Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-03-22
100000 IN SECURITIES
Police Say That the Sack Was
Spotted All the Way From
New York.
MAIL WAS IN SPECIAL POUCHES
Way Bill Giving the Much Needed
List is Expected to Arrive
Tomorrow.
AL WAS IN SPECIAL POUCHES

The police IN Paris think that
there was collision in New York
and that the sack containing the
registered mail sack was spotted
from the start. 1t is even intimated
that one of the band of thieves
crossed on La Savoie and kept track
OF the one valuable sack among the
$500 sacks that were shipped or
that vessel from the time it left the
boat at Havre until it was unloaded
in Paris. No accurate estimate Of
the amount of securities is obtain
able on this side Their face value
is said,. however, to reach into the
millions. M. Synian, subsecretary
OF the post office, thinks that the
robbery was committed on board
La Savoie or at Havre. He be-
lieves the theft would have been i'm
possible without the completely Of
an American postal employee, who
must have marked the sack contain
ing registered mail SO that the rob-
Der could recognize it without
searching all the sacks.
PARIS March 22-That missing 100000
mail bag from New York was stolen by an
>fv
So much has been established by the au-
thorities here, chiefly through the confess
sion Of the man calling himself Butloss,
who was arrested while trying to negotiate
$4,000 Of American securities and could
give no satisfactory explanation of how he
come by them.
It is given out here that the French gov
eminent has ascertained that the greater
part Of the stolen securities are not nego-
table.
1t is also said to have been determined
that the sack was not stolen on board ship.
but after the steamers whole mail had
reached the railway station in Paris.
The first report that the mail was brought
by the French line steamship La Provence,
which left New York February %, and ar
rived at Havre March 6, was corrected yes
terday. The missing sack came with 1900
other bags, on the steamship La Savoie,
also of the French line, which sailed from
New York January II, and reached Havre
January q.
Post officials Statement.
A postal official here says:
1.-The discovery that a sack of registered
mail had been stolen was made on the ar
rival Of the rest of the mail here. AS the
total number of sacks received was correct
the authorities here cabled to the New York
post Office to ascertain whether there had
not been a mistake in the number Of regis
tered mail sacks. A reply was only re-
ceived last Saturday when the case was
turned over to the police with the result
that they captured man named Rousseau,
formerly brokers' clerk. but they did not
capture Butloss at that time.
LAS the principal part of the booty. with
the exception of the stocks, has been re-
covered and the longtime checks are not
negotiable the loss is comparatively
small
NEW YORK, March 22.-Several Wall
street banking houses figure among the
biggest losers by the 100000 mail bag rob-
berry between New York and Paris.
Postmaster Wilcox admitted yesterday
that the contents of an American registered
mail pouch, incased in regulation mail
Dag, had been stolen from the French line
steamship La Savoie on her trip from New
York to Havrc| during the week of jan
uary 1924 or within French territory.
What Postmaster Wilcox Says.
January H." explained Mr.. Wilcox,
"a registered pouch containing 1913 pack
ages left here with $500 bags of general
mail. When this mail reached France the
postal authorities there discovered that 125
of the 12S packages in it had been alb
stracted. We hold the French governments
receipt for 1900 packages and are satisfied
that the robbery took pace in French juris-
diction The fact that a cablegram states
that some person attempted to negotiate
American securities in Paris strengthens US
in that belief.
There are many unusual features In this
work of persons acquainted with the meth
DDS of handling foreign mail.
Il must decline to give the names Of the
big houses concerned in the robbery, but
will say that w all street lawyer informed
me that he had sent land deeds of enor-
nous value across on La Savoie, and that
they had never reached their destinati
The deeds, however, were not negotiable.
"a banking house in Wall street sent to
their Paris office securities to the value of
$75 900 which had not been delivered up to
my latest information"
The First Intimation.
The first intimation that there had been
q large robbery of registered matter from
the mails consigned to the french Line
steamship La Savoie, which sailed from this
port January II last, came to the local
postal authorities on February l. when
Goldman, Sachs & Co.. bankers. Of As Ex-
change place reported that securities val
ued at 100000 which had gone on that
ship had failed to reach their Paris cor
respondents. They asked Postmaster Will
cox what had become of them.
1t was not until two weeks later that the
French authorities sent word that a mail
pouch was missing. The notification from
the French postal authorities came in the
regular "buIlet.n of Irregularities" which