AN OLD FRAUD.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 56, 7 March 1914, Page 4

AN OLD FRAUD.

That evergmeu imposition—t)i o Spanish prisoner fraud-dms had a fairly long run, and despite the numberless exposures if seems necessary to again |

warn tho credulous British people about it, and Sir Arthur Ilvrdmgo has been doing so. It i. rtat-.d that epute twenty years age, v. her, Sir Robert Anderson was at Scotland Yard, a case came under his uol.ee uherein it was alleged that a Spanish revolutionist had come to London nilli some b" 000 for the purchase of arms. Before lie could complete the transaction a telegram from a dying wife' in Spain had summoned him home. Knowing no one in England, he had buried the money in a field, of which be had kept a plan, and thou returned to Spain, to be imprisoned on a political charge. By the connivance of a priest he had contrived to smuggle a letter out of the ! gaol, wherein it was stated that the plan’of the field was in a portmanteau, which fortumuch had been seized by iiis creditors. £90!) would, however,' relieve his necessities, and for that ( sum the plan of the field would he handed over, and the benefactor could recoup himself with the hidden I mi-, sure. At this point Sir Robert inter-' rupted iiis informant with the re-, mark, “You have not told me the whole story ; you have kept back everything about the prisoner’s lovely daughter. Have yon got- her photograph in your pocket?” His informant blushingly protested that the “lovely daughter” element was immaterial. Despite Sir Robert’s warning, a meeting was arranged in Spain, the £9OO was handed over to the ex-prisoner, who had just been released (!), and an appointment made for tho transfer of the plan of the field. Jn a few hours the deluded philanthropist received a telegram telling him that the oxprisouer feared rearrest and had fled to Franco, where he could he soon at a certain address, which, of course, lie never was. And so, ever since tho game has gone merrily on.