Evening Star Newspaper, October 26, 1930, Page 97

-~ THE 'SUIBAY STAR, WASHINGTON, < P. C, OCTOBER 26 1930. o J— 13 T'raps “Ninth Man” Only to Set Him Free Arthur W. Cutten, Chicago millionaire grain operator. €6 END him back where he is building a character for himself.” * When Arthur W. Cutten, mil- lionaire grain operator of Chicago, made this recommendation to Prosecutor Chauncey W. Reed of Du Page County, Il, he saved Casper Rosenberg, long an outlaw and now a successful real estate agent, from a long prison term. But Mr. Cut- ten by his magnanimous action did something even more spectacular than that. By his state- ment he relinquished a policy of reprisal for a great wrong committed against himself and members of his family, which he has followed relentlessly for more than eight years. Casper Rosenberg is one of nine men who in March, 1922, entered the famous financier's home, robbed it of loot valued at many thou- sands of dollars and locked Mr. Cutten, his wife, his brother and several servants in a vault, where, but for a fortunate escape, they might have perished from suffocation. The other eight are either behind bars or on parole today as a result of arrests and convictions due to Mr. Cutten’s persistent search. Casper Rosenberg will go free, with all the charges against him quashed, because his efforts to be- come a productive and law-abiding member of . society have appealed to his former victim’s sense of generosity. ‘The story of Mr. Cutten’s unremittent efforts to apprehend and punish the men guilty of the outrage against him is dramatic enough to be, likened by Prosecutor Reed to Dumas’ story of the Count of Monte Cristo and his success- ful vendetta against the enemies who sought to have him immured for life in a dungeon of the gloomy Chateau d'If. Although the total value of the plunder seized by the robbers did not exceed $20,000, Mr. Cutten has spent in the last eight years no less than $30,000 in bringing them, one by one, to justice. “The money and jewelry were nothing,” Mr. Cutten said in explaining his determination to apprehend every member of the bandit gang. “What made me determined to get them, if it took a lifetime, was the fact that they tied up Mrs. Cutten, tied up my brother and tied up the servants and then locked us in the base- ment vault to be smothered to death. ‘“That was an unnecessary, futile and fiendish piece of cruclty. It filled me with rage and I vowed then that I'd spend every dollar at my command, if necessary, to put them where they belonged—behind bars. “ I never let up. When a man comes into my house and robs me and my family, then Jocks us in a vault where we might have suffo- cated—well, I'll get him.” LIKE the reprisal, the robbery of Mr. Cutten’s home in March of 1922 was dramatic in the extreme. The plot was originated by one Joseph Vormittag, a former butler in the pala- tial Cutten residence that stands on the farm and showplace of the daring grain-pit operator at Downers Grove, one of Chicago’s most fashe ionable and expensive suburbs. - Vormittag, ace cording to a confession obtained after his cape ture, had considered first the project of kidnap- ing Mr. Cutten and holding him for a huge ransom, but finally decided that the risk of capture of any gang which kidnaped so famous a man was too great. Another version of his tale is that the gang accually followed Mr. Cutten’s automobile in two cars as he drove to the home from Chicago, but failing to overtake it at a lonely enough spot to put the plan safely into effect, deter- mined to raid the house instead. As accomplices he chose eight men whom he had met in the Chicago underworld. Their names, as later confessed by him, were Joseph Cornelissen, Gustave Kawell, John Kiminne, John Cuda, Paul Graborski, Otto Tempers and the Rosenberg brothers, Simon and Casper. In their two cars the men drove at night to the Downers Grove estate, brought the butler to the door by a subterfuge, entered after threat- ening him with revolvers and in an armed group made their way to the dining room, where Mr. Cutten, his wife and his brother were at dinner. Unwisely, perhaps, the bandits wore no masks. The butler, though cowed by the display of weapons, nevertheless studied each of their Saces carefully, & precaution which proved in- Mercy Stays Chicago Millionaire’s Final Vengeance Against LastMan of Gang T'hat Robbed His. Home andThen ImprisonedHis FamilyEight Years Ago. valuable in identifying and eonvicting eight of the men as thiey were captured in later years. In the dining room the gailg forced members of the family and servants to line up against the wall, took a necklace and ring valued at $17,000 from Mrs. Cutten, gathered silverware from the table and money from the two men, then forced the master of the house to lead them to a vault in the basement where several thousand dollars’ worth of liquor, retained from the days before prohibition, was stored. After the vault had been emptied of its cases, the victims were ordered inside and the door locked from without, while the robbers piled their loot in a stolen car' and drove away. FOE’I’UNATELY, one of the servants was able, after a few minutes of agonizing uncer- tainty, to force the door of the vault. A pur- suit was begun in another car and the robbers were almost overtaken, but managed to escape under gun fire. Mr. Cutten, however, was de- termined that their escape should be only tem- porary. He could afford to forget the monetary loss caused by their raid. But he could never forget the heartlessness and cruelty of their methods. He anade a public statement to that effect and backed it by offering large rewards for the outlaws’ capture. But the successful and courageous pit and market operator, accustomed to fight his own battles vigorously, did not rely on the police alone. He hired private detectives to follow every clue that promised the capture of any of the gang. . Eventually the appearance of some of the rare liquor at a Chicago underworld re- sort put detectives on the trail. They found and arrested Vormittag, who had made his hid- ing place Chicago. From him they learned the identity of the other bandits, and the long manhunt continued. In three years detectives, moving from city to city, never lacking for funds which might aid their pursuit, had run down and gathered seven more of the men. ALIBIB proved useless against the careful web of evidence which Mr. Cutten’s agents built up. Some went to the State Penitentiary at Joliet. Some confessed and are now out on probation. Some turned State’s evidence. Finally, early this year, Simon Rosenberg was captured in Cleveland. Private detectives em- ployed by Cutten had followed him from the Pacific to the Atlantic Coast, from the northern boundary of the country to the southern, then to Cleveland, before the arrest was made. Un- | der many aliases he had moved from city to city, sometimes working as an insurance solici- tor, sometimes in other jobs, but never quite able to shake the sleuths off his trail. “Number eight,” pronounced Mr. Cutten as he read the message which told of the arrest. “When I get number nine—this one’s brother— I'll be through with the job.” Then Casper was found. Realizing the re- lentless character of the pursuit and the in- evitability @f capture, he walked into the office of Prosecutor Reed and surrendered. “Cutten wins,” he said. “I've been hunted Jong enough.” It was learned that after the robbery he had fled to Ohio and then to Canada, finally set- tling down in a small Middle Western town, determined to make an honorable career for himself. For five years he lived there, gaining the respect of the community and even winning the presidency of a fraternal lodge. He had brought his family to the city and established a home there, But the sword hanging con- stantly over his head proved too much. He de- termined to end the suspense by direct action, and therefore surrendered himself to the proper authorities. 5 These facts were laid before Mr. Cutten. What guided hft consideration of them he has never told. Pethaps his sense of justice was satisfied by the completion of his object in bringing the entire group of bandits into the arms of the law. More probably the evidence that a man once capable of so ugly a crime also was capable of rehabilitating himself ap- pealed to his own constructive tendencies. ‘Whatever guided his judgment, Mr. Cutten de- clined to press the charges, and as a result Prosecutor Reed succeeded in having the charge of robbery quashed and Rosenberg was free to return to his family, his business and his new associations. The persistence displayed by Mr. Cutten in his search for the bandits and the successful termination of that search came as no surprise to those who have followed his career in the business world. Determination and success are characteristic of him, whether in Board of Trade operations or elsewhere. The chase di- rected by him was, in fact, no more spectacular than had been many of the stories told of his extraordinary career and coups in the wheat pit and the stock exchange. Born in Guelph, An exciting moment in the wheat pit of the Chicago Board of Trade, where Myr. Cutten made his fortune. - v Ontario, in 1870, he went to Chicago in M4 early twenties and began his long, hard climb up the millionaire’s ladder as a clerk in a hard« ware store. His salary was small enough to keeb him good at figures and make him the power of dollars accumulated. He the world markets, poring over the lessons supply and demand and analyzing crop condi« tions. Later he became a clerk in a graig broker's office and there delved further into the problems of corn and wheat. i There came a day when he did not appear at his desk in the grain broker’s office. Shortly - after the market had opened his boss found him, pencil and paper in hand, just inside the door on, the floor of the Board of Trade. “What the blazes are you doing in hewe, Art?” his employer questioned. ¥ “Oh, I forgot to tell you. I want to be fired,® was the young man’s reply. “I'm on my own now.” For the next few years he was a “scalper,” playing the market for a slight rise or drop in corn or wheat, with an occasional dabble in rye, barley or oats. Once he took a “fiyer” in lard and reaped a nice profit. Other deals foly lowed, and in a relatively short time he was speculating in a large way. 2 i Because he had nothing to say regarding his deals and accepted no gratuitous advice, oldes speculators dubbed him the “lone wolf.” Seve eral years later they called him the “big bear,” for by adroit strokes he had gradually accumue- lated $1,000,000. His reputation for silence and ability grew with his wealth. Occasionally he spoke, fore« casting the market, and usually those who fole lowed his forecasts with investments profited thereby. The amount of his wealth was never made known, but in 1925, when personal income taxes were made public, it was learned that his was the largest of any one man in the Chicago district. : ESPITE his occasional statements on the future of the grain market, public gamey bling in that commodity has always been dis« couraged by Mr. Cutten. ¥ “There are so many wrecks down there in the pit!” he explained on one occasion. “If I had a son I wouldn’t let him touch it with a 10-fool pole. People call themselves brokers, but they are only part of that—the ‘broke’ part. Not more than 10 per cent of the men who go into grain remain. The rest pass out, and those who stay are mostly ‘broke’ brokers. ! “Their failing seems to be lack of nerve. They seem to lose it when they handle their own money. So they have to trade for others on a salary.” 3 Stories of large winnings in the New York stock market by Mr. Cutten were also: current during the boom days of 18 months ago. Rue" more emanatnig from Wall Street and circue lated throughout the financial district ‘credited, him at that time with cleaning up more than $18,000,000 in the stock of one corporation alone. New Yorkers were convinced thdt he was now playing the Eastern stock market in the same sensational way he dealt in wheat 1§ Chicago. Apart from profits made through his acquie sition of 100,000 shares of the stock, which rosp about 180 points after his purchase of it, Mn, Cutten was known to be a big holder of many other high-priced favorites. Today, it is saldy he continues his active, aggressive and d