The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1906-04-02
CUT OFF BONDSMEN'S PROFITS.
NELSON'S COLLECTOR JUDGED
WHILE WOMEN GO FREE.
Magistrate steinerts New 4 TO Stop
Professional Bal-Two Courts Busy
with Woe RAids-Blaok Men ana
white Women Again I'm spriggs's Den.

FTOlC9dlUuu 10
With Woe Raids-Black Men and
white Women Again I'm FprigBs's Den.
Professional Bondsman Sailor Flam OF
1853 West Thirty-frst street, who got into
trouble with Magistrate Stelnert last week
and who said at the time that he was merely
an agent for Bob Nelson, the Tenderloin
saloon keeper. got o bad setback yesterday
at the Jefferson Market police court.
Detectives Roy and Brosrnan OF tho Ten
derloin station had In court twenty-five
women whom they had arrested In various
houses and on the street. just as these
women wee about to be arraigned Magis-
trate Steinert was told that Flam was out
side the court again collecting bail money.
Bring him in said the Court. a. We
won't lot any Of these women 60 until he
Is here
Sergt. Farrell and a court policeman
went outside and informed Flam that the
Magistrate wanted to see him Flam
went inside and remained In q back room
during the rest Of the proceedings.
In tho meantime the women were ar
raigned one at q time. Each was asked
IL she had given bail and il she had to pay
for IL. They all said they had been bailed
out and we're TO pay IS to the bondsman.
"We have found out said the Court to
the women, that the bonds you gave were
no good. The bondsman cannot get any
money from you, therefore, and he has
no one outside to collect the money. l
am going to discharge you. but don't you
pay any one a cent for that bond
The women left court in a happy frame
OF mind.
Finally Flam was brought out and re-
leased. AS he started through the gate
former Magistrate Wentworth, who had
been retained to look after Flam's interests,
called him back.
DO you want to go?' he asked.
"Surel" was the reply.
"Are you content to go without being
a~rraigned?'
Yes said Flam. only too glad to. get
out in any way.
After Flam had left. Mr.. Wentworth said
that Flam had virtually been under arrest
by the courts order.
in consenting to leave without an ar
raienment," said Mr.. Wentworth, she adj
mits that he came here voluntarily and
hence can have no case against the court,
/ know. because | was the defendant IN
Just such q suit
Magistrate Steinert said he was doing
and expected to continue to do all he could
to break up the system of professional
bonding.
Il may step outside the letter Of the law"
said the Court, but | believe the moral
sentiment Of this community will he be-
hind a ma gistrate who tries to do his duty
as he sees it. Every one has to cut a
Gordian knot at some time or other
Thomas Phalen, from Sheepshead Bay,
was complainant in this court against
Caroline Mcmillan and Annie Bryan, two
white women. and George Dahomey. a
colored man, all Of whom were arrested by
Policemen Haynes and Farley of the Ten
derloin station in Bob Spriggs's old house
on Sixth avenue on Saturday night,
Phalen said he went to the place with a
woman he met on the street. While in the
house he was robbed of 81 80. He saw
these two white women md two negroes.
When he left the house ne began excitedly
to tell passersby about the place. A crowd
raided the house on the strength Of Phalen's
story. One of the negroes got away.
Phaien said it was not the lose of the $3.50
that excited him but the sight of white
women with negro men.
When the prisoners had been taken to the
station house, Caroline Mcmillan. after
considerable questioning, said she had been
living with Dahomey for two years, volln-
tarily. When asked if she had ever been
threatened she said NO. in a very hesitating
manner. Annie Bryan told a similar story
about the other negro who escaped. The
police said that from the way the women
answered their questions II looked as II they
might have been kept in Spriggs's place
against their will and were afraid to say so.
The police asked in court for time to go
deeper into the affair and the case was adj
journed for forty-eight hours. Both
women were held as witnesses, Dahomey
was held on a technical charge of tntoxt-
cation and Phalen was also detained as a
witness.
When Cassie Montgomery and Alice
Wallace were arraigned in the West Side
court for inviting two detectives into their
apartments In a West Si1ty-siXth street
tenement house they were weeping bitterly,
and al once aroused the interest Of Ma gis-
trate Wahle. When they pleaded guilty
to an offence for which the penalty is six
months in the workhouse he was mystified,
and asked his probation officer, Miss
McQuaide, to talk with the women before
he accepted their plea.
The Magistrate then learned that Ernest
Mont gomery and John c. Wallace, the
women's husbands, were in court. He
called them before him. Mont gomery,
who said that he was a union printer on
strike since January ?. declared that he
didn't know what his wife had been doing.
Mont gomery said that he was also sur
prised. He produced a marriag e certificate
dated March 20.
Detective Murtha told the NJ Magistrate
that both men we're in the kitchen Of their
fat when the women were arrested He
aid that he saw Montgomery's maria ge
certificate hanging up on the wall,
Montgomery and Wallace were both
charged with being Migrants. and were
held in $500 bail for examination this after
noon, when the Magistrate will hear the
story of the women.
sThere goes a Gerdron who will be we'll
taken care Of for at least six months said
Magistrate Wahle a few minutes later,
when he sent Harry Braun Of 225 West
Fifty-ffth street to the island for six
months.
Braun had been arrested for beating
Bessie Taylor, who said that she left Phila-
delphia last year to escape him. Braun
followed her here, she said, and had COM
PEELED her TO give him money every week.
While Inspector Schmittberger was walk