Los Angeles herald., 1909-04-15
300 PER CENT
BROKER BROWN
UNDER ARREST
FUGITIVE IS CAPTURED BY P0-
LICE AT OAKLAND
coRPULENT OPERATOR OF BUCK.
EFT SHOP CAUGHT
Ascending swindIer Who Fled After
Being Exposed by Herald
Must Face Felony
Charges

TT d. BROWN, Hurry Harry"
II the 300 per cent broker, who
11s fed from Los Angeles March
16 after fleecing clients out of a sum
estimated at $25O,0O0, was arrested yes
terday by the Oakland police on tele-
graphic request of Chief Dishman. The
prisoner will be returned to Los An
geles on Saturday by Detectives Jones
and Boyd, who will leave for the north
on the Owl tonight to bring Brown
back.
The arrest of Brown was made on
three felony warrants issued by Justice
III. II. Rose, the first of which charges
Brown with the embezzlement OF $S0O0
from Nettie Il. Hammond and the sec
ond and third with passing on Joseph
Rittigstein two checks for $1,000 and
$1,000 respectively, both of which were
refused payment by the bank on which
they were drawn because the broker
had no money on deposit.
When the corpulent broker left Los
Angeles he was reported to have gone
to San Diego and from there to Tia
Juana, Mexico.
Herald Traces Him
Within a week after his disappear
ance The Herald secured information
which showed that Brown had gone
north, leaving Pasadena in an auto
mobile which transported him in a
roundabout way to San Francisco.
AS soon as confirmation of this evil
dence was secured the police began
search for him in the vicinity of San
Francisco. From Oakland Brown was
traced to San Francisco and then into
Mendocino county and from there to
Sacramento, Marysville, Red Bluff, An
tioch and Martinez. Here trace was
lost of him for a time, but he was
again heard of in Portland. Here, as
in each of the other towns, the officers
were always just a little behind Brown.
Seattle. Tacoma, Vancouver and all
other northern Pacific ports, including
San Francisco and Oakland, were
ticipated that Brown would endeavor
to escape across the Pacific.
For week nothing was heard OF
Brown. and then yesterday morning
Detectives Jones and Boyd secured the
information in Los Angeles that the
200 per cent broker was in or near
Oakland, and this information was at
once telegraphed to Chief of Police
Wilson of Oakland by Chief of Police
Dishman, and at o'clock reply was
received saying, "Your man is in jail.
Send and get him"
In tracing Brown and trying to learn
something of his past the information
was secured by the local police that
he was a former convict and known
to the police of every eastern city OF
Importance.
According to the. police, he was ar
rested twice in New York city on fell
pny charges and December IL, 1908, was
convicted of a charge of grand larceny
In New York and sentenced to Black
wells island prison. 1t was also learned
that he had been arrested in Chicago
In May, 1896, for passing bogus checks
and that his criminal record was con-
fined to no one city or state east or
the Mississippi river.
Exposed by Herald
March The Herald printed an ex-
pose of Browns get-rich-quick meth
DDS. wherein he made dupes of all who
came to him with money, but more
especially SO the Japanese laborers and
servants whom he caught with adver-
tisements inserted in Japanese news
papers promising to pay 6 per cent
weekly profits on each 500 intrusted
to his care for investment in the New
York stock market. Personally to his
callers he intimated that by reason or
his wide acquaintance with the affairs
of the New York stock market and
the assistance of associates there he
was enabled to secure inside informa-
tion as to the movement Of the mar
ket.
With the more intelligent clients who
were drawn into his handsome suite of
offices in the Union Trust building he
adopted different methods, but in the
long run they amounted to the same
thing--specious and glittering prom
lses of golden gains for practically
nothing.
Brown did not like the exposure of
his methods in The Herald and he
made demand for a retraction, March
T. The Herald followed with further
expose of his methods and made more
fully apparent the swindle.
Customers Suspicious
The long and waiting list of GUS
toners in the 300-per-cent profit estab-
iishment dwindled to almost nothing,
but there came steady and ever-in-
creasing line of investors who demand
ed their money back. To hundreds Of
them Brown paid interest on their
money at the rate of per cent week
In an effort to placate them, and he
sat back in bis big leather covered
chair and talked of damage suits and
libel suits, and what he was going to
do for the outrageous attack upon him.
To some few of his customers he paid
back the money he had taken from
them, in an effort to stem theN tide
setting against him, but finally he saw
that, in criminal parlance, the Zig
was up" and gathered together all his
loot and silently faded away.
But Brown intended to get back as
much as possible of the money he had
been compelled to return, and in the
final days he perpetrated the swindles
which brought him into police light.
March g. two days after the first ex-
pose was printed in The Herald, Brown
called on Joseph Rittigstein, jeweler,
with offices in the O. T. Johnson build
ing, and persuaded him to cash check
for $4,000. drawn on the City and Coun-
,ty bank. Brown, when Rittjgstein de-
INJURED at cashing check for so large
a sum. talked long and earnestly to
the jeweler and assured him that he
had funds on deposit at the bank, and
that the check was just as good as the
cash. and almost any one would be
glad to accommodate him with the
money. W
Rittigstein finally let Brown have
the money, and on the following Mon
dav when the broker called he again
succumbed to the Establishments and
parted with $1,000 worth of his stock of
tCoatinued on Page Fiye)