The Persistent Bootlegger
After multiple arrests and a brief escape to Seattle, a local 'bootlegger' is being used by police to trap the druggist supplying his liquor.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
W. A. Bell, a self-confessed 'bootlegger,' was arrested for the third time yesterday afternoon by Detectives Huckaba and Fackler and is now in a cell at the city jail without access to bail. Bell was arrested Sunday, charged with peddling bottled whisky to friends on the streets. A prominent druggist bailed him out, but he was later re-arrested so that the police would have evidence against the druggist who furnished him with the liquor. Monday afternoon, however, he escaped from jail and went to Seattle, being subsequently arrested a third time. The city attorneys are making arrangements to prosecute the drug dealer who sold the whisky to Bell.
“A prominent druggist bailed him out, but he was later re-arrested so that the police would have evidence against the druggist.”
Long before modern drug enforcement sting operations, Tacoma police were already utilizing street-level sellers to target upstream distributors. The 'druggist-as-dealer' trope was a common legal loophole in an era of tightening liquor laws.
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