TRICKED OUT OF £50,000.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXII, Issue 815, 22 February 1910, Page 3

TRICKED OUT OF £50,000.

ENGLISH VICTIMS OF THE POST-MORTEM SWINDLE.

New York, Dec. 22

The police arrested a man named Charles Adams this afternoon on a charge of fleecing various English people out of ,£50,000 during the past five years by variations 0! the “confidence” trick.

Adams is alleged to be the leader of a gang of swindlers who watched the death notices in the London papers. When they saw that a business man was dead, a member of the gang wrote him a long letter recalling the fact that deceased had been a great friend of the writer, and had loaned him money years ago.

This money the writer wished to repay by informing the deceased that a fortune was awaiting him if he would invest in certain securities. The writer urged the deceased to send the money immediately. The gang counted on the letter being read by the relatives of the dead man, believing that the latter would send the money as requested.

A surprisingly large number of people have been swindled in this manner. A chief inspector of the Post Office Department, who tracked Adams, says that one woman, a widow of a wealthy Fnglishman, whose name is withheld, was recently swindled out of ,£[o,ooo, while another Roudon victim lost ,£4OOO.