The San Francisco call., 1909-09-16
Imperial Valley Trials Connect
ed by Many Angles With
Ballinger-1o -1oinchot Row
WEALTHY MEN INVOLVED
in ALLEGED SWINDLES
Plan to Defraud ldoyernment
and Innocent Purchasers
Is Charged
Especial Dispatch 10 The Calll

OS ANGELES, Sept. 15.-1n-
l terest in the Imperial valley
- land fraud cases, in which four
prominent land owners of the val
ley are being prosecuted on charges
of conspiring to defraud the govern
ment of land, will be revived in Los
Angeles tomorrow with the return
of Assistant Attorney General Oscar
Lawler, fresh from a conference with
President Taft at Beverly. Lawler
will take up the work of prosecuting
the cases.
Attorneys for the defense declare
that the case will have an important
bearing on the now famous Ballin-
ger-Pinchot controversy. They as
sert that Lawler's business at present
is to throw every possible favorable
light on the Ballinger administration
and that his unusual interest IN the
case, leading him SO far as to come
to Los Angeles at this time to prose-
cute instead OF turning the cases over
to his successor. A. /. Mccormick, is
due to his desire to make it appear
a Ballinger administration policy to
push the cases. That President Taft
will be here while the cases are being
concluded. as the fight will be long
and bitter one, is also called as pos
sible reason for LAWYERS presence
Bitter Fight Involved
1t is certain that the trial will bring
to a head the bitter fight between Sigel
Skinner, a land lawyer and contestor,
group of influential men of the val
ley, of whom the four accused of land
frauds are representative, and the gen.
eral public of the valley.
The men accused are Frank N. and
David Chaplin, Paul McPherrin and Ar
thur Kemper. The latter are named
in the indictments as conspirators.
But it is admitted that their part
was only that of witnesses, employed
as attorneys for the California devel-
opment company, and by that corpora
tion directed to aid the Chapiins and
others in making required proof as to
the IeCldIHdtlOH VI CcI l<1Ah idhuos hO
men the government attorneys are
attempting to get are the two Chap
Inns.
ChaplinS Are Indicted
The indictments on which these two
men are to have their hearings before
the United States court in the Tajo
building, beginning September 90. were
returned last winter. They charge that
~ vH NJ
made a deliberate and fraudulent at
tempt to induce citizens to f1le' entries
on desert land in the Imperial valley,
and that the land was later to be as
signed to the ChapIins. Similar indict-
ments were returned at the same time
against several other wealthy men OF
the valley.
The conviction grows daily here that
there are a number of different angles
to the case, connecting it with the
Ballinger -Pinchot affair. It is declared
that LAWYERS principal business for
the last few weeks has been to justify
Secretary of the Interior Ballinger in
his attack on Clifford Pfnchot.
Makes Contracts
1t is alleged attorneys for the de-
fense in the Chaplin case and by scores
of residents OF the valley that Skinner
has made a large sum Of money by dis
covering flaws in filings and making
successful contests. His method is to
secure compromise with entrymen who
are threatened or else to sell to a third
party his own lawful privilege, as a
successful contestor, to the prior right
of fling on the forfeited piece
This novel method of making iiv-
ing might never have been exposed
had it not been that a former partner
and collaboration of Skinner. rancher
named Clark oxford, fell out with the
expert and, in a number of afidavits
made public in the valley this spring.
laid bare the whole system
Shirley G.. Ward, counsel for the ac-
cused man. openly declares that Skin
ner has received unusual favors at the
hands of the registrar of the land Office
in Los Angeles. Frank c. Prescott, and
that it was through the friendship of
Skinner and Prescott that the matter
was brought to the attention of Oscar
Lawler. then district attorney for the
government in this district
Under this method the two. brothers
really made thir money, disposing of
large blocks of water stock in their
possession. When the California De-
velopment company built canals and
opened the valley for settlement and
reclamation it issued stock with which
to raise necessary money for construc-
tfon and maintenance-each share of
stock emitting the owner to the use of
sufncient water to irrigate one acre OF
land.