The Julesburg grit-advocate., 1908-06-26
FORTUNE FOUND
IN MAIL SACK
RECOVERY OF LOST MAIL SACK
WITH PART OF ITS CON-
TENTS.
MONEY is MISSING
ONE HUNDRED DOLLARS WORTH
OF DIAMONDS AND JEWELRY
WERE TAKEN.

Kansas City, Mo.-The registered
mail pouch which contained $4,000 in
money and 100000 worth of da-
monds and jewelry, stolen from a mail
car at the union station here on the
night of June 9th, was found Monday
afternoon by a switching crew in the
yard of the Rock Island railroad in
Kansas City, Kansas. The pouch still
contained number of valuable arti.
cles OF jewelry, but four empty envel-
opes, which had contained the fifty
thousand dollars in money. showed
that the thief had made good on the
smaller part of his haul.
The theft of the mail pouch was
highly mysterious. The pouch was
consigned from Los Angeles to New
YORK City, and contained, in addition
TO the valuable diamonds and jewelry,
$4,000, which was being sent to
New York bank. Receipts were shown
for it all the way from Los Angeles to
Kansas City. where the pouch was lost
sight OF. Government agents from
Washington were hurried here, and
one of the most extensive searches
ever made by the department has
been conducted.
The case of the stolen pouch was
made still more notable by the fact
that the thief slipped through the
hands of the Kansas City police force
Early on the morning of June detec-
tives arrested negro lettering in I'm
ion avenue, near the Union station.
He was taken to police station and
booked for investigation. The desk
sergeant, when searching the negro,
took $4,000 worth of jewelry from his
person and $500 or $500 in currency.
Shortly after being locked up the ne
gro sent for an influential attorney of
Kansas City and told him that he
would give him 5000 if he was freed
in Police Court in the morning. The
attorney had the charge changed from
investigation" to 'vagrancy," and the
next day there being no other charge
against him, he was ordered to leave
town.
Two days later the federal authori-
ties issued photographs of a negro
known as Charles Stephenson, and un-
der various aliases. The picture
proved to be an exact likeness of the
negro. Federal authorities immediate
ly struck the negro's trail, and traced
him to Denver where the search was
apparently dropped. A reward of
$4,000 has been offered by the govern
ment for his arrest.
Postoffice officials refuse to di-
vulge the value of the iewelry recov-
cred, but it is believed that almost all
of the original -hpment was intact in
the pouch.
The pouch was found in patch of
weeds near where from ten to twenty
switch engines pass each day. Rail-
road men say that for several days
crews have spoken of that white
patch of something" and it became
rather a joke among the swtchmen
Monday, while his train was passing.
L. Louth, switchman, jumped off and
investigated. The envelopes cut, ap-
parently by paper knife in a very
neat way, lay in a stack by themselves
The pouch was some feet distant, and
when Louth began to rummage in it
he extracted number of packages un-
opened and untouched. 1t was ap-
parent that the negro was unaware of
the value of the stuff he overlooked.
The unopened packages were immedi-
ately handed over to the federal au-
thorities.