ACTION FRAUDS

Greymouth Evening Star, 11 October 1913, Page 5

ACTION FRAUDS

KXPOSED IN LONDON. SCOTLAND YARD HELPLESS. [TIMES-SYDNEY SUN SPECIAL CABLES.] (Received This Dav at 8 a.m.) LONDON, October 10. The public prosecutor is taking up a ease against the men connected with the side auction room on the Strand, charged with assaulting a Scotchman who tendered a sov-ereign in payment for a twopenny knife, but who did not receive the change. He called next day for it, but I,he three defendants attempted to eject him .breaking his nose. They were remanded in custody.

The Press is filled with complaints of people fleeced in such places. Scotland yard states that it is unable to take action. the people not caring to make a specific, charge.

HOW CRIME IS DETECTED. “There are, of course, no definite rules for crime detection.” said an officer at the detective headquarters at Scotland Yard, apronos of the ingenious method used by the nolice in securing the arrest of the man who sent threatening letters to Lord Rothschild, “but in two or three classes a simple method is nearly always infallible. For instance large contractors and horsekeeuers arc the victims of a particularly mean theft. Sometimes employees steal the fodder intended for the horses and .sell it. One effective method of detection in cases of this kind is to mix finely shredded paper with the chaff, and if a person is suspected of buying stolen property an analysis of the fodder in his possession will quickly prove if he is guilty. Then in tea warehouses where a large quantity is stolen every year, fine shot is mixed with the tea, and by its presence the thief can be traced. For a more scientific method of detection you can turn to cases of threatening letters. There was one quite recently. and to prove the guilt of the person suspected the officer in charge of the case, marked certain stamps with invisible ink. 'These were sold to the suspect in the ordinary way across the Post Office counter. When the next letter was received the stamp was stripped off and chemicals applied, with the result that the detective’s previously invisible writing at once appeared.”