Evening star., 1934-03-10
Testimony Is Given Before
Public Welfare Board
Committee.
REMOVAL OF HEARINGS
TO LORTON is PLANNED
Bankers Porch to Be Inspect.
ed-Whether to Call Prisoners
Is Not Decided.

For 10 years, Col. William L. Peak,
former head of the District Jail, who
since has been promoted to the su-
perintendency OF Lorton Reformatory,
sent recalcitrant Jail prisoners to the
post" punishment so severe the priS-
oner's heart was examined hourly
to see that it was bearing up under
the strain.
Peak testified to this effect late yes
terday to a Board of Public Welfare
Investigating Committee, after search
ing questioning by Judge Michael NJ.
Doyle, committee member.
Hearings being conducted by the
committee will be removed to Lorton
in the near future TO permit closer
examination of conditions there, w.
w. MILAN, chairman, said this morn
ing. The next session will be held
here Tuesday when the business man
agement of the reformatory probably
will be more closely scrutinized. After
that, MILAN asserted, the committee
may make its personal investigation
of Irregularities and improprieties al
legged to exist at Lorton.
Will Inspect Bankers Porch"
Whether inmates will be called as
witnesses had not been decided today,
some committee members feeling to
do so would undermine prison dis
cipline.
The committee will inspect the So
called bankers porch" where most
of the prisoners involved in Wash
ington's major financial scandals are
housed. They also will make a spe-
cial effort to determine the truth of
rumorS that bankers, gamblers and
bootleggers are allowed to make fire.
quent visits to Washington from the
penitentiary.
The revelation made by Peak con-
corning the post" had not been dis
closed in previous testimony.
The punishment consists of man
acling a mans hands behind him to
a post and leaving him there. Judge
Doyle insistently questioned Peak as
to whether the prisoners hands would
be elevated SO as to force him for
ward onto his toes, but Peak denied
this.
Peak said he found the post" be-
ing used when he came to the Jail IA
years ago and continued to use it
until four years ago when the base
ment of the Jail was remodeled and
the upright to which the prisoners
were manacled removed.
Peak said that when he came to
the Jail lit had dark dungeons with
rings in the ceilings and rings in the
walls, but I had these converted at
once into linen closets and shelves
put in to make it impossible to con-
tinue to use the rooms as dungeons"
The upright which constituted the
post" was a support in the laundry
In the basement. Prisoners in soil
tary confinement who made too much
noise at night sometimes were chained
to it so they would not disturb other
inmates, Peak said, but explained that
in such cases the man was allowed
to face the post and lie on a mat
tress. It was only when he was man
acled for punishment that his back
was toward the upright and he was
forced to stand Peek denied men
were kept manacled to the post for
as long as "a hours.
The post was quite dreaded by the
prisoners, wasn't it," inquired Judge
Doyle.
They didn't like it very we'll" Peak
answered
Not only was the heart of the pris-
oner examined hourly, Peak said, but
also before the punishment was i'm
posed. Sometimes, he said, the first
examination showed the prisoner
could not stand the strain.
"You only inflicted this punishment
at night when there was no danger of
visitors learning of it, didn't you?"
Judge Doyle asked.
Peak agreed it was used only at
night, but said that was because the
laundry was operated all day.
Earlier in the afternoon the COM
mittee heard a trusted prison en-
ploye testify A. c. Tawse, then super
tntendent of Lorton, took G. Bryan
Pitts and Edmund Rheem, convicted
Washington brokers, from the re-
formatory to the George Mason Hotel
in Alexandria to visit their wives
during the Winter of 1882.
Partially Verified Information.
The witness was William A. Stein
superintendent of the prison wharf
at the foot of Ninth street, who has
made an enviable record capturing
escaped prisoners.
He said he got the story from a
police informer called 'Ladybug,"
whom he met at the wrestling matches
in Washington on the night in ques-
ton He said he also saw Tawse,
Tawse'S wife and son-in-law there to-
gether with a prisoner named Dorsey,
who had no right to leave the re-
formatory reservation.
He later partially verified his in
formation, he said, by going to the
George Mason Hotel the next day
and finding the name of Mrs. Pitts
on the register.
Col. Peak testified to the prevalence
of rumors that wealthy prisoners were
allowed to make excursions to Wash
ington and said he took special pre-
cautions when he went to Lorton Sep
tember l to prevent such thing
happening.
81 New Guards to Be Needed.
Existence of the bankers porch" is
bad prison management" Peak told
the committee, but admitted he was
responsible for assigning Abner Siegal,
former Washington attorney, to a
place there.
AS soon as four dormitories under
construction are completed, he de-
clared, inmates on the porch and all
other clerical convict help will be
housed in a dormitory by themselves.