The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1916-07-18
Pays for All With Certified
Checks on MuskOgee Bank.
EMPLOYS A STENOGRApHER
His Checks Are Written on a
Typewriter.
One Topeka Man VOuches for
Him for $3.50.

When w. R. Crump, check artist.
disguised as promoter of a whoie-
sale grocery firm in North Topeka
and a water service concern in the
East side, put a crimp in the profit
and loss accounts of Topeka mer-
chants which boosted the loss side Of
the sheet considerably. he jumped to
st. Joseph. Mo, with several hundred
dollars in Topeka money.
The police and L. L. kiene, sheriff.
were about two jumps behind him
and when he utilized the extra jump
in his favor gloom spread over To-
peka merchants, and a StenOgrapher
nc hired here wondered who was go
ing to pay her wages and a dozen or
more clerks, office managers, not to
mention office boys, messenger boys.
truck drivers and others turned up at
the building he rented in North To-
peka to find it vacant with no pros
poets of the Jobs they had been prom
ised.
Crump, according to l.. L. Kiene,
sheriff alighted from a passenger
train here last week. He went to
North Topeka where he negotiated
with a real estate agent named Mich
OILS for the building owned by oscar
krauss. Curtis street and Kansas ave-
nue.. He gave a check for the ad-
vance rent payment.
Hires. Stenographer.
Then he hired a stenographer, Miss
Ellen Christy, 1872 Western avenue,
and put her to work writing price lists,
contracts and other things that go
with a well managed wholesale gro
Gerry store The contracts were to the
effect that the Consolidated Whole
sale Grocery company of Oklahomas
was to furnish all groceries to whom
ever wanted them.
Then he dropped into the store Of
Tom Handy. Fourth and Quincy
streets, and confided his Intentions of
opening water service plant for the
Union Pacific here thereby bringing
thirty men and their families to the
city. Handy endorsed a check, Kiene
says. for $50 and identified Crump in
bank here for $3.50 check. How
ever, the bank merely took the
$3.50 check for collection. Crump
Muskogee bank. Also his checks We're
stamped with a certified stamp which
Kiene claims he welded himself
Catches Another Victim.
Robert Gathers. Fourth and Lake
streets. cashed one of Crump's checks
| 50 worth of groceries. The groceries
were hauled to the vacant house on
7O1 Lawrence street, which Crump
i had rented for a relative who was to
be connected with his business activi-
| ties here.
| Crump also hired a boy. Kenneth
Hamilton, 102 Western avenue, to
drive him around in a buggy. Crump
and the boy started for Lawrence
that's what Crump told the boy and his
parents-Sunday, but ended their trip
in st. Joe. Crump's one decent act
in his career, officials say. was to
place the boy in a good hotel over
Sunday and send him home the next
day, Monday.
Crump, the sheriff says, tried to
pass worthless checks on a number OF
other grocers here, but failed with
some of them. Kiene says he does not
know how many Topekans Crump VIC
timized, but hints they are many.
After Crump rented the store build
ing in North Topeka he hired an Of
| flee manager. messenger boys and
other help. He assumed a prosperous
attitude and carried all the ear marks
of man making a flier for fortune in
a legitimate and forceful way.
When those employees arrived in
| North Topeka to go to work today
| Crump was somewhere else