The Hawaiian gazette. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu, Hawaii]) 1865-1918, 1905-12-29
WILL CLEAN
THE TOWN

Honolulu is TO be rid OF a number OF
sure thing" men who are known to
have been operating here for some time
past That is, If the plans of the
County Attorneys department work
out as il is intended they should.
For some time past the department
has had a number of suspected char
acters under surveillance and sufficient
information and evidence has been OBJ
tanned concerning the modus vivendi of
certain individuals about town, to war
rant their arrest on charges of va
grancy or worse.
One by one the gentry in question
have dropped into town. One came on
an army transport; another in the
stewards department of a liner, and
J yet another blew in the price of
steerage ticket from the Golden Gate
to Honolulu, taking the chance of find
ing the grass as long here as he had
heard was the case, in Frisco.
Honolulu appears to have suited
these doubtful acquisitions to her popu
lation to a nicely. They have clothed
themselves in fine raiment, have en-
joyed a sufficiency of spending money
and have lived on the fat of the land.
And yet not a single one has been
known to do stroke of work since ar
irving on these balmy shores.
To the ordinary everyday, regular
eating-and-sleeping citizen, these NICE
smooth-appearing, hail-fellow-well- met
young men are probably unknown
Those who work in the silent watches
of the night are acquainted with them
and their devious ways, however,
though just what their graft has been
has not been allowed, until quite re-
Gently. to transpire.
The County Attorneys department
has for some time past been striving
to elucidate the problem of how fine
raiment and good meals could be OBJ
tanned in town without some toiling or
spinning having been done, with the
result that an active crusade against
suspicious characters has been COM
lmenced and will be kept up until Ho-
nolulu is rid of this class of undesir-
ables.
! I'VE have had the matter in hand
for some time" said County Attorney
Douthitt, yesterday, "and have come
TO the conclusion that the town is har-
boring a lot of bad characters that it
can well afford to be without. We in
tend to make IL so hot for them here
that the town won't hold them and I
expect within a month to have got rid
of the entire bunch. If nothing else
can be traced TO them they viii be
charged with vagrancy and given the
option Of shipping away from here by
the first boat or doing n term on the
reef"
The first arrest to be made was that
OF Leon Kissler, who was run in on
Monday night and held for investiga-
ton, in company with a room mate
who has since been released. Kissler
VIII appear before Judge Whitney this
morning to answer to charge of
vagrancy
Kissler is fellow OF excellent ad
dress and good appearance. He has
been knocking about Honolulu for
month past representing himself as
half a dozen different things to as
many different persons, borrowing a
dollar on the strength of a chance ac-
quaintance and doing other things.
The last thing he did was to Dispens-
ing Clerk Serber of the u. S. trans
port Buford Serber alleges that on
Christmas night ne met Kissler and at
the latter's invitation accompanied him
TO his rooms at the back of the Pacific
hotel on Union street. There he was
given drink of whiskey and states
that the next thing he remembered was
coming TO in the room with his pockets
inside out and relieved of twenty odd
dollars.
| Hardly had he regained his senses
when another man came into the room
and threatened 10 knock his head off
If he didn't clear out pretty promptly.
Serber cleared. He went to the CEN
trail fire station and rang for a police
man who was dispatched to the spot.
The house was visited and Kissler and
his friend found hiding. They were ar
rested and taken TO the police station.
kissler was searched and I'm his pos
session was found a stock certificate
OF the Hygia Soda Company, a Maui
corporation. 1t represented a block of
stock and his name was filed In, in
dicating that he was the owner of the
shares. How he obtained the certif-
| cate Is not known, but IL is thought
that his plan was to borrow money on
the strength OF II, II possible.