Opium Smuggler Intercepted on the Great Northern
Customs officers tracked a shipment of 'dope' from Vancouver to Ballard, arresting a man who tried to hide the illicit goods in a bedroll.
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The customs officers secured another lot of opium yesterday, thirty-two pounds or sixty-four five-tael cans of Victoria manufacture being seized while in the possession of George Manser. A telegraphic tip from the north induced Inspectors Humes and Lord to go to Ballard, where they boarded the Great Northern train and arrived here shortly after 5 o'clock. Meantime they had changed their game and arrested Manser. He had as baggage one innocent-looking roll of blankets, which of itself might not have attracted attention, but neatly rolled up inside was the dope. Manser admitted that he had brought the stuff from Vancouver, but claimed he did not know what was in the bundle, as he was carrying it for a friend and had no property interest in it. He was taken before Commissioner Emery, who committed him to jail to await examination today.
“He had as baggage one innocent-looking roll of blankets, which of itself might not have attracted attention, but neatly rolled up inside was the dope.”
Opium smuggling was a frequent target of federal intervention in the 1890s, often serving as a pretext for the broader enforcement of exclusionary laws. This report illustrates the era's intensifying border scrutiny and the criminalization of trans-border trade.
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