Los Angeles herald., 1909-07-10
CRIMINALS UNFINISHED

IN THE opinion of good citizens who
are opposed to law breaking and
desire to see law breakers punished
no more regrettable occurrence has
ever transpired in the city than that
which appears to have permitted the
escape unpunished of lot of criminals
who had to do with the preparing of
the petitions recently filed for an ex-
tension of the wholesale license zone.
An investigation of this matter, as
reported in the news columns of The
Herald yesterday, shows that there
were three distinct classes of law vio-
lation involved:
First-Forgery of names to the petit
tions.
Seoond-The perjury committed by
parties who swore to the correctness
of sections of the petitions containing
forged names.
Third-It appears that in several in
stances notaries certified to the oaths
of parties to the petitions where the
affiants did not appear before them
personally and no oaths were admin
istered.
There were several crimes of each
of these three classes committed in
connection with this petition, and at
least two classes of these crimes were
felonies.
In addition to the punishment of fine
and Imprisonment which the law pro-
vides for false certification of the af-
fidavit by the notary, 1t also involves
the loss by the notary of his commits
sion, which would have been a most
deserved and appropriate punishment.
The statements of officials who had
the handling of these petitions under
their control are so much at variance
that it appears impossible to fix the
tion, very grave dereliction of duty
on the part of one or more persons.
OF course, Captain Fredericks' state
ment that the prosecution of these
crimes was not a matter for the dis
trict attorney, but for the city attor-
ney, is all bosh. The city attorney
cannot prosecute for a felony and can
only prosecute certain misdemeanors.
At the same time, Captain Fredericks
does appear to have a very good ex-
cuse for non-action on his part in the
fact that the attention of his office
was not called to these palpable and
grave violations Of the law.
The failure to bring the matter be-
fore the district attorney while the evi-
dence of the crimes was in their pos
session is the point at which the Sc
rious error was committed by some
one or more Of the city officials. BY
just whom, 1t now appears impossible
to say.
The crime of perjury is one of the
gravest known to the criminal calen-
dar, because it involves a direct attack
upon the administration of the law,
and, If permitted to go unpunished,
tends to bring the whole system of the
law as we'll as its administration into
contempt.
Horse stealing is a comparatively
harmless pastime as compared with the
crime of perjury, which appears to
have been committed In a number OF
instances in connection with these pc
titions.
One good which The Herald hopes
will come out Of the investigation of
this regrettable affair that it has con-
Quoted Is that hereafter when petit
tions Of this kind are filed with the city
clerk they will be carefully scanned,
and any one in charge of them will
promptly report to the proper officials
any evidences Of crime in the prepara-
ton of these petitions which he may
discover.
Furthermore, The Herald proposes
upon its part, to pay some attention to
petitions OF this character in the fu-
ture and it will make it It's duty to
see that such criminal acts as charac-
terized the preparation of the last one
shall not again go unpunished.