The Birmingham age-herald., 1922-03-12
NEW YORK PROVES FERTILE FIELD ID
 CLEVER SW|NDLER
Society Women Fall for Lind says Scheme and Give Him More Than Million
 Dollars to Invest
By EDWIN R. HARRIS, JR. Special Correspondent of The Age-Herald (CopyriEht, 1929, by The Age-Herald)

so! Then now oo you account TOT Alfred E. Lindsay?
 If you had gold bricks for sale, Broadway would be the easiest place on earth wherein to make the sale. Offer wooden nutmegs in some be- nighted rural cross roads and they'll run you clear across the country. Hawk wooden nutmegs in the center of New York and you'll have to call out the reserves to keep your custo- mers in line.
 Take the case of Alfred E. Lindsay Which is just what the district attor- ney is doing at the moment If half the charges against this man are true, New Workers are children and he's the big boy that took away their candy. And made 'em smile while he took it.
 Over s1.ooo,ooo worth of it. ac- cording to the distriD. attorney, has been taken from clever society wom- en. sharp business women, and grad uates of West Point. In return for the $1,o00,0 ,000 the police say Lindsay gave his clients number of rosy visions, some week-ends at his coun- try place on the Hudson, a dinner or two in New York hotels and-lately
 -d CoplOuS IOL ol lSdISs
 'He Cries Well"
 He cries we'll" says Richard Mur- phy, assistant district attorney, in charge of the case.
 Simplicity, the police say. marked Lindsay's methods. Nobody who want ed to take a fortune away from a society leader would pretend an inti- macy with Rockefeller, Stillman, La mont, because of course the society leader would cheek up and discover the fraud. Nobdy would invent fan ciful tale about half a dozen of the biggest financiers in the world put ting on masks and meeting him once a day to "fix" the stock market Mo- body would pull that old line about wanting to help all women to wealth because the worlds such hard place, anyhow. Nobody but a genius or a man who knew his New York. Lind say is both And he knows his New York not because he's New Yorker An No, the man who Is charged with holding out his hand while a dozen people placed a million dollars in it is not native of the big town. He's a boy from the rural community. From as far away as possible. From, in fact, California It is there wide eyed strangers from the simple west who can saunter into slick New York and pick the gold filings from the wisdom teeth of the inhabitants
 Never Heard of s<Doruino CIubp heard of the "Dl Tho Club" the mask ed assem blaze of stock manipulators. Percy Rockefeller, Thomas Lamont and James Stillman say they never heard of it. either. But six women told the district attorney they'd heard of it from Lindsay, and hearing of it-they added-cost them sums ranging from $500 to ss75.00o. By their own statements Mrs. Lillian N Duke. former wife of the "tobacco king" gave the stock broker s350, 900 in cash and $25,ooo in jewels; Mrs. Dorothy Atwood gave him $250,0O0: and seven other women and one man gave him sums ranging from S5,000 to 31,000, or-for the nine-more than s750, 900.
 However. handsome man of dis. dnguished appearance, exuding cul- ture, snappily dressed.
 Wrong again. There was nothing of the cotillion leader about Lindsay. A rather tall. stout man. 57 years old, smooth faced. blue eyes. peering from behind shell trimmed glasses. some what awkward. making mistakes in e7A oAithoi hoW anu Iucn, d1IeCLtnG clothes that showed signs of wear, frank in manner rather than pol ished-thats he For s7o,ooe he bought one of the show places on the West Shore-Mrs. Duke says she loaned him the s7o,ooo and wished she hadn't
 Civic Activities
 And there wasn't civic activity round about South Nyack. N. Y, which really went big unless Mir. headed a committee.
 He subscribed liberally to the Red Cross. He collected money for dis abled firemen- He interested himself in town improvement That Is, until he left town about a month ago, about the time two of the society women became suspicious, consulted their attorneys, did various unpleas- ant legal things to tho Lindsay spa cious bungalow. garage, boathouse and grounds. and asked the district attorneys office to ascertain where had gone. They found him later in a suburb of Philadelphia. reg istered under an assumed name which the authorities say is but one alias of many.
 Indignant wet-eyed and bent on revenge. the crowd of fashionabiy gowned women began Immediately to gather in the district attorneys office They told story of most ex- and extraordinarily suc- cessful sort since Dr. Cook was feasted by kings for his failure to discover the north pole or Bergdoll was let loose to hunt for his buried treasure.
 Showed the Key
 "But he told me that Rockefeller asd Lamont and the rest would put on masks and slip into a room at the Ritz every night to decide what stocks would go up next day. He even showed me the key and I gave him $15,000.-
 ''Why, met him at card party in the Murray Hill hotel He was aw- fully nice and brotherly. He never money till I'd known him several weeks. Then he just hap pened to let fall remark about Percy Rockefeller. And I let him have S18,000 to invest for me-
 He told me how devilish the Wall street brokers are to women rob bers,' he called them. He said he felt sorry for women; life was so hard on women. By and by. he described the Domino Club Next evening he called up from the Domino Club and told me to get together as much money as I could and he'd invest it. Of course, I did what he said. gave him $3e,0o0."
 "One day he said: Let me have $500 and don't even ask what it's for I let him have it, of course"
 So their stories ran. What made them do it? Assistant District At torney Murphy smiled at the ques- ton. Lindsay is a very convincing he admitted, though Lindsay had talked to Murphy three hours without convincing him at all. He talked glibly and he talked big.