PROTECTING THE PUBLIC

Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 11, 12 July 1930, Page 23

PROTECTING THE PUBLIC

RACE GANGS IN ENGLAND

I Each year at the Kacing Conference the 'orderly nature of Dominion courses and absence of the criminal element is commented on. In England a good deal has been done in recent years, as the following story shows, but the undesirable element is still in evidence on trains and the outskirts of races.

One thing which surprised colonial visitors to English racecourses a few years ago was the latitude allowed the tough element on racecourses, states an exchange. A prominent English sporting writer took "the boys"—as they are called —to task in a London paper, and said it was time the Jockey Club curbed them. The "boys" resented his' comments, and, taking the trouble to locate his private residence in. the suburbs, waited for him, and so brutally assaulted him that he was in hospital a long time. After that the Jockey Club had tv take notice and established a police organisation which has broken up most of the gangs which terrorised racegoers and bookmakers. It is estimated that these blackmailers, bullies. and thieves have been reduced by SO per cent.

About seven years ago the Jockey Club began its systematic cleansing of the Turi. It engaged-as its chief organiser a man of great police experience. He has with him about half a dozen supervisors and a comparatively small clerical staff. The new organisation first turned its attention to "welshing," which it has almost completely eliminated.

When investigations were first set on foot it was discovered that some of the trouble was in the roots as well as in the^ branches. Certain gatemen, ring eusI todians, and others were found to be I making quite big sums of ?noney by selling pitches" to bookmakers, admitting known thieves to the 7'i'ngs, and .of even levying blackmail on unsuspecting backers. One by one these men were found guilty and quietly removed. Now nearly nil lb.e men employed in responsible positions on English racecourses to-day may be accepted as of proved integrity and incorruptibility.

The value and effectiveness of the new organisation was proved the moment the totalisator was introduced. On the first day of the operation of the betting machine at Newmarket last year thieves and pickpockets simply swarmed round the gates in the hope of reaping a fine harvest once they were iuside. Not one of them was ■ admitted, and seeing the game was up they returned to town. Unfortunately, while such undesirables can be kept out of the ring, they 'cannot be barred from travelling in trains and other conveyances to race meetings. Cardsharping; on race trains is undoubtedly on the increase. This is particularly true of the service to Newmarket. Scores of these crooks travel down on "specials" and loaf away the interval before the return journey in local hotels, but they dare not go near the course.

About a couple of years ago, on a train between Liverpool and London, "the boys" raided the first-class compartments when their occupants had p-one to the dining-car, and took everything portable in the way of suit-cases, .field-glasses, ;uul luggage of every kind.