. Consider what must be
the generalization of department which
permitted man to remain one of its men,
bers who was continually yundersuspicion
OF burglary A policeman certainly
ought to be as much above suspicion in
regard to the eighth commandment as
Cesar required his wife to be in regard to
the one next to it. Fortunately for Nu-
gent, the Police Commissioners were
not so requiring, and it was not until he
mad been proved guilty of completely in the
robbery of the Manhattan Bank that he
was dismissed the force. The jury which
tried him for the crime declared him innO-
cent In the teeth of positive proof to the
contrary, and Nugent caused the Com
msslOners to pay him his salary during
the eight months he lay in prison await
ing trial. Consider what must have been
the mismanagement which permitted a
policeman to draw $500 for the time spent
IN jail under charge of felony! Since his
acqulttal by what was a worse miscar-
rage OF justice than that of even the star
route and Duke trials, Nugent has en-
deayored to support himself by keeping a
saloon at Houston and Thompson streets,
which is resort for thieves. This ap-
parently has not proved a profitable
speculation, and it was in try ing to make
money by more familiar enterprise that
he earned for himself ten years incarcera-
tion in the Trenton prison.
Now, am not prepared to say that
tnere are many men, or even one man,
like Nugent on the New York police force,
but If there be no policemen in collusion
with felOns for the committal of crime,
there are scores who cOnniVe at misde-
meanors and wink at the infractiOn of
law. A large fraction of the force is prac-
tlcally In the pay of the saloon keepers
who do business on Sunday, or after 1 a.
M, which is the legal closing hour. So
Systematically do the police sell permis-
sion to violate the law that the lager beer
saloon keepers call upon the brewers from
whom they bring their beer to aid in the
purchase. The latter comply with the
demand, for their business would be Grip
pied were the Sunday sales of beer put
an end to, as many saloon keepers sell
more beer on Sunday than curing all the
rest OF the week put together.
THE CASE OF DRAMATIC HALL.
A disreputable resort in Houston street.
whose rear abuts on the Police Central Of
flee, illustrates how the police are hand
in-glove with law-breakers. Its recent
application for license to sell liquor was
accompanied by police Endorsement that
it was respectable place, and this in the
face of the fact that it is notOriously the
try sting place of Magdalens and
their dishonest associates. So notorious is
its character that the Board of
Excise was obliged to reject
its application in spite of the police in
dOrsement. This rejection, by the way,
was an instance of straining at gnat
and swallowing a camel, for the Excise
Commissioners have licensed resorts far
more VIGOROUSLY disreputable. "The''
Allen, the Republican politician, for ex-
ample, keeps a licensed place ON Bleeck-
er street, within hundred yards of police
headquarters, where thieves and prOsti-
tutes hold reyelry all night long. while
policemen idly watch those who 90 in
and out, as they are revealed by the elec-
trio light which flashes over the door.
1t is the social evil, naturally, which
brings most grist to the police pill. AL
though not legally licensed, as theV used
to be in st. Louis, the Outcasts of New
York pay regular tax for the poor privi-
lege of plying their trade. but the tax is
paid to the police, and not to the city. 1t
is safe to say that every disreputable
house in the city, whose character is
known, pays in proportion to its estimated
receipts and number of its inmates, for
immunity from interference by the po-
lice. The poor creatures who walk the
streets are obliged to 'Esee'' the police
man on post to secure themselves from
continual arrest. 1t is estimated that the
police Captains in whose precincts the So
clal evil tOurishes gather hundreds of dol
lars month from this source while the
emOlUments of the force throughout the
city from the Sunday liquor tax include,
IN addition to cash receipts, no end of bad
cigars and worse whisky.
POLICEMAN's LIFE
indeed ought to be a happy one in New
York, for he rides on the Elevated and
street cars for nothing, has tobacco and
liquor free, and, as in the case of Nugent.
may for years unite to his profession of
policeman that of bank burglar and high
Wayman.
Our model policeman who allows him.
self to be bribed by drink, and forces n
cyprian to give him of her scantv earn
ings by threat of arrest, much as high
Wayman says, ''yOur money or your life,'
very often drinks too much of free liquor
and clubs the wrong man. | mean hits
EOmnhOnU VUhn hoe frif rro.E, /.
him arraigned before the Police Commits
sioners. The trial, however, merely
brings to the front his capability for per-
jury, in which he is often aided and
abetted by his brother policemen. But ii
is when Greek meets Greek-when a DO
liceman makes charges against another
pollceman-thatth the tug of war, or rather of
perjury, comes. l have myself heard half
dozen policemen on a side make under
oath diametrically opposing statements,
both OF which could by no possibility be
true, and about which there could be no
mistake; and it would be hardly drawing
a very long bow to say that there have
been more perjuries committed in the
court room at the Police Central office. at
the trials of policemen. than in the same
length OF time in all the rest of the world
put together! AT least that has been the
cheerful impression left on my mind after
witnessing police trial.
Like master, like man, the heads of
TINS demoraliZed department are pOliti- |
clans who merely use their offices to
further their political ends. Promotion
with them becomes a political matter.
and police captaincy depends not on
merit, but on the political pulp the
candidate has. Politics also often prevent |
a policeman who has been proved guilty |
OF wrong-doing, in spite of his perjury,
from being punished, and when a police |
man who has this ''pull' gets into trouble.
his political friends flock to Headquarters |
and make representations which are far
too often successful in mitigating the |
penalty due his deeds.
L heard recently of the practices of a
class OF criminals, who, judging from the
of their arrest, must also pur- !
chase police immunity A physician in
good standing was in Fifth avenue about
dusk the other evening, when it began to
rain. AS he put up his umbrella, a we'll |
dressed woman stepped from under a tree
and, in self-possessed but lady-like wav.
said: "May beg you to shelter me under
your umbrella, sir? l am going but few
blocks" The physician was only too de-
lighted to share his umbrella, and wished
she were going further. When he reached
MS home, however, he found that one of
his diamond studs was missing.
PATIENT OF THIS PHYSICIANS
either met this same woman, or one even
better dressed and more lady-like, appa- |
rentiy, coming down the steps of his house |