The Cairo bulletin., 1912-04-01
MOTOR CAR IS
BIG AID TO
PARIS CRIME
Thieves Use Fast Machines to E.
cape After Theits-- Snug
Cling on Increase

Paris, March 3l.-ihe lhotui cai
is becoming more and more an ac-
cessory to the criminal OF modern
Europe Just as in New York, so in
Paris and other cities OF the CONT
nent is the motor car employed TO
aid in Crime. Its chief attribute,
the means of immediate and speedy
escape after commission Of the rob-
berry. is what makes 1t alluring
to the criminal.
Within the last year, also, the
| motor car has developed as a sue
c2ssful accessory for the smuggler
between France and Belgium, Snug
Cling has long been going on at this
frontier, and tobacco, owing to the
high duties in France, has been the
principal OBJECT OF the smuggling
trade. The customs authorities on
the frontier ere professors in the art
Of meeting the wiles of the snug
vented by the smugglers. Thus one
day an entire funeral procession
hearse, with the coffin buried in
wreaths, acolytes with lighted cam
dies. weeping relatives and even al
clergyman. Wien the suspicious
authorities insisted upon examining
the hearse, they found in the coffin
not body, but several hundred
pounds of the best Belgian tobacco. |
The modern smuggler, however,
are criminals, mostly refugees from |
the French penal settlements, form
or convicts and desperate men who
are willing to take any risk. The
motor car has given them a means |
Of carrying on fraudulent operations
in a manner to defy the most acute |
Inspector. The phantom auto" as
II is called, has begun TO make its |
appearance in the thickly populated |
district enclosed in the three manu-
featuring towns OF Lille, Roubaix |
and Tourcoing. The smuggler's
car rushes across the frontier att
night, laden with tobacco, and |
speeds into France at the rate of |
sixty miles an hour, disappearing |
before the customs official has had |
q chance to stop it.
The customs officials admit that
they are almost powerless to stop |
these contraband automobiles.
Considering themselvts gravely |
prejudiced in the exercise of their |
profession, the Association of Grip
pies of France wish for official |
protection against the hordes of
sham blind, lame and paralytics who
usurp their alleged rightful priyi-
leges on the purses of the charitable.
Their president, NJ F. Rosin, and
NJ e. Sauvlgrain, former president
Of the Association of Blind Men of
Rheims, have waited on the Minister
Of Labor and submitted on behalf of
248 union" cripples, their state
ment of claim. The truly af1ict-
ed" as they style themselves, de-
mand the suppression of the FAX
err; they wish to put an end to the
exploitation of children hired out
for begging purposes; and they ask
for the expulsion of gypsies.
The consumption of absinthe in
France in recent years shows, &C
o-dng to the official report, "a
frightful increase" The report is
expected to hasten the campaign in
France for the total prohibition Of
It's manufacture and sale, after the
'ystcm in Switzerland, where alb
iinthe is entirely forbidden. Strange
Y enough. the drinking of absinthe
IS not chiefly ~ Paris, speaking
n a proportional sense, but In the
departments bordering the Mediter-
'anean Sea The so-called sober"
legion is found in the southwestern
| section of the cOutny,