The San Francisco call., 1898-06-23
FLEECED BY 4
 CLEVER ROGUE Timber Land SWindIe in
 the North.
SHASTA AND TRINITY BITTEN
MANY VICTIMS OF A PLAUSIBLE
 SCHEME.
The Sharper Cleans Up About S5O0o From Speculators in the Two Counties and Suddenly
 Disappears.
Special Dispatch to The Call.

BEDDING, June 22.-For the past two months man named William Woods, representing himself as the agent of a Scotch syndicate, has been quietly at work in Trinity and Shasta counties inducing people to locate tim Der claims in the Trinity Center region Of Trinity County. He made Reddins his Headquarters, and succeeded in rop- Ing in over 100 locators to exercise theil timber rights on the representation that he, as agent for the syndicate would advance the necessary money with which to prove up and then take their locations off their hands at a con- siderable advance over the Government price.
 Monday was the day set for the first lot of locators to appear at the Red ding Land Office and prove up on their claims, and their failure to so prove up brought to the surface the details of one of the biggest land swindles ever attempted in Northern California.
 William Woods, the promoter or agent of the alleged syndicate, is a man well along in years, probably 55 or 50 years old, although at first blush he would be. taken to be considerably younger, as he keeps both his hair and mustache dyed. He took rooms with a private family, and then began in a quiet way to circulate among the peo- pie. Posing as the agent of a Scotch syndicate with millions behind it, he caused it to be known that his people were bent on securing thousands of acres of sugar-pine land in the virgin
 
 The man selected as a victim would be approached with an offer of all the way from $1O0 up to $350 for his timber right. It was represented that the sym dicate had $5,000,000 behind it and that there was $S0,000 on deposit in the Bank of Shasta County to be drawn on for preliminary expenses. Many people who had not exhausted their timber rights snapped up his alluring proposi- tlon. The schemer charged $35 for To- eating each victim. There was a further charge of S1 50 for having the neces- sary papers made out and S10 for pub ication fee. This made a total pre- liminary outlay of $46 50 for each vic tim.
 The schemer asserted that in the fall hundreds of other locations would be made and that newspaper would be immediately established in Weaverville to control the immense profits arising from the wholesale publication of the timber land notices. The Trinity Jour nal and the Dunsmuir News and Her. aid are all three full of these publica- tions, many of which will never yield a dollar A railroad was going to be built into the pine lands and sawmills and box factories would be established. The credulity of certain people was preyed upon to such an extent that many made up their minds to pull up stakes here and move to the scene of the operations of the syndicate
 On the 17th instant, three days before the first proofs were to be made in the land office, Woods packed up his be- longings and l it for pastures new. He has not been seen or heard of since. The people victimiZed have no recourse at law as by agreeing in advance to transfer their locations is an infraction of Federal law. The amount, as far as heard from, which the schooner cleaned up from his project is S3500 and it may yet reach a total of S5000