WHOLESALE CRIME

Hokitika Guardian, 15 December 1932, Page 8

WHOLESALE CRIME

CREATING ALARM IN AMERICA

NEAYi YORK, December 9

The ravages of “racketeering” in the buttness life cf American cities are. creating widespread alarm. The state of affairs in Chicago was described recently by'Mr Cordon Hostetter, director of the Employers’ Association, which, he stated, is engaged in a determined effort to defeat an attempt to “organise” the milk business. The leader of this “racket” tried to bribe officials of the Milk Wagon Drivers’ Union with offers of £20,030 ' each if they would agree to permit him and his machine-gunner® to “discipline” the trade. The plan was rejected and the union officials now reach their headquarters in armoured motor-cars, while a police m'achine- | gun squad guards their offices during ■ business bonus. Unless racketeering is checked, Mr Hostetter said, armoured offices with armed guards in every city will be the inevitable sequels. Business racketeering evils, arc already beginning to supplant those of prohibition as a menace of equal size and viciousness. Ini four years Chicago business men have suffered 500 bomb explosions, and an annual cost estimated at £30,000,003. The criminal underworld’s parti in the “racket” is to bomb, to commit arson, to club, to aim, and to terrorise citizens into staving away from the election polls. In Chicago there were more than ICO “rackets” of this character, to which shopkeepers, clerks and labourers subscribe for “protection.” Do- 1 litiea] influence and antiquated laws, render the racketeer almost immune from punishment. Unless the public is aroused to the danger of racketeering, he declared, industry will become cl in plotely ga ngstcr isecl.