The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1906-01-18
he SOLD PASSES.
Carl A. Reeder, Santa Fe Office
EmpIOye, Under Arrest.
Forged Names of Officials to
Orders For Transportation.
SCALPERs GOT THEM.
They Had All Been Issued to
Fictitious Persons.
Young Man Arrested in Iowa
and Brought to Topeka.

]
Carl A. Reeder, Topeka young
man Of good parentage and who stood
| high among his associates, is in the
county Jail
Reeder. who is 21 years old, has
/ been employed in the general offices
of the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe
Railway company. He secured a num-
Der Of passes for fictitious persons and
sold them to ticket sca1pers. Just the
/ extent of his operations have not been
ascertained as yet by the officers of
the, company but they have been con-
siderable. He will be prosecuted on
charge of obtaining money under false
pretenses.
Young Reeder has not been in the
/ employ of the company for two
months, having been discharged from
the office of chief engineer for misbe-
having himself and not paying proper
attention to his duties. His discharge
was in no way connected with the
charge on which he has been arrested
/ but it was through his position in the
4 engineers office that he was able to
obtain the passes which he sold. He
/ was given a minor clerkship in the Of
flee about six months ago, going to
that department from the offices of the
general superintendent where he had
ben employed as a messenger and Of
fee boy for about a year. His duties
in the engineers office comprised those
of messenger as well as other things
and he was the empl0ye in the office
who was sent to the general manager s
office with acquisitions for passes. He
also had the clerical duty of filling out
some of the requisitiOn blanks for
passes on requests which We're made
for them on the engineers office.
All of these acquisitions had to be
signed by W. B. Storey, jr. chief en-
gineer, or his chief clerk, r. L. Coch-
ran, who was delegated with that au-
| thority before they We're presented tC
the general managers office for the
. / passes Mr. Cochran generally attend
. ed to this matter.
It turns out that Reeder had beer
in the habit, when requests on the en-
gineerss office for passes were given tg
him for the purpose of filling out the
requisition blanks, of filling out one
or more additional acquisitions fOl
! fictitious persons. He would slip these
= in with the legitimate ones and they
7 would be countersigned quite natural
~ by Chief Clerk Cochran, as Reedel
was trusted. Reeder would get passes
= on these fake acquisitions, which ap
= peared to be as regular as any of the
others, from the general managers
, office and then sell them to ticke
scalpers.
Discovery of this irregularity in the
+ issuing of passes resulted from the
: fact that gents of the Santa Fe founC
number of passes on sale in ticke
f brokers' offices in Kansas City. H. H
German, special agent of the com
- pany, began an inVeStigat ton of these
! passes and started to trace them tC
the men to whom they had been ISSUED
/ and who had presumably sold them
! None of these men could be found
very naturally, as they had been iSSueC
( was IA
all of these passes had been made out
on acquisitions from the engineer's
Office, and it was not long then before
, Reeder'S methods of operation Were
discovered. He was not then in the
; employ of the engineers office. having
l been discharged, as stated for othel
L reasons.
= Mr.. Germain succeeded in working
= up d specific case against Reeder, tht
instance being a pass from Kansas
City to Chicago and return made Ou
n 1 to one c. T. Jett. The requlsItiOI
- blank was filled out to the effect tina
- "Jett" was employed by a contractor
= doing work for the company at Argen
It tine This pass was secured by Reede
on July 26 last. With two othe
z passes of the same nature it was SOLE
o by Reeder to brokers for S14, which i
S less than One-quarter of the value o
= the transportation called for by tn
F. passes.
- When the case had been worked III
had left town. He first went to Her
= ington and later to Cedar Rapids
s. Iowa. where he secured a position wit
p the Northwestern railroad Mr. Ger
= main filed his Information of Reeder'
v operations with County Attorney Hun
e gate and the latter a few days ago is
sued a warrant for the boys arres
p charging him with obtaining none
1t under false pretenses. This Warrant
a with the necessary requisition papers
o were turned over to Mr.. Germans as
e sistant, f. J. Price. He arreste
Reeder at Cedar Rapids. Iowa, yes
V terday and arrived here with him jus
st before noon today. Reeder was lock
t ed up in the Jail and will be arraigne
a later in the city court. He is said t
have admitted to Mr. German that h
E. was guilty of obtaining the passes i
} the way described.
Reeder is the son of James NJ. Reed
er an insurance agent, whose home
at No. 1414 Harrison street. He wa
l. one of the well known young fellow
= around town and had many friend
le with whom he was popular. He ha
rt borne a good reputation and was we
le liked by his superiors in the Santa T
l. offices. He was captain of last year
Santa Fe baseball team, which We
e made up the younger clerks in tn
s. general Offices. and which made quit
~ a record last season among the ana
teur teams in this vicinity
J. KENNEDY PROMOTED.