True Stories of Crime From the District Attorney's Office

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ce of his class, been "due" for a long time. The stolen property in question was the sum of thirty thousand five hundred dollars in greenbacks, part of the loot o

ding curtly to his lawyer, he turned to be led away by the court attendant. The fortune snatched from his client had procured for him the most adroit of couns

rong as a bull, bluff, good-natured, reckless and of iron nerve, he would have given good account of himself as an Indian fighter or frontiersman. His fine presence, his great vitality, his coarse humor, his confidence and bravado, had won for him many friends of a certain kind and engende

" he had said to Miller in his office. "Han

a god knowing both good and evil, as well as how to eschew the one and avoid the other. Miller hated, loathed and feared him, yet freely entrusted his libert

convict, to the stand to testify against him. A curious contrast they presented as they faced one another; the emaciated youth of twenty-five, the hand of Death already tightly fastened upon his meagre frame, coughing, hollow-cheeked, insignificant, flat-nosed, almost repulsive, who dragged himself to the witness chair, and the swaggering athlete who glared at him from the bar surrounded by his cordon

erable fraud from start to finish, carried on and guided by the advice of the defendant. He told how he, a mere boy of twenty-one, burdened with a sick wife and baby, unfitted by training or ability for any sort of lucrative employment, a hanger-on of bucket shops and, in his palmiest days, a speculator in tiny lots of feebly margined stocks, finding himsel

tined to be the scene of one of the most extraordinary exhibitions of man's cupidity and foolishness in modern times. At first he had tramped round, like a pedler, delivering the dividends himself and soliciting more, but soon he hired a boy. This was in February, 1899. Business increased. The golden flood began to appear in an attenuated but constant rivulet. He hired four more employees and the whole top floor of the house.

Street quarters were besieged by a clamoring multitude fighting to see which of them could give up his money first, and there had to be a special delivery for Miller's mail. He rented the whole house and hired fifty clerks. You could deposit your money almost anywhere, from the parlor to the pantry, the clothes closet or the bath-room. Fridays the public stormed the house en masse, since the money must be deposited on that day to draw interest for the following week. The crush was so enormous that the stoop broke down. Imagine it! In quiet Brooklyn! People struggling to get up the steps to cram their money into Miller's pockets! There he sat, behind a desk, at the top of the stoop, solemnly taking the money thrown down before him

s Franklin Syn

n of one Edward Schlessinger, and with him went to Charlestown, Mass., for the purpose of opening another office, in charge of which they placed a man na

rt of the receipts being laid aside to pay off interest checks and interest, and the balance divided. Schlessinger carried his off in a bag; Miller took the rest, cash, money orders and checks, and deposi

s of the circulars. When he was handed one of the printed receipts he said they were "incriminating." Miller must try to get them back. He advised (as many another learned counsellor has done) incorporating the business, since by this means stock could be sold and exchanged for the incriminating receipts. He explained the mistakes of the "Dean crowd," but showed how he had been able to safeguard them in spite of the fact that they had foolishly insisted on holding the stock in

with scathing attacks upon the Syndicate. The reporters became so inquisitive as to

ied by Miller, carrying a satchel which contained fifty thousand dollars in greenb

l right; you must g

sited Watts, the

calling the enterprise a "green goods business." If the thing wasn't all right, did Watts suppose that he, Col. Robert A. Ammon, would be conne

victims eager to withdraw their money from the Boston office of the Franklin Syndicate. Powers paid the "Pauls," of Boston, out of the bag brought on by Miller containing the deposits of the "Peters," of Brooklyn. Meantime, Ammon addressed the throng, incidentally blackguarding a Post reporter before the crowd, telling them that his paper was a "yel

ob Ammon. He advised stimulating deposits and laying hands on all the money possible

, to begin Saturday or Monday morning. Big prof

M F. M

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up. There were scare-heads in the papers. Miller saw detectives on every corner, and, like a rat leaving a sinking ship, Schlessinger scuttled away for the la

hursday remained until about twelve o'clock noon, when he placed thirty thousand five hundred dollars i

," announced

a run for it," said Ammon. "The be

he contents to his own account, as well as the certificate of deposit for one hundred thousand dollars previously mentioned, and a check for ten thousand dollars, representing the balance of Miller's loot. In addition to this he received an order for forty thousand dollars United States Government bonds, which were on deposit with Wells, Fargo & Co., and later, through Miller's father, sixty-five thousand dollars in bonds of the New York Central Railroad and the United States Government. Thus Ammon secured from his dupe the sum of two hundred an

ps and a receipt si

drug store and a Chinese laundry, finally made the elevated railroad, with his pursuer at his heels, and eventually reached the lawyer's office about two o'clock in the afternoon. Word was received almost immediately over the telephone that Miller had been indicted in Kings County for conspiracy to defraud, and Ammon stated that the one thing for Miller to do was to go away. Miller replied that he did not want to go unless he could take his wife and baby with him, but Ammon assured hi

lly fortune to another for the other's asking, without even taking a scrap of paper to show for it. More than that, he had then voluntarily extinguished himself. Had Ammon not chuckled he would not have been Bob Ammon. The money was stolen, to be sure, but Ammon's skirts were clear. There was nothing to show that the two hundred and forty-five thousand dollars he had received was stolen money. There was only one man-a discredited felon, who could hint that the mon

ud which had been perpetrated. The grand jury of the county started a general investigation. Public indignation was stirred to the point of ebullition. In the midst of the rumpus, there came a knock on the office door of the Hon. John F. Clark, D

inquired nonchalantly,

he District Attorney by every means in his power, but denied knowing the whereabouts of Miller, alleging that he was simply acting as his counsel. Mr. Clark replied that in Miller's absence th

turned Mr. Clark, "the grand j

towards the door of the grand jury room. Just outside he sudd

forgot that I have an engagemen

k, "I do not think you

safely ensconced without

gaming tables until he was called to his final account a year or two ago. The money which he took has never been traced. Miller was tried, convicted and

turned State's evidence. It is interesting to note that among the counsel representing Miller upon his trial was Ammon himself. Miller's wife and child were not sent to Montreal by Ammon, nor did the latter secure bail fo

eemed small indeed. The reader must bear in mind that up to the time of Ammon's trial Miller had never admitted his guilt; that he was still absolutely, and apparently irrevocably, under Ammon's sinister influence, keeping in constant commun

as his parting injunction to his dupe on his final visit to Sing Sing

, and the stipend was increased to the m

dred dollars received by Ammon from Miller and deposited with Wells, Fargo & Co. was the identical money stolen by Miller from the victims of the Franklin Syndicate. It was easy enough to prove that Miller stole hundreds of thousands of dollars, that Ammon rec

alth was such as to necessitate his being transferred to the hospital ward. Several of the District Attorney's assistants visited him at various times at Sing Sing in the h

in conversation while the District Attorney occupied himself with other business in another part of the ward, but it was easily apparent that Miller would say nothing. The District Attorney then approached the bed where Miller was lying and inquired if it were true that he declined to say anything which might tend

ting that he was a miserable swindler and thief, who had robbed thousands of poor people of all the money they had in the world, that he showed himself devoid of every spark of decency or repentance by refusing to assist the law in punishing his confederate and assisting his victims in getting back wha

ak to the District Attorney alone. With some reluctance

ould gladly die, if by doing so I could pay them back. But I haven't a single cent of all the money that I stole and the only thing that stands between my wife and baby and starvation is my kee

yes were not entirely dry as

receive forty dollars a month, for the money in my charge cannot be used for such a purpose; all I can assure you of is that, should you decide to help me, a full and fair statement of all you may have done will be sent to the Governor with a request that he act favorably

e and full confession, not only assisting in every way in securing evidence for the prosecution of Ammon, but aiding his trustee in bankruptcy to determine the whereabouts of some sixty thousand dollars of the stolen money, which but for him wou

y the certificates of deposit which Ammon had, with his customary bravado, made out in his own handwriting, no room was left for even the slightest doubt, not only that the money had been stolen but that Ammon had received it. Indeed so plain was the proposition that the defence never for an instant contemplated the possibility of putting Ammon upon the stand in his own behalf. It was in truth an extraordinary case, for the principal element in the proof was made out by the evidence of the thief himself that he was a thief. Miller had been tried and convicted of the very larceny to which he now testified, and, although in the eyes of the law no principle of res adjudicata could apply in Ammon's case, it was a logica

points urged by

only as Miller's counsel,

y stolen from the victims of the Franklin syndicate. As bearing upon this they urged that the stolen money had in fact been deposited by Miller himself, and so had lost th

g only as a lawyer was quickly

effect that the defendant, as a lawyer, had a perfect right to advise Miller, but I k

which person performed the physical act of placing the cash in the hands of th

at doubt as to whether in the eyes of the law Miller, the thief, could be regarded as an accomplice of Ammon in receiving the s

ily inadequate, since under the laws of the State of New York, the receiver of stolen goods, however great his moral obliquity may be, and however great the amount stolen, can only receiv

-stricken clerk, or the shrewd, experienced lawyer who preye

e he had to pay is known to himself alone. But the horrors of life in prison for the "squealer" were thoroughly familiar to him when he elected to d

, in reporting the affirmance of Goslin's conviction, "e

ho help the State-the absolute black silence of convict excommunication, the blows and kicks inflicted without opportunity for retaliation

margin he set out to secure. Then when he saw how easy it was to get money for the asking, he dropped the idea of speculation and simply became a banker. He did make one bona-fide attempt, but the stock went down, he sold out and netted a small loss. Had Miller actually continued

and clients among the inmates. He brought a social position which had its value.

his act of executive clemency, many honest folk in Brooklyn and elsewhere loudly expressed their indignation. District Attorney Jerome did not escape their blame. Was this contemptible thief, this meanes