DICTOGRAPH ARREST

Hokitika Guardian, 16 December 1920, Page 1

DICTOGRAPH ARREST

CARUSO’S LOST JEWELS. NEW YORK, Oct. 20. A* arrest was made under dramatic circumstances last evening of a man alleged to have been connected with the robbery of a large quantity of jewellery from the summer home of Signor Caruso, the tenor, three months ago, while the singer was in Cuba.

Two women known to the New York' public as the Poillon . sisters, whose escapades have frequently made them the subject of newspaper notoriety, are responsible for this latest development in the robbery, which caused consternation in the fashionable colony of Hampstead, Long Island. A few days ago they visited the offices of the company with which Signor Caruso had had bis wife’s jewels insured and said they believed they were in communication • with a man concerned in the robbery who had offered to sell them “a quantity of Caruso’s gems.” The police were notified and dictographs (small machines easily concealed and containing an extreemly sensitive microphone or telephone transmitter) were installed in the women’s flat, one behind a tapestry and the other under a bed with wires leading to the roof, where detectives and shorthand writers hid.

The man, who gave his name as Henry V. Tobaek, called at the hour lie had fixed. According to the police who listened he offered to sell to the sisters £9,000 worth of Caruso’s diamonds for £6,000. He is said to have suggested that the amount he paid in cash at an hotel in Baltimore where the stones were hidden. The women tentatively assented and made plans to accompany him back to Baltimore, but as the man left the flat he was met at the door by a detective and arrested. He denied any connection with the jewel theft, although lie admitted the trend of the conversation,, which, lie said, was a ruse to get the two women to Baltimore, where he Imped to sell them an expensive sable coat.

The Poillon sisters, Katherine and Charlotte,’ who have previously been conspicuous as volunteer and amateur detectives, will share the reward of £2,000 offered by Signor Caruso if the arrest results in the /discovery of. the stolen jewels. WHISKY IN A HE All SIC. . NEW YOHK, Oct. 20, Prohibition enforcement agents believe they have accomplished something in the seizure of a motor-hearse as it was about to be driven aboard the New Jersey ferry For weeks reports have been made about a mysterious black wagon which left behind it whisky of fair, or better, quality each time it passed. As the motor-hearse rolled up to the entrance of the New Jersey ferry yesterday afternoon three prohibition agents demanded of ihe two innocentlooking individuals on the box that they should open the vehicle. Instead of the usual coffin, was discovered a long box containing a number of fivegallon glgss kegs of liquor, which, according to the subsequent analysis, was high-grade rye whisky. The traffic in liquor among “bootleggers” (n colloquialism describing illicit dealers) is so general ns to lead many to the bqhef that it is -the plan of the Government to let the country drink itself dry, on the theory that it san better control the manufacture of new liquor than -the distribution of the large amount tliat still remains in veriuaont warehouses.