Evening Star Newspaper, August 8, 1929, Page 3

EX.CHIEF SCORES | DRYLAW SLAYINGS Mrs. Willebrandt Condemns Unwarranted Use of Firearms. (Continued From First Poge.) 1 condemn as atrocious, wholly’ un- warranted and entirely unnecessary some of the killing by prohibition agents. But I know that there are equally shocking cases of gangsters’ at- tacks on agents, which, if as widely known, will influsnce the fair-minded people not to b> too hasty in lavishing sympathy on violat~ - of the law who get wounded in the course of arrest. \ Letter as Evidence. As a sample of how the bootlegger deals with citizens who stand in his way this touching letter to me stands as mute evidence: “Dear Madam: “I understand that my husband wrote to you some time ago about prohibition law and the agents you sent here told those, the wholesalers, about him writ- ing to you, so the wholesalers went to the pricst on the 4th of April. This priest called on my husband and warned him that the wholesalers would make a lot of trouble. Just four days after that they murdered by husband, Eugene Costa, and left me with five little chil- dren. My husband fought for his country during the World War. And it took a foreigner to murder my husband over beer and whisky. If you sent someone in I will explain it better. If you think it would better for me to come there please tell me when and how For I am broken hearted. “Kindly pay special attention. “MRS. EUGENE COSTA.” ‘Take the case of Tom Morris, de- ceased. His family now knows that in | enforcing the prohibition law agents of | the Government are not dealing with | mere “good-hearted boys” who meet a| public demand for liquor. He with another officer stopped a car which was crossing the border loaded with liquor. After making the arrest and putting handcuffs on one of the men who had been in the car, the other said, “Wait _a minute till I light a cigarette.” The officer “waited a min- ute,” but instead of lighting a cigarette, the rum runner pulled a gun and shot Morris, who died almost instantly. The defendant then ran, and the surviving officer shot at him but missed. Sub- sequently captured and convicted. he was given only a prison term of from | 2 to 20 years. These bootleggers were the type ordinarily engaged in running liquor between Texas towns. Nothing in their appearance gave the agents warning. They were no better and no worse than thousands of other bootleg- gers who are operating daily in 21l parts of the counts And let it be remem- bered that the man who committed this act of violence was himself in no great danger from the law prior to the shoot- ing of the customs officer. He was sub- ject to a penalty at most of only six months and a few hundred dollars’ fine after conviction. Nevertheless, in an attempt to avoid facing that charge, he | lshnt down and killed an officer of the aw. Indicted for Self-Defense. The case cited is not at all unusual. On September 26, 1928, a prohibition agent named King stopped an automo- | bile crossing a bridge at Jacksonville, Fla., and arrested a well known bool legger who was in charge of the load of liquor. When the agent stepped on the running board of the car the bootlegger pulled a gun and shot the agent, who fell into the road. Wounded as he was, King nevertheless managed to draw his | own gun and as the bootlegger started | o drive away a running battle occurred in which Agent King killed the boot- legger. A disinterested workman on the bridge told the facts. While thel| agent lay at the point of death in a hospital the State authorities. as the| result of sensational and unwarranted press reports which inflamed the public mind, and following threats of death from the deceased’s associates, en- deavored to obtain an indictment for | murder against an officer who had | risked his life in_the performance of | his legal duty and’ who had shot after | being thrown in the road, wounded, and | only in self-defense. I might cite dozens of other similar, — cases, but I will call attention to only, one more. It is the case of the United States of America vs. James H. Alder- man, charged with and convicted of murder and sentenced to death. The conviction has been upheld by the United States Circuit Court of Appeals for the fifth circuit and the Supreme | Court of the United States has refused | to review the case. The facts are these: | On August 7, 1927, a United States Coast Guard patrol boat, on duty off | the coast of Florida, stopped a small boat coming from the direction of Bimini in the British West Indies and headed toward the Florida coast. On boarding the boat the Coast Guard commander. Sidney C. Sanderlin, found one James H. Alderman in charge, with Robert K. Weech aboard, together with 20 sacks of liquor. Of the Coast Guard boat crew only Sanderlin was armed. | = | SPECIAL NOTiCES. NOTICE_15 HEREBY GIVEN THAT THE partnership composed of Frank T. Stone | and 8. Stuart Poole. trading and doing | business as Stone & Poole. retail druggists, | at 1210 Pennsylvania avenue n.w., was dis- | solved August 1. 1920. Future conduct of the business will be bv Frank T. Stone, trading as Stone & Poole, at the same ad- ! tha assumes the payment of all RD_D. DA ._Attorney. WILL, NOT BE, RESPO! Gonis oiher than those canizacted by mysell. (Signed). IRVING GORDON. 119 Rock Creek Chureh road. Washington. D. C. T NOT BE RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY dents other than those contracted by my- selt.” JOHN P. PETERSON. Merrifield. Vs, GONFISCATED TQR y 14th and Florida e. n.w., Friday. August Sth, 10 a.m. WM.' R, BLANDFORD. Administrator. ADAM A. WESCHLER & SON. Aucts. FALLS CHURCH ORCHARDS. 1 peaches, $2 per bushel: low as 50c per_bushel. _Alexandria-Le burg pike, West Falls Church. Va. 11! GOING? WHERE? Tell us when and we'll move your furni- ture and take mighty good care of it at low ost. A telephone call will save you time trouble. NATIONAL DELIVERY ASSN., phone M. 1460. From CLEVE! 4 To NEW YORK CITY To PHILADELPHIA . To ASBURY PARK . YORK AUTOMOBILES (32, violation of pronibition laws. will be gald auction at Pidelity Garags av et ~ an INC. .SEPT. tes guaranteed on 10 days’ clal Tates for part loads, UNITED STATES STORAGE CO.. INC,, 418 10th St. N.W. Metropolitan 1845, A Printing Service —offering excepti for a discriminating clientele, The National Capital Press _’_11"-]111 D St N.W.; Phone National 0650. , WATCHES AND CLOCKS. w. R. McCALL, 1342 EYE ST. N.W. 10-DAY SALE—20% OF! . "KENSINGTON ORCHARDS. ee-ripened peaches. Roadside P oAb, Kensington: orchards, ers ‘Mill rd., 1 miie north PEACHES ARE RIPE AT QUAINT ACRES sands of baskets of choice, tree sipennd T, “open, evers’ day tiil 9 B O e T ki er” Bpring. Hve. TUFR Fent at Siigo, Sign At farm entrapce. ' Remember the Name No ter wha root | were established. | tics are much more severe than thos | Times: He searched Alderman for weapons and found none. the Coast Guard crew was ing the liquor from the small boat to the Coast Guard boat, Sanderlin started toward the pilot house of the patrol boat, where wireless was lo- cated, and Alderman followed him. A moment later the Coast Guard crew heard shots and saw Alderman, an au- tomatic in his hand, take a step or two from the pilot house door and shoot at a member of the crew named Lamby. The shot struck Lamby and he fell into the engine room. No one saw Alderman shoot Sanderlin, but afterward Sander- lin was found dead on the floor of the pilot house, killed by & bullet which en- tered the right side of his back, through the heart and coming out of the left breast. Lamby died four days late in a Florida hospital. Alderman, the bootleg runner, then lined up the remainder of the Coast Guard crew and menacing them with his revolver, said that he was going to “get” the rest of them He then di- rected his own companion, Weech, to get the liquor back abeard their boat, tear out the gas pipe of the patrol boat and set it afire. Alderman told the pa- trol crew that he was going to throw them overboard one at a time and shoot them, and that they might as well say their prayers, because they were all going to hell and they would need them. Meanwhile, he had secured two more revolvers from the pilot house and had given one to his associate, Weech, so that the prisoners were covered by three guns. A few minutes later Alderman glanced down the hatch to see what Weech was doing with regard to the motor which he had ordered Weech to start. Taking advantage of his momen- tary inattention, the surviving members of the Coast Guard crew rushed toward Alderman ‘and he began shooting. He succeeded in shooting one of them through the shoulder and head and in killing another. However, the others overcame him and later captured his associate, Weech. Bootleggers Mostly “Killers.” T have outlined the facts in this case to show what viclous criminals are in ihe bootleg business, and the risk of his uty to make arrests. | The law gives the arrested man every | presumption of innocence and much legal protection. But he must go peace- ably with the arresting officer to the nearest magistrate for hearing. Re- sisting an officer is a serious offense. It has been such ever since governmenis It has been the duty of all sworn officers of the law to bring | in their prisoners “dead or aliv ‘That nce the days of Blackstone, been regarded as vital to the protection of society and the preservation of the state In dozens of cases, hundreds in fact, arrested bootleggers are resisting with force and with guns officers of the law who have the legal right and the duty to make the arrest and are discharging that duty lawfully. In no other class of cases has there been so much resist ance to officers. Every day, in some part of the United States, men are ar- d Federal officers for v, 'y, arson, mail robbery and other crimes for which the penal- imposed for hpotlegging. Yet there is no such resistance to the officers as in | bootlegging cases, simply because the men arrested know that they will get no public or newspaper support if they attack or kill the officer of the law. But let resistance be made to a prohi- bition agent in the lawful performance of his duty, and there is an immediate | rallying to the defense of the bootlegger | by those who are opposed to prohibition enforcement. Are we losing our sense | of proporticn when the arrest involves | liquor? | T condemn without qualification un- justified use of firearms in the enforce- | ment of the prohibition law, as well as | any other law. but I think no one who | is fair minded will disagree with thls‘ editorial statement of tie Los Angeles | “There _seems to be a good deal of | over-emphasis for wet propaganda pur- poses of such regrettable affairs as the slaving of Jacon Hanson at Niagara Falls and of Henry Virkhula at Inter- | national Falls, Minn, If either man had been killed by a policeman who mistook him for a burglar, the case ould have been dismissed. so far as national public interest is concerned, in a_few lines of press. and it is incon- Chassis Wor of all kind's GAUCARLR TNCORTORATLD 9, GULOENS ‘Mustard . ‘Q ous statement. EVENING THE ceivable that it could have become subject for congressional discussion.” In expressing my condemnation of the use of unnecessary and unjustified violence in the name of prohibition en- forcement, I have the woman’s privi- lege of saying “I told you so.” . I had not been in charge of prosecu- tion under the prohibition law more than a few months before I discovered what many people since have acknowl- edged—that hundreds of prohibition agents had been appointed through po- litical pull and were as devoid of hon- esty and integrity as the bootleggin fraternity, I found that there were scores of prohibition agents no more fit to be trusted with a commission to en- force4he laws of the United States an to carry a gun than the notorious ban- dit Jesse James. Among the evidences of this fact that early reached me was this letter from a judge known through- out the country as an upright, fearless, able jurist: “More_intelligence ought to be used in selecting prohibition agents. The majority of them in my district are stupid, and on the witness stand, under cross-examination conducted by highly paid and able lawyers for the bootleg- gers, they crumple up. “In my courtroom an agent testified that between October 17 and November 1, about 14 days, he drank 700 glasses of alcohol and 700 glass of moonshine whisky. That was a period of 14 days, and when 1,400 is divided by 14 it will be reasonably clear that he did not drink any such quantity. But if he only drank a fraction of that amount, it would be sufficient to destroy his use- fulness. This situation cannot be per- | mitted to go much further, because the judges are losing confidence in the in- tegrity and veracity of the Govern- ment’s witnesses.” It was my opinion in 1921, and it still is, that the Govérnment is com- miting a crime against the public gen- erally when it pins the badge of police authority on and hands a gun to a man of uncertain character, limited intelli- gence, or without giving systematic training for the performance of duties that involve the rights and, possibly, the lives of citizens. (Copyright. 1920, by, Current News Features. ‘Tomorrow Mrs. Willebrandt will dis- cuss forther the reason for unwarrant- ed ac., of violence in the enforcement | of the prohibition law, and how and | when such conditions can be corrected. ———— Whales Answer Sailor. NEW YORK, August 8 (#).—Capt. Robert Irving, skipper of the Cunarder Cynthia, remarked on a recent voyage that whales had disappeared from the steamer lanes. On his latest trip west he saw “one a day from the Irish coast to Ambrose Lightship.” The explana- | tion? “All T can make of it.” says Capt. Irving, Royal Navy Rescrve, “is that be the whales' reply to my The Artists Here Enter Into the Spirit of the Occasion When They Plan “BIRTHDAY BOUQUETS” Exquisite in plan and arrangement—and you govern the cost. Between 14th and 15th Sts. Telephone National 4905 1407 H St. ASK FOR THE ORIGINAL Buttermilb. Churned Fresh Daily 'S just another reason why Chestnut Farms Buttermilk is superior to any other in Washington. It is highly recommended by physi- cians, not only for its food value, but as a general tonic for the whole system. Coming to you ice cold—fresh from the churning, it is a most delicious and appetizing Summer beverage. A glass frequently dur- ing the day will renew lost vitality due to the excessive heat. Highest Quality WASH LN UWLOK, STAR. GIANT POWER CHAIN IN SOUTH REPORTED Aluminum Co. of America Is Said to Plan $125,000,- 000 Project. By the Assoclated Press. ~ CHARLOTTE, N. C.,, August 8—The Charlotte Observer today says a “New Niagara” is planned in the mountains of North Carolina and Tennessee by the Aluminum Co. of America, which will spend $125,000,000 in development of hydro-electric projects. Through eight separate dams elec- trical power exceeding in magnitude the energy now generated by Niagara Falls will be created. Seven of the eight projects named in the newspaper story will be in Western North Caro- lina and the other in Tennessee. The projects in their totality are said to represent “one of the largest and most ambitious power developments in the United States” and will require years to execute. Recent formation of the Natahala Power & Light Co., with principal of- fice at Bryson City, N. C., and an au- thorized capital stock of $10,000,000, is declared to be a step in the plans of the Alyninum Co. The lakes created by damming streams will wipe out the towns of Almond. Bushnell, Judson, Wesser, Forneys Creek, Eppes Springs and several smaller villages. The cost of relocating railroads and highways is given as $1,700,000. The Aluminum Co. of America ac- quired its first power site in Western North Carolina in 1905. Two plants now are in operation and a third is under construction. The Observer's story today says the first step in extension plans for devel- opment of the “New Niagara” will be construction of a plant at Fontana, on the Tennessee River. It declares two O}hprs are planned near the junction o Rivers, one at Needmore and one at Aquones. Andrew W. Mellon, Secretary of the ‘Treasury, is one of the principal stock- holders of the Aluminum Co. of America. the Tennessee and Tuckaseegee | Ve D. C., THURSUAY, Texas Goat Coming Here to Take Place Of Secretary’s Pet “Billie the Kid” to Suc- ceed “Capt. Bones,” , Barred From U. S. By the Assoclated Press. SAN ANGELO, Tex., August 8.— “Billie the Kid,” one of Texas’ 3,000,000 angora goats, leaves here today for ‘Washington, where he will become the pet of Secretary of State H. L. Stim- son. The goat, named after one of the Southwest’s most notorious bad men, will replace “Captain Bomes,” Stim- son’s pet goat which was lost when the Secretary moved to Washington from the Philippines. “Billie the Kid” is a gift to the Secretary from the Texas Sheep and Goat Raisers’ Association, ‘The trip will be a novelty for the goat which was raised 65 miles from the nearest railroad on the ranch of G. W. Stephenson, 75-year-old stock- man. Officers of the sheep and goat raisers’ association said that Billie, having licked all the goats on his range, was a prize animal and an aristocrat, but that he probably would have to lose many of his crude ways to minc!' with Washington society. FIRE THREATENS TANKER, DESERTED BY CREW OF 30 Flames Are Eating Through Coal Bunkers Toward Explo- sive Cargo. CANSO, N. S, August 8. —Abandoned by her crew, the tanker Mina Brae last night lay rolling helplessly 4 miles off Cranberry Head light with fire eating its way through the coal bunkers and threatening a cargo of gasoline and re- fined oil. Shortly before the fire started, Capt. | Calway and his crew of about 30 were take:s off by the Gloucester fishing schooner Catherine, commanded by | Capt. Archie MacLeod. No information as to how the fire started was available. It was thought possible here the flames might burn themselves out before reaching the ex- | plosive cargo. $32.50—50c Weekly We Give a Written Guarantee oxidaitulast {75 mql.uckusiar 5 4 Y/ $49.50—$1.00 Weekly Wear a Ring of Romance ) -~ o Girl O'Min,, $110—$2.00 Weekly See These Rings in Our Window Dairy Products Try it—a note in your bottle tomorrow will assure you getting this superior Buttermilk with your regular milk delivery daily. A few days’ trial will convince you of its rightful place among our AU ST 8, 1929, SUPPOSED MADMAN SOUGHT INCHIEAGE Farmer Runs Amuck, Defying Officers—Flees Into Tim- ‘ ber Heavily Armed. | | | By the Associated Press. CHICAGO, August 8—A supposed | madman ran amuck early last night | and was surrounded today by a scaze of county police under orders to sho®. to kill. He had taken refuge in a Cook | County forest preserve when he was routed from his home with tear and stench bombs. | Harry Weider, 50, a farmer near Wheeling, I, was the man sought. He had attacked John Wilinski, State this- tle commissioner, yesterday afternoon when the official ordered him to cut the weeds about his shack. Wilinski, severe- ly beaten by the farmer, swore out a warrant for his arrest and returned to the farmer’s home with several police- men. A volley from an automatic rifle, fired through a window, forced the officers to cover. The police opened fire and soon Welder's wife, daughter and two sons fled from the dwelling. The siege continued until dark, when Weider slipped from the house and ran to & heavily wooded section of the forest preserve. Prom there he fired numerous shots at his besiegers and motorists passing on the Dundee road. The high- way finally was closed to traffic. Officers, aware that Weider was armed with an automatic rifle and several pis- tols, were prepared for a hot fight x’}aen they sought to seize the fugitive ay. NORTHWEST CORNER 14% Anp K CHITECTURALLY an outstanding &ggtribu. tion to the Capital’'s skyline, W gton’s newest office building stands pre-eminent in its many advantages offered the professional man or business firms of the better class . . . the reasonable rental schedule will reveal that tenancy in the city’s fore- most building is actual economy. Space now available in units of from one room up, with ceveral choices of exposure and outlook. YOUR INSPECTION INVITED H.L.Rust Compan 1001 15 §t.N.W..NAt1 8100 CLOSED ALL DAY SATURDAY—SHOP FRIDAY, TILL 6 PM. The Very Finest of Our COOL SUMMER SUITS Reduced Now From $35to TWO-TROUSERS SUITS FROM OUR HIG HER - PRICED SPRING STOCK IT‘S simply a case of reducing stocks—for as far as quality goes, and style, these Suits are strictly up to Saks standards and your standards. Included are 2button and 3-button models, smartly developed in the popular Tan and Gray shades. All sizes. Saks—Third Floor. - WE don’t believe it will take much persuasion to bring you in—when, at a price like $26.50, you may take your pick of the most superbly tai- lored Summer Suits in the house! OR instance, you will find striking 3-piece (Coat, Vest dand Trousers) Suits of finest Tropical Worsteds as well as lightweight Summer Tweeds and Twists. BESIDES, you will find a handsome assortment of 2- piece (Coat and Trousers) Suits in fashionable Silverton fab- rics in the wanted Tans and Grays. Unquestionably — the opportunity is big! Saks—Third Floor. Reduced! HIGHER-PRICED SUMMER SUIT S— TROPICALS — GAB- ARDINES AND FINE MOHAIRS $19 COAT AND TROUSERS TH]S price could be many dollars higher—and the value would etill be decidedly unusual. The models are those of the present Summer—the shades and patterns are those of the pres- ent Summer. There are light and dark effects, plain and patterned; and every Suit is richly silk-trim- med. Saks—Third Floor.