The One-Armed Commission Man Who Took Yakima Farmers for $4,000
A Selah farmer travels to Seattle's federal grand jury to haul a smooth-talking produce swindler back from California — and the stationery he left behind may be the evidence that hangs him.
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.
Yakima Democrat: C. W. Bryant, a Selah farmer, who among others was victimized last winter by G. W. Allinger, the notorious one-armed commission house swindler, left for Seattle Tuesday to take the initial steps in the United States court toward bringing that smooth-tongued rascal back from the "Golden State" to stand trial.
Allinger, while here, worked the job office department of the Democrat for a large quantity of stationery, for which, of course, he never paid, as it was against his principles to pay anything that could be avoided. The use of this particular stationery, however, is likely to prove the undoing of Allinger. The form of letterhead used by Allinger was calculated to convince his trustful customers that the commission firm of Reidel & Allinger, with its branch establishments at North Yakima and other leading cities of the country, was one of the biggest and best things that "ever came down the pike." At any rate, Allinger succeeded in getting produce from Yakima farmers to the amount of about $4,000, and then skipped out.
In letters written to his victims since returning to his home at Alameda, Cal., Allinger has acknowledged the justice of the claims held here against him, but has tried to excuse himself on the plea that his partner in San Francisco "did him up."
Mr. Bryant went to Seattle armed with an affidavit from the publisher of this paper to the effect that the stationery used by Allinger to gull the public was printed in this office. Inasmuch as the fellow used the United States mails to carry out his swindling operations, the purpose is to prosecute him through the United States courts. The federal grand jury, now in session at Seattle, will be asked to bring in an indictment against Allinger on that ground.
“Allinger succeeded in getting produce from Yakima farmers to the amount of about $4,000, and then skipped out.”
Mail fraud was a young federal crime in 1904, and it was often the only tool rural victims had against a con man who had simply crossed a state line. Substitute a wire transfer or a fake online storefront for Allinger's letterhead, and the Yakima farmers' problem — the swindler is in another jurisdiction and the local sheriff can't touch him — is exactly the complaint of modern fraud victims chasing an out-of-state seller.
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