Arizona republican., 1913-01-24
Postoffice Inspectors Un- earth Illegal Trafficking in Cards and Stickers Between Office Boys and New York Brokers
STEALING FROM
 THE GOVERNMENT
Crime is Also Committed in Selling at Prices Less Than Face Value as Well as in Receiving Stolen Goods
ASSOCIATED PRESS DIsPATCHl l

WASHINGTON. Jan. 23-Illegal trafficking in stolen postage stamps several millions annually has been disclosed by post office in- spectors whose investigations were re- ported today to Postmaster General Hitchcock. Involved are so-called stamp brokers and confidential em- ployes of large business concerns throughout the United States Through the confessions secured by the inspec- tors from some of the brokers whose operations were investigated, it was learned that stamps of all classes and denominations stolen or 0urglarized from post offices or embedded by em- ployes from great business houses, manufacturing establishments are pur- chased and resold by the brokers at prices far below the price of their values.
 The postal laws make it a crime pun ishable by imprisonment to sell stamps issued by the government at less than their face value. The investigations disclosed the fact that in addition to selling stamps at a less price than that at which they had been purchased from the government, the brokers knew the stamps were stolen. Inquiries showed that the brokers in some instances ent- cred into a conspiracy with the em ployes of business houses to buy at the prices agreed upon. all the stamps the clerks could steal from their employers
 The first of a series of indictments resulting from these investigations were handed down sealed in New York yesterday The men indicted are Richard F'redericks, Irving Uzzy) Se vel and John Frank District Attorney Whitman informed the post office de- partment that other indictments would follow
 Detectives arrested Richard Freder- icks. a stamp dealer and Irving Sevel, keeper of a news stand today on charg- es that they had received stolen stamps Other arrests are expected.
 Stamp frauds against the govern ment and various business concerns aggregating hundreds of thousands of dollars annually, have been unearthed in New York city alone while the il- legal trafficking in stamps in Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Pittsburg. Chi CagO, Indianapolis, St. Louis. Minne- apolis, Cincinnati, New Orleans, Kansas City, Denver, San Francisco, Seattle, Portland. Ore, and many other cities has reached large proportions. In New York approximately twenty so-called brokers make a business of purchasing postage stamps at discount ranging from 50 to 90 cents dollar and selling II from 95 cents to 99 cents on the dol lar. One stamp broker in New York City who sold from $500 to 5000 worth of stamps day to merchants, it is all legged, has been purchasing some of his supplies from employees of the New
 York state government at Albany, who it is said, confessed to the post office
 inspectors that he remitted to the stamp broker from $25 to $50 a week
 in stamps stolen from the state
 One broker advertised by means of a sign carried through the New York fi-
 nancial district at the noon hour that
 cards. This resulted it is said, in many office boys stealing cards from
 their employers, selling them at 8 cenIS per nunureu inc printed DOT
 ton of the cards was then usually GOV cred by the broker with a piece of thick
 paper and the cards resold. A capable
 broker according to his admission to the inspectors, sold in the last two years, more than two million postal cards to original purchasers at 75 per
 cent of their face value.
 A few weeks ago a member of con- gross and former deputy commission CT of police in New York requested the third assistant postmaster general to redeem over one million cards for a constituent of the congressman. In quiry by the inspectors developed the fact that the cards were the property of a stamp broker, whose business was declared by the department officials to be clearly illegitimate