The White River Potato Swindle
A Tacoma produce buyer exploits a legal loophole to walk free after tricking local farmers out of their harvest.
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.
The prosecution of Abraham Hockwald, a Tacoma potato buyer, ended in Judge Humes' court after Hockwald was accused of swindling farmers near Kent and Slaughter. Hockwald had purchased several carloads of potatoes from local ranchers like Dennis Mullin and Jeffs, paying with checks that were subsequently dishonored. When arrested for grand larceny, Hockwald argued successfully that because the farmers had voluntarily transferred the title of the goods upon receiving the checks, the transaction was a sale, not theft. Judge Humes agreed that under the current law, larceny would not lie if the vendor consented to part with the title, even if the buyer had no intention of paying. The prosecution has signaled its intent to appeal this ruling to the supreme court to address the loophole.
“The prosecution wants to see whether there is any way in which such practices can be stopped.”
This 1893 case highlights a recurring tension in Seattle’s history: the struggle of small producers against predatory middlemen. The legal debate over whether fraud constitutes theft or a ‘failed contract’ remains a point of contention in modern commercial law.
From readers
No comments yet. If you know something about this story — a correction, a family memory, a source — it belongs here.