The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1921-12-30
MANY CHARGES
 AGAINST DIST.
 ATTY. PELLITIER

Boston, Dec 30-Removal of Jo- seph c. Pe1Ietier as distriol attorney of Suffolk county, hearings in whose case have begun before the Supreme Judicial Court, is asked by Attorney General J. Weston Allen on the gen .eraI charge that Pelletiers continued incumbency is "inimical to the pub lie interest Two sets of charges against the district a1orney, as well a petition for his disbarment, have been filed.
 In the original charges, Pelletier is alleged to have aided in extorting or alempting to extort money or prop ezrty from certain persons by threats of prosecution. The attorney general alleges that the district attorney rprocured indictm ents that ought not @ 70 have been procured; that he failed from improper motives to prosecute in specified cases and that he per nitted persons to use his office in CO., ercing other persons to release or set tie civil claims.
 The first charges, submitted on Oc- tober 27 last, contain 35 specified tf6ns. Some of these are items taken from a petition of the grievance com mittee of the Boston Bar Association; E others were Formulated by the attOr sney general. Some are virtually the same as those on which MT. Allen is seeking the disbarment of Daniel F. Coakley of Boston an attorney, who was mentioned frequently in the pro- sceedings that resulted in the removal last fall of Nathan A. Tufts dis arict attorney of Middlesex county.
 The second set of charges against Pelletier, filed Nov. 21, resulted from a speech he made when a. candidate for mayor. In this speech, as read
 by Allen before the Supreme Court, the disN1ct attorney was quoted E saving that he would noIIe prosequf
 the case of anyone who would ''back up 8 denial that he '(Pelletier) in tended to resign.
 Attorney General Aliens petition
 al hat nf
 district attorney since November 3,
 1909 when he took office, down to the si date of filing the charges, show him to be unfit to hold office. It charges that Pelletier conducted his office in unlawful and reprehensfble man
 ner.'
 Pelletier is said in the petition to
 have failed from improper motives
 to prosecute Merrill W. Shute after
 Shute's indictment on the charge of
 embedding s16,O00 from Emma F.
 Bracket of Bangor, Me.
 Coakley and William J.~Corcoran,
 former district attorney of Middle
 sex county are named as among
 thoseNGwith whom Pelletfer is alleged
 to have consptred. Mir. Allen charges that the district attorney conspired
 with Coakley and others to extora
 se0, 300 from the Emerson Motors z Co, to procure the abandonment of Threatened criminal prosecution.
 PeJletier Is further charged with having conspired with Coakley to at I'3temupt to extort s10.oO0 from War iren c. Daniel, a dealer in securities.
 by threat of prosecution. Conspiracy is charged also in the case of Dorothy iC5:e. who, it Is alleged, was forced Ito abandon a suit for conversion of
 an automobile by similar threats.
 Mrs. Elizabeth Chase Emery. daughter of a Worcester county mil
 lienaire, figures in the charges, in a Specification that Pellet1er conspired
 with Coak1ey. Corcoran and others tc
 Norf rrinF h fJc W
 Mrs. Jennie s. Chase. her mother, Conspiracy to Tighten Albert T.
 Smith into paying ssT.60o aimony
 to his wife. Agnes L, Smith, and
 abandonment of prosecution againse Smith after the money was paid, also attorney general alleges that one-half the s37.5OO alimony was claimed by Coakley as contingent fee. When these charges were first len had acted to discredtt his cand1- adcy for mayor, which he was plan- ming to make public the next day. PefIetAr. withdrew from the mayor On November a3, Pelletfer at- tackled as unconstitutional the statute under which the original proceedings were brought, contending that 1nas- much he had been elected to of ifice he was removable only through Impeachment proceedings. He said the law giving a majority of Supreme Court justices the power to remove z district a5tornev after a hearing con | ficted with the 14th Amendment tl the Federal constitution. He peti. 7ioned the court for writ of prohi. HitiCn restraining fur Gher action or tie original information. Two day, Ircer Justice De Courcr ruled tha Inc court was without Jurisdiction Ts issue such a writ and dismissed th' petition.
 PeIletier has been district atxor J@E -f Suffolk county since NoVem 1~~ 1909. He filled out the unsx lire term of the late John E, Mo rGn and was subsequently reelected fo" successive terms.