Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1918-12-21
HOG ISLAND PROBE:
 NOW MADE PUBLIC
(COntinued from Page One.

attorney general under date of Sep tember 12. Mi Gregory's letter of transmittal to the president is dated September 21. Since then there have been demands in congress for publica- tion of the report. The understanding has been that publication was delayed pending an agreement between the department of justice and Chair man Hurley as to the causes of delay as shown by the inquiry.
 The report describes at the outset the contract entered into by the En- ergency Fleet Corporation on Septem- Der 13, 1917, under which the Amer ican International Corporation of New York agreed to purchase S45 acres of land at Hog Island to be utilized for the purpose of the contract upon a six percent rental basis, to build on this tract with funds furnished by the Elm ergency Fleet Corporation a shipyard of fifty ways and to construct with funds supplied from the same source fifty or more steel cargo ships at an estimated cost of $1,100,000 each. The agreement was that upon completion of the ships the fleet corporation might purchase the land at cost, fail ing which the contractor might pur chase the plant at value to be fixed by appraisal, failing which the govern ment would scrap the plant and re- move it. The estimated cost of, con- ,,%, QD1 0O0 O0n ny, October 23, the fleet corporation plac ed an order for seventy additional steel ships estimated to cost $1 650,000 each calling for longer ways and piers and also more shop and storage capacity. On November 27, the contractor re- vised the estimate of yard construct7. ion cost, adding S2,750,000 on account of the additional seventy ships and $3,- 25O ,O00 on account of unfavorable sub- soil conditions, costly labor and nec- essary extensions of the plant. On May. 7 an order for sixty more ships to cost $1,425,000 each was placed. All of the 1SO ships were to be completed by August 4, 1919.
 uC SOAli oSIiiAS SOihpetHJ 70 SoiiiPSii sation for building both the yard and the ships was fixed at a percentage of the estimated cost of the ships, with premiums for early deliveries or sav ings in cost and penalties for delayed deliveries or increased cost The maXi- mum fee under this arrangement would be $14,44O,00 and the minimum SS,91O,OOO. MT. Piez testified yesterday that to date the company had been paid nothing.
 Although the contract was made with the American International Com pany the report says there was an unwritten obligation publicly admit ted by all parties to consider the en- gineering firm of Stone and Webster and the New York Shipbuilding Cor poration as jointly interested in the benefits and burdens. A separate cor poration, the American International Shipbuilding Corporation was organ ized as the agency through which the yard and ships actually were to be built.
 In section on the status of the yard later modified by the letter to the at torney general, the report says in less than a year after the date of the con- tract 846 acres of marsh land without railroad facilities twill be a complete industrial city of thirty thousand men,. served by two trunk lines of rail road-and equipped to deliver to the government two completed 7,5O0 ton steel cargo vessels each week. " Speaking of difficulties encountered a blockade of cars loaded with mater ial extending from Philadelphia to Norfolk, Va is described.
 The reports tells in detail of the vast work involved in the investiga- tion, of the questioning of everybody from high officials to taXi-drivers and of the examination of thousands of books, bills, diaries and other papers It recites at length the charges made against the contractors and answers on which the inestigators do not at, tempt to pass judgment.
 Not Criminally Liable.
 This is the conclusion as to crimina, liability:
 "In response to the question submit ted by the president, our conclusion is that the facts do not justify criminal process; that no fraud or secret pro fits on the part of the officials of eith CT the agent or the fleet corporation has been established that while there were some minor frauds on the pay roll which have been prosecuted, the laborers, laborers' timekeepers an( payroll supervisors were in the mair honest.
 "One of the accountants employed by our chief accountant criticised the latter's method as inadequate. Thess criticisms were submitted to two leading firms of certified accounts who reported in writing that thu criticisms were unfounded and that th' methods and scope of the accounting taken in conjunction with other line