The Morris County chronicle. [volume] (Morristown, N.J.) 1877-1915, 1910-06-14
HEIKE CONVICTED WITH
GERBRACHT OF FRAUD.
Found Guilty of Aiding Sugar Trust
to Cheat Government
AT e5 lie FACES TERM IN PRISON
Rendernagel. Once Cashier For Conn
pany, Escapes by Disagreement
of the Jurors After Deliberation
of Almost Twelve Hours.

New York City.=Charles r. Heike,
secretary and treasurer of the Sugar
Trust, and Ernst w. Gerbracht, for
mer superintendent of the trusts Wh-
liamsburg refinery, at a salary OF
$4,000 a year, were convicted OF
conspiracy to cheat the Federal Gov
eminent Of customs dues by sugar
underweighing frauds in the Criminal
Branch of the United States Circuit
Court. The jury disagreed in relation
to the guilt or innocence of James F..
Bendernagel, former cashier at the
Williamsburg refinery. On him the
jurors stood seven to five for acquit-
tai. 1t was his second trial, the jury
in the first one also having disagreed,
although it convicted others who were
tried with him.
Heike is convicted on only one of
the six counts in the indictment. Ger
bracht who had asserted his inno-
eence, and whose counsel had tried to
make it appear he merely was a sort
of errand boy for H. o.. Hayemeyer,
former autocratic head of the Sugar
Trust, was convicted on all six counts.
The jury was out eleven hours and
forty-six minutes before it found and
reported its verdict. No effort was
made by Judge Martin to force the
jurors to reach an agreement on Ben
dernagel. The court thanked the ju-
rors and discharged them. They had
been on duty almost four weeks.
The sixth count, on which Heike
was found guilty, asserts that he con-
spired with Oliver Splitter and others
in making and effecting, and aiding
in effecting, entries of dutiable raw
sugar at less than the true weights by
means of false and fraudulent state
ments as to those weights prior to
March 1, 1907.
Heike, Gerbracht and Bendernagel
were in the court room when the
jurors filed in. Their faces during
the trial often had been wreathed
with smiles. There we're no smiles
when the jury returned. All three
men gazed anxiously at the jurors as
they took their seats. Heike and
Gerbracht, who had been confident of
aequittal, were staggered. Bender
nagel, although not acquitted, showed
his pleasure at the disagreement 1t
had been conceded generally that If
he escaped the second trial the Gov
eminent would not put him in jeop-
ardy again.
If the court imposes on Heike the
maximum sentence he will be sent
to the Federal penitentiary in Atlanta
for two years and fine of $4,000
also will be imposed He is sixty-five
years old now, and John b. Stanch-
field, his counsel, told the jurors be-
fore they retired that If they con-
victed him they would practically be
sentencing him to prison for life.
Gerbracht can be sent away for
twelve years under the six counts on
which he was convicted. A fine of
$4,000 also may be imposed on each
of the first four counts, and a fine of
$4,000 on each of the two remaining
counts, or $4,000 in all. He is six
ty-three years old Close friends
have said that If he were sent to
prison he never would live to COM
plete his sentence, because at his age
his health would break and he would
lie in prison.