Evening star., 1942-05-06
Mailing List
Offer Revealed
At Trial Of Five
y. S. Workers Names
Reported Quoted at
SIS Thousand


were sold to business establishments
at the rate of SIS a thousand, it
was revealed today in District Court
during the trial of four men and a
woman charged with illegal removal
of more than 10000 personnel rec
ords of Federal employees from a
Civil Service Commission file.
The disclosure was made by James
r. Barrett who identified himself as
Process Co. in North Warren, Pa,
a firm which specializes in mail
order sales of textiles and hosiery.
Mr.. Barrett testified that one of
the defendants, Walter A. C. Camp,
at conference in the Pennsylvania
firms plant in October, 1910, said
he would soon have available for
'circulariZing purposes" a list of
names of Government employees and
that the charge would be SIS a
thousand.
That was higher price than we
were accustomed to paying" Mr.
Barrett declared. IT suggested that
we might use a test list of 10000
names at a rate of $40 a thousand.
Others at Conference.
MIR. Barrett said that in addition
10 Mr.. Camp the conference at the
Pennsylvania plant was attended by
Lynford j. Haynes, the late proprie-
tor Of the Standard Business Serv-
ice of Washington, which furnished
lists Of prospects to business con-
Germs. His son, Lawrence ]. Haynes,
is one of the five defendants.
For nearly two and half
hours William p. Lehman, chief of
the inter r-departmental replacement
unit of the Civil Service Commits
sion, from which the 10000 person.
mel records are alleged to have been
removed, was questioned when the
trial resumed this morning. Mr..
Lehman declared he had not given
authority to any one to take the
personnel records of the Govern
ment workers out of the building in
which they were stored.
The trial was resumed today fol-
lowing a futile attempt by defense
attorneys to end it abruptly on
grounds of "mistrial"
The motion for mistrial was
made late yesterday after Mr.. Leh-
man had described as repre-
hensible" public disclosure of al
legged confidential information in
the personnel records. Defense at
torneys claimed the remark would
leave a prejudicial impression on
the jury
Motion Is Denied.
Justice James w. Morris denied
the motion. In doing so he said the
word 'reprehensible" was used in
statement by Mr.. Lehman in lee
ture to his staff and heard by one
of the five defendants-Harlin w.
Crandall, who at the time was in
control of the flow" of personnel
records in the commissions inter-
department placement service-and
therefore was admissible in evil
dence.
Mr.. Lehman had testified he de-
hvered the lecture to the employees
under his supervision following
suspected leaks of information in
the personnel records which ap-
peared In the newspapers
Justice Morris said he is not yet
ready to rule on the controversial
issue of whether the records were
confidential. But 1t is expected to
furnish one of the chief arguments
during the trial. since the defense
already has taken the position that
most of the records removed from
the commissions files were re-
turned after the desired informa-
ton had been obtained by COM
mercial mailing agency.
The indictment against the flve
defendants charged both illegal re-
moval of Government files and the
theft of them. Defense counsel have
argued that If the records were not
confidential the element OF theft is
not involved.
Mitchell Order Cited.
On the other hand. Prosecutor
Charles B. Murray insists that the
records were confidential because
President Mitchell of the Civil Serg-
ice Commission had ordered them to
be so. Moreover he contends that
while the records we're not in pos
session of the Government, the
meat" vas extracted from them
and circulated all over the country.