The St. Johns herald., 1893-06-29
DAMAGED FOR REVENUE.
\ New Scheme fer Obtaining
 Money Without Working.
oopie Who Claim Payment for Injuries That Are Never Received-WoInen Are Adept5 fn the Disrep-
 utable Business.

utable Business.
 There is a certain class of people
 A2 make good living by claiming
 images for injuries which they have
 lever received, :" "said Sergeant John Me
 Sweeney. of the New York police, to a Journal reporter.
 ''These fakirs are constantly trying new schemes he continued, ''by which | make it appear that they have been dieabled through being assaulted or by f ing down somebody's stairs or being llaoched down by somebody's horse, taking care that in every instance the person claiming to be at fault is amply able to pay.
 ''Women are very clever at this new tri k, and it was through pretty little widow, who staggered into the station house one day, that I got the first inti- nation that the game was being gener- ally worked
 ''The woman was in the greatest dis tress apparently, and was scarcely able to stand. When I had given her chair she said in faint voice that she had just been run down by wagon, and that she was certain she had received internal injuries of a severe nature.
 ''She had taken pains, she said, to take the name of the firm, which was painted on the wagon, and as it was one of the biggest dry goods houses in the city, she proposed to make them pay roundly for their drivers careless ness
 q at once offered to send for a hospi- tai ambulance" the sergeant went on. but at this she bridled up and declared that she would allow no one but her family physician to make an examina tiOn. Then for the first time I began to suspect that the woman was not as badly hurt as she pretended to be, and l think she must have divined my thoughts, for she suddenly jumped up, and, thanking me shortly for my trouble, started hastily for the door. I was too quick fer her, however, and barred her passage into the street. I told her that she could not leave until she had signed a paper that I would prepare releasing the firm from all re- sponsibility for her alleged injuries.
 ''Of course, I did this only as a further test of the woman's veracity. and it worked beautifully, for she not only signed the release. but reluctantly confessed that her whole story was myth"
 A remarkable case which occurred but a few days ago was that of man who feigned death in the face of sur geon's threat to cut him open in order to find out what he had died of
 ''I had just come on duty the other evening"" said the sergeant, ''when man ran in all out of breath and gasped out that man had just been knocked down and killed in the saloon at the corner below. Suspecting nothing, posted the dozen or so officers who hap pened to be within call on dead run for the spot, telling them to bring back the dead man and everybody they might find in the place.
 ''In few minutes they returned with thirty men and women prisoners, and in the rear of the procession was the dead man, laid out on window shut ter.
 ''After locking up the crowd in the cellroom, the murdered man was placed on table and hurry call sent to Gouv- erneur hospital for an ambulance.
 ''The story 1 got from the prisoners in chorus was that the saloonkeeper, who, by the way, is wealthy man. had struck the man on the head with a bung starter, and that the latter had promptly fallen down dead On look ing at the man could see no evidence of life whatever, but when I felt his pulse found that it was beating away as regularly as clock.
 Certain now that the fellow was shamming, determined to give him good scare, so when the ambulance sur geon came we called all the mans friends into the room and told them we were going to cut him open.
 ''The surgeon made a great fuss get ting ont his saws and lancets, but the fakir was game and didn't betray him. self by the flicker of an eyelid. The crowd was all agape, of course, and as the surgeon and l tore off the mans waistcoat and shirt the women cov- cred their eyes and groaned.
 "'Here goes, said the surgeon, at last, and, grasping the fellow on the !, table firmly by the throat, he ran the back of his knife quickly down the mans bare breast. At the first touch 1 of the cold steel the eyes of the corpse Jew wide open, and with a yell that ,ould be heard block he tore himself l rom the surgeons grasp and in two umps was out of the door and on a lead run for the East river.
 Seeing that the game was up, one of he fellows friends in the crowd con- essed at last that the saloonkeeper lad merely pushed him out of the door md that he had fallen down and pre- ended to be dead in the hope that he night be admitted to a hospital, where le would come to life and as soon as possible sue for heavy damages"
 4 Jealous Office Seeker.