The Washburn times. [volume] (Washburn, Wis.) 1896-1976, 1906-09-06
CRIMINALS NEVER CAUGHT.
How LaWbreakers Have Succeeded In
Evading the Police.

How Lawbreakers Have Succeeded In
Evadng the Police.
The Oxford street doctor" who
while ostensibly conducting a legiti-
mate business, yet maintained the
closest relationship with the elite Of
rascaldom, assisting them with his
advice and financing and engineering
their most promising schemes, might
have posed as a veritable double of
the man who so nearly foiled the re-
doubtable Sherlock Holmes.
True, Bridgewater, has met with his
deserts at last and is now undergo
ing we'll deserved term Of penal
servitude. But his conviction was due
to series of (for him) unlucky coin
cidences, such as no intelligence, how
ever keen, could hope to guard
against or circumvent. And, besides,
there are others, keener and cleverer
even than he, says the London Tit
Bits who have f1outed the police all
their lives through and have died
rich and respected in the end, with
out having had solitary conviction
recorded against them, although their
crimes have been manifold.
Sir Robert Anderson, K. G. B., late
chief of the criminal investigation de-
partment, Scotland Yard, who was in
terviewed by the writer, laid particu-
lar emphasis upon one such-the In
dividual responsible for the theft OF
Gainsborough's picture of Georgiana,
Duchess of Devonshire, and its sensa-
tional restoration aftersa lapse OF
more than 20 years.
"That man." said Sir Robert, civ
ed in bigger and finer house than
the one l now occupy. He was better
off financially than l ever was, or am
ever likely to be. Yet he simply re-
yelled in robbery. 1t was his profess
sion, you see. He had embraced it
as other men embrace the army as q
profession, or the law, or the church.
He took genuine pride in it. And he
made it pay from every point of view,
save only the moral one.'
Further investigation revealed the
existence of other master criminals
of a. like type. One of them-he is
well known to the police, who, how
ever, can do nothing for lack of the
necessary proofs-is an individual
who, some few years back, conceived
certain diabolical scheme which had
for it's object the decoydng abroad OF
rich Englishmen and numbering them
there for the sake of their money and
valuables. This dangerous desperate
resides at this present moment in an
elegant suite Of bachelor chambers not
fer from Hyde Park, and can be met
with nightly at "swagger" West End
bars as well as at other and more
questionable resorts in the same neigh.
! borhood.
He never commits crime himself.
but is ever ready with advice and
money for the encouragement of those
who do commit them. He is liberal,
too, and straight" from his own
point Of view, and for this reason
probably not one Of the human tools
he uses so freely has so far presumed
to round on" him.
Once, however, the police thought
they had him. It was when a noto-
rious jewel thief was being tried at
the Central Criminal Court for the
theft of duchess's jewels. Scotland
Yard knew perfectly well that this
man had been financed in his enter
prise by the individual in question,
who had also disposed, through his
agents, of the bulk Of the stolen prom
erty. A,word from the prisoner would
have sufficed, and he would then have
got Off with nominal nine months
or so. That word, however, he re-
fused to speak, and was consequently
s'sent down" for seven years. This
was in 1899. He was released in the
spring OF 1905, went straight from the
prison to his banker" and confeder-
ate, and received from him in hard
cash the sum of s. 1000, with a prom
Use, afterward faithfully kept, Of more
to follow
Of different type of the above
but equally difficult to catch, is the
master criminal who, while keeping
carefully in the background, devotes
all his energies to the furtherance
and fostering of some particular
branch of rascality. Concerning one
such the writer gathered some inter
eStiing particulars in the cnurso ~