The Montgomery advertiser., 1906-05-12
PERSONATEDOFFICER
4. R. BROWN ACCUSED OF COLLECT.
 ING LICENSE FEES.
Young Man Held At Police station Said To Have Prncticed System-
 atic Frauds In Montgomery County.

Suspected of being implicated in liz
 cense frauds, which have been practic-
 ed In Montgomery. and Montgomery Brown was arrested by Day Sergeant
 Oscar McDade and Bicycle Patrolman Harry Evans at II o'clock yesterday [, morning and is being held at the po- | lice station to await developments. 4Further than the positive identifica- ton by n. S. Clarke. merchant of Bell street. who alleges that Brown att him, there was nothing else at late hour last night on which to hold Brown.
 For some time reports have reached department, that one or probably more white men were .fmpersonating an off,
 cer.- and. In representing themselves to
 be a license, collector, had illegally ta- keepers. and had attempted the fraud on several others. The stranger, or
 strangers. represented that he was a license collector and was collecting H. cense for the county. It was in the office of the probate judge that the frauds were first discovered
 ,, In one instance. ss was collect collected gI ocery store on the Carter Hill Road just inside the city limits, and at an- other time. about the same amount was collected from Mrs. Katherine E. IIo gan. who conducts a grocery store at 101 Madison Avenue. As far as was known last night. these were the only collections made. but 1t Is expected that. with this publication. others will be brought to light.
 Attempts were made to collect license from a number of persons including D. s. Clark. a grocer of Bell Street. West End and Lucy Garrett, negress who conducts restaurant on Lee Street.
 As matter of fact the county has no license collector and anyone represent n ht,,,Ealf ta frat
 The sheriff's force and the police
 have been at work on the case for some
 time, and. before making an arrest, they endeavored to have positive iden-
 tification of the person.
 Brown was arrested in the city pas-
 ture near Cypress Pond and. on being taken to police headquarters, he gave his age at B years, said he was a painter and had been at work in Mont gomery about three weeks. He em- phatfcally denied any knowledge of the felony of which he is suspected. He said he was a native of New York. Brown is below the average height though he is well built. He Is clean | shaven, has sandy hair and when ar-
 rested, was wearing a derby hat. As soon as Brown was taken into custody, MT. Clark was summoned to
 the police station. He positively iden-
 tified Brown as the man who attempt ed to collect a county license from him. Early last night, the. negro, Joe" went to the police station, saw the white nan in his cell, but wavered as to the identity of the man. He was rather inclined to believe that Brown
 was not the man who collected the mon- ey from him.
 Mrs. Hogan was asked by the police to go to the station to see the man
 but she declined to go yesterday say
 ing that she would probably go to the
 station today.
 It Is believed that there was more than one person implicated in the frauds and a determined effort is be- ing made to find the remaining viola tors