New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1902-12-07
SCHEMES TO DEFRAUD INSURANCE COMPANIES.
DRAMATIC AND GREWSOME STORIES OF CONSFIRA CLES
TO RECOVER LIFE LNSU-RAA CE FUNDS-THE
CRIMINALS USUALLY CAUGHT

Life Insurance Company and check for $1,000
ready to be delivered to her by the <Etna Life
Insurance Company, but when the guilty pair went
to collect the insurance of $50 In Mutual Life
Insurance Company some questions which were
asked led to suspicion that all not right,
and the evasive answers of the bogus widow led
investigation, which disclosed the whole
plot. AS Meyer and his wife discovered
that they were suspected. they separated and dis
appeared
The body of Brandt was exhumed, and was dis
covered to be full of poison, and after several
months Meyer was arrested in Detroit, through the
efforts of the insurance companies and brought to
New-York for trial He had been in prison
twice before at least, and probably the number
of his crimes will never be known unless he him
self reveals them 1t appeared on trial, however
that he had killed at least seven persons and
three others had escaped after he had begun
poisoning them by slow degrees
An older that terminated dramatically
without any of the unpleasant details of most
fraudulent insurance schemes is recorded in the
courts of Beloit Wis. In the fall of 1866 John H.
Sergeant secured policy of insurance in ac-
cident insurance company in the of 5000, and
on the same day he married by a minister in
Beloit to a woman who with him TO Beloit.
the clergyman's wife and daughter and woman
friend in the house acting as witnesses to the
ceremony. Sergeant secured the policy directly
after his marriage. and had 1t made payable TO
his wife.
The newly welded couple LETT town and were
not heard from again until about a month later
when the people in the village We're informed by
Henry j. Allen, Samuel A. Corwin and Emanuel
Hill that Sergeant had been skating with Corwin
on the Pecatonica River in the afternoon of De-
cember Is, and had fallen through airhole and
disappeared under the ice. Search was made for
the body. and continued for two three days by
large number of citizens, but no trace of the body
could be found. The proofs of the death of Sar-
geant were sent by the widow TO the insurance
company. and the 5000 insurance money was
claimed. The insurance agents made an investiga-
ton and came to the conclusion that Sergeant had
been really drowned and that there was nothing
wrong about the
One Of the companys inspectors, however,
learned that all Of the parties interested were OF
rather bad reputation and decided to contest the
payment Of the money In order to gain time for
further investigation. Several circumstances led
TO the conclusion that Henry j. Allen the one who
had given the first news of the death of Sar-
geant, was, in fact, Sergeant. In the first
| place. some of Aliens handwriting was secured
and 1T was found to correspond exactly with that
or the signature Of Sergeant the hotel register
at the hotel where he remained when he came to
Beloit first The signature of Sergeant who gave
his name as J. H. Sergeant appeared on the hotel
/ register as H. ]. Sergeant. instead of j. II The
Initials of Allen were II. J.. j. II This coupled
with the belief that it would be almost impossible
! Tor a man to make mistake in signing his own
name. led to further investigation.