A Customs Official, a Forged Check, and the Opium Hidden in Coal-Oil Tins

PORT TOWNSEND, Jan. 23.—Special.—Ex-United States Immigration Inspector Thomas M. Fisher was arrested tonight by United States Marshal Bridges on a charge of forgery alleged to have been committed at Portland, September 5, 1893. He is charged with forging the indorsement of a Canadian customs officer to a check issued by Collector of Customs Taylor, of Astoria, and collecting thereon $350.

The Canadian officer had previously given information to local customs officers which led to the seizure of 400 pounds of opium on the steamer Wilmington in the Columbia river in September, 1892. His name was entered on the seizure book as an informer, and after a delay the government finally awarded him $350 and instructed the collector to pay him. The steamer Wilmington sailed from Vancouver in September, 1892, with 600 tins of prepared opium for the Columbia river. In response to a telegram from Vancouver, local officers had the Astoria officials search the vessel, and they found 300 pounds stored in coal-oil tins, which was seized. The remainder was captured the following day at Portland.

Subsequently, when the opium was condemned and sold by the government, the Canadian employed Lockwood & Mulkey, attorneys at Portland, to represent his interests. He was unable to get any of the reward, and, on account of being in the employ of the Canadian government, was afraid to publicly appear as a claimant lest he should lose his official position. Then he complained to the local authorities, and the Treasury Department detailed officers to investigate. Fisher went to Portland in October, 1894, and in the presence of Deputy Collector McKenzie, of Seattle, conferred with Attorney George C. Strout, who claimed to be representing the informer. The canceled check was found at the First National Bank and bore the indorsement of the informer and that of Lockwood.

Fisher tonight denied positively the charge of forgery and exhibited documentary proof showing that he was in the northern part of Washington during the time mentioned in the indictment. Col. Fisher is prosecuting attorney of Island county, deputy clerk of the superior court, and commander of a local G. A. R. post. In a letter to the Treasury Department in October, 1893, he had urged payment of the informer's award and warned that "some unauthorized person received and appropriated the same, and in so doing forgery was committed." Mulkey, the attorney, is a cousin to ex-Special Agent Mulkey, now convicted of smuggling opium and Chinese into the United States.