The L'Anse sentinel., 1908-01-18

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For many years Chicago has been
the Headquarters for the swindlers
and confidence men of the country.
Chicago being the great railroad and
distributing center OF the west.
strangers are drawn here In great
numbers and for many years they
have supported large class of men
who live by their wits. Because Of
the ease with which money IL obtain
Cd by various kinds of swindles the
swindler has fiourished In Chicago
despite the utmost vigilance and activ.
ity Of the officers Of the law both
state and federal. In devising
schemes, swindlers always have In
view two objects: First, obtaining
money for nothing; second, evading
the law. The ingenuity displayed by
these men IL often remarkable. Az
the attorney for one Of them. remark
ed after his client had been convicted:
IF that man had used the same in
genuity and persistence In legitimate
business that he has in inventing
swindles. he would now be . million
aire."
The evolution of the swindling
game during the last rs years is very
Interesting. Twenty-Five years ago
the swindler eked out q precarious
existence. His operations we're con-
fined to the shell-game. short-change.
fakebet, green goods. gold brick and
other similar schemes. Usually these
schemes were worked upon country
people and only small sums could be
obtained. They also lacked another
important feature of the modern
swindle In that there was no provision
for defense In court Swindlers who
worked these schemes depended upon
avoiding detection, but they could
make no defense to the scheme itself.
This was q dangerous and cumber-
some method of procedure and during
the last decade has been superseded
by the confidence game or scheme to
defraud In It's modern form.
In the '90s these schemes began
to exhibit some Of the elements of
their modern perfection. The method
adopted was to conduct the swindle
by an elaborate imitation Of business
methods. An example will show the
great advance that was made over the
old method. The man would open
an office and insert advertisements
in the papers stating that business
firm with q large capital wished men
to represent It In various states at
substantial salaries. This would at
tract scores Of men who would come
to the once. Each victim would be
told that he had all the qualifications
necessary to conduct the business and
would be offered . salary of two or
three thousand dollars Q year and
commissions, and would have some
state assigned to him. He would then
be told Il was necessary for him to
make a deposit Of two, three or five
hundred dollars. AZ the case might be.
and q contract, shrewdly drawn,
would be presented to him to sign.
He would pay his way to Cleveland or
Milwaukee Ohio and Wisconsin
we're the states they usually gave
where his employer would pay NO
more attention to him. When he
would return and demand his deposit
he would be shown The contract, vari-
Gus provisions Of which he had not
kept, and the money would not be
returned to him.
Another scheme was TO advertise
for sale partnership in an old and
established business. A Get Of fake
books, showing profits, would be pro-
duced for the inspection Of the vfc-
tim and he would pay $500 or $1,000
for new partnership. Some pre-
tense TO conduct the business would
be made, but soon the bnsiness would
fail and the victim would be out Of
his money. Schemes Of this kind were
conducted in great numbers In CHI
cago during the latter 'e0s and up into
the nrst few years Of the present
century, and millions Of dollars thus
obtained from the credulous.
There was weak point however.
In schemes Of this nature. When the
swindler was hailed into court S he
could show no effort to conduct : real
busipess. The defense was always
that this was not = crime but only =
failure to carry out Z contract: nut
the courts ho1l that . oontroct o(>de-
vie legal. Il used n oonne6tion vl1h
scheme - defraud, could Dot avo1l
- ~'7'.~- ~ ~. = !. & 4 4. n. ~ 4 i. ~ =.