The Columbia herald. [volume] (Columbia, Tenn.) 18??-1935, 1913-01-31
STAMP FRAUDS ARE
UNEARTHEO BY ].
S. INSPECTORS
BROKERS IN MANY CITIES ARE
SAID TO BE IMPLICATED IN
THE PRACTICES.
DISCOUNTS GIVEN TO DEALERS
indictments Are Returned In New
York City and the Traffic Is Gcing
on in Many of the Larger Eastern
Cities.

on IN MANY OF inc Larger Gasse''
Cities.
WASHINGTON, Jan. 3O.-Iilega
trafficking the country over in stoler
postage stamps aggregating sesera
millions of dollars annually, has jusI
been disclosed by postoffice inspec
tors, whose investigations were re
ported today to Postmaster General
| Hitchcock. They involve so-called
stamp brokers and confidential en-
ployes of large business concerns
throughout the United States.
Through confessions secured by
the insector from some of the brok-
ers whose operations were inyesti-
gated it was learned that stamps of
all classes and denominations stolen
by burglars from postoffices and en-
bezzled by employees from gerat BUSH
ness houses and manufacturing es-
Establishments were purchased and re-
sold by the brokers at prices far be-
low their face value.
The postal laws make it a crime
punishable by Imprisonment to sell
stamps issued by the government, at
less than face value. Investigations
disclosed the fact that, in addition
to selling the stamps for less than a
price they could have been purchas-
ed for from the government, the brok-
ers knew the stamps were stolen
when they purchased them. 1nquir-
les showed that brokers in some in
stances entered into conspiracy
with employees of business houses to
buy at prices agreed upon all the
stamps the clerks could steal from
their employers.
The first of a esries of indictments
resulting from investigations was
handed down sealed in New York
ycSlci udy. lhc incu lhuiSeCu NCAO
Richard Fredericks, Irving (Izzy) Sc
vel and John Frank District Attor-
ney Whitman has informed the post
Office department that other indict-
ments will follow.
Stamp frauds against the govern
ment and various business concerns
aggregating thousands of dollars an
nually have been unearthed in New
York City alone, while illegal trafiick-
ing in stamps in Philadelphia. Ros-
ton, Pittsburg, Baltimore, Chicago,
indianapolis, st. Louis, Minneapolis,
Cincinnati, New Orleans, Kansas City
Denver, San Francisco, Seated, Port
land, Ore, and many other cities
have reached large proportions.
In New York probably twenty So
called brokers make a business of
purchasing postage stamps at dis
count ranging from so to 80 cents on
the dollar and selling them to mer-
chants at prices varying from 95
cents to 80 cents nthe dollar. The
stamps, it is said, are obtained large
ly from the Office boys and confiden-
tial employees, who embezzle them
from their employers.
One stamp broker in New York
City who sells from $500 to $1,000
worth of stamps a day to merchants,
it is alleged, has been purchasing
some of his supply from an employee
of the New York state government at
Albany. The employee confessed to
postoffice inspectors that he RENTED
to the stamp broker from s25 to $50
a week in stamps stolen from the
state. An Official of foreign alli-
ance association, with headquarters
at Chicago, confessed that for a long
time he had been stealing stamps
from the association and hypothecat-
ing them. An employee of large au-
tomobile concern at indianapolis ad-
mitted that he had been filching
stamps firm his employers and dispos-
ing of them to brokers who knew that
they we're stolen