tels or lands of the said Richard Roe within your precinct you cause to be levied, and the same being disposed of as the law directs, paid and satisfied unto the said Richard Grant one dollar for this writ, and thereof, also, to satisfy your own fees; and for want of goods, chattels or lands of the said Richard Roe, to be shown to you or found within your precinct to the acceptance of the said Richard Grant, to satisfy said sum of one dollar and your own fees, you are hereby commanded to take the body of the said Richard Roe and him commit to the keeper of the jail in Chelsea, in the county of Orange, within the jail, who is hereby commanded to receive the said Richard Roe and him safely keep until he pays said sum of one dollar and your own fees, or is discharged by the said Richard Grant, or otherwise by order of law.

Fail not, but service and return make within sixty days from date hereof.

Dated at Chelsea, in the county of Orange, the tenth day of July, A. D. 1899.

POSTAL CRIMES.

BY HAROLD N. ELDRIDGE.

1. CRIMINAL COMPLAINT FOR ATTEMPTING TO INDUCE POSTMASTER TO SELL STAMPS ON CREDIT, 98.

II. INDICTMENT, 99.

1. Against Post-office Employee, 99.

a. For Destroying or Secreting Letter, 99.
b. For Larceny of Contents of Letter, 100.
(1) By Clerk, 101.

(2) By Postmaster, 102.

c. For Unlawfully Detaining Letter, 103.

d. Postmaster Requiring Employee to Receipt for More Money than is Paid Him, 103.

2. For Advising Person Intrusted with Mail to Secrete and Destroy it, 104.

a. In General, 104.

b. To Secrete or Destroy a Particular Letter, 104.

3. For Assaulting Letter-carrier, 105.

4. For Breaking and Entering Post-office, 105.

a. In General, 105.

b. Building Used in Part as Post-office, 106.

5. For Buying, Receiving or Concealing Stolen Postage Stamps,

106.

6. For Conducting a Private Postal Route, 107.

1. For Enclosing Letter Mail in Circular, 107.

8. For Forging Money Order, 107.

9. For Mailing Matter Concerning Lottery, 108.

10. For Mailing Obscene Matter, 111.

a. Letter, 112.

b. Newspaper, 113.

c. Pamphlet or Circular, 115.

11. For Obstructing Passage of the Mails, 115.

12. For Opening Letter with Design to Obstruct Correspondence,

116.

13. For Robbing the Mails and Putting in Jeopardy Life of the Person Intrusted Therewith, 117.

14. For Using Mails to Defraud, 120.

a. By Use of Fictitious Name, 121.

b. In Execution of Conspiracy to Defraud, 124.

CROSS-REFERENCES.

For Forms of Indictments Against Post-office Employees for Embezzlement, see the title EMBEZZLEMENT, vol. 7, p. 489.

For Form of an Indictment for Larceny of Letter from Letter-box, see the title LARCENY, vol. 11, Form No. 12905.

Volume 14.

For Forms of Indictments for Larceny from Post-office, see the title LARCENY, vol. 11, p. 195.

For other Forms of Indictments for Sending Obscene and Indecent Publications by Mail, see the title OBSCENE, INSULTING, INDECENT AND ABUSIVE LANGUAGE, vol. 13,

p. 294.

ERAL

See also the GENERAL INDEX to this work.

I. CRIMINAL COMPLAINT FOR ATTEMPTING TO INDUCE POSTMASTER TO SELL STAMPS ON CREDIT.1

John H. Bario, being duly sworn, deposes and says that he is an inspector of the Post Office Department; that on October 23d, 1888, Charles Palliser of the city and State of New York, then and there doing business under the name and style of Palliser, Palliser & Co., at Old Lyme, in the county of New London, in the State and District of Connecticut, with force and arms unlawfully and wilfully did tender to one W. R. De Wolf, who then and there was and thereafter continued to be until the 4th day of March, 1899, a postmaster of the United States at a certain post office known as Black Hall, in said county of New London, a certain contract in the words and figures following:

Postmaster, Black Hall, Conn.

"New York, October 23, 1888.

Dear Sir: We desire in each county a place through which to send out mail matter, as we want to reach every business man, mechanic and real estate owner in every State by circular. If we ship to you from our printing department, located in the country in your State,

1. For the formal parts of a criminal complaint in a particular jurisdiction consult the title CRIMINAL COMPLAINTS, vol. 5, p. 930.

2. United States. - Every person who promises, offers or gives, causes, procures to be promised, offered or given, any money or other thing of value, or makes or tenders any contract, undertaking, obligation, gratuity or security, to induce any officer of the United States or any person acting for or on behalf of the United States in any official function under or by authority of any department or office of the government, to do or omit to do any act in violation of his lawful duty, shall be punished by a fine of not more than three times the amount of money or value of the thing offered, and shall

be moreover imprisoned not more than three years. Rev. Stat. (1878), $5451.

No postmaster of any class, or other person connected with the postal service, entrusted with the sale or custody of postage stamps, stamped envelopes, or postal cards, shall use or dispose of them in the purchase of debts, or in the purchase of merchandise, or other salable articles, or pledge or hypothecate the same, or sell or dispose of the same except for cash, on pain of being deemed guilty of a misdemeanor and punished accordingly. 20 U. S. Stat. at L. (1878), c. 259.

3. This complaint was held to charge a crime on the ground that if there was not an offer of money to the postmaster there was clearly a tender of a contract for the payment of money to him, with

say 5,000 or 10,000 circulars in envelopes, and each addressed, will you give the same your careful attention, sending out daily 50 to 100 during the coming months until they are all out, and then render us statement of same, with account for stamps used, and we will remit. We are doing this at other general store post offices in adjoining counties to yours, and it is perfectly legitimate, and we await your reply in addressed and stamped envelope enclosed herewith, as, if you cannot attend to same, we must at once send elsewhere.

Yours very truly,

Palliser, Palliser & Co." with the intent of him, the said Palliser, to induce him, the said De Wolf, as such postmaster, to do certain acts in violation of his lawful duty as such postmaster - that is to say, to sell him, the said Palliser, postage stamps of the United States otherwise than for cash, to wit, upon the credit of said Palliser, against the peace of the United States and contrary to the statutes thereof in such case made and provided. Deponent further says that said Charles Palliser is now within the Southern District of New York.

John H. Bario. Subscribed and sworn to before me this 27th day of September, 1889. John A. Shields, U. S. Commissioner.

At a stated term of the District Court of the United States for the eastern district of South Carolina, begun and holden at Charleston, within and for the district aforesaid, on the third Monday of Septem

ber in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and ninetyeight, the jurors of the United States of America within and for the district aforesaid on their oaths respectively do present that James L. Gruver, late of the county of Charleston, in the state of South Carolina, on the second day of April, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and eighty-eight, at said county of Charleston, in the state of South Carolina, in said district, and within the jurisdiction of this court, being employed in the postal service of the United States, to wit, as letter-carrier, in the post-office at Charleston, in the county of Charleston, in the said state and district, did then and there unlawfully destroy a certain letter which was intended to be conveyed by post, and came to the possession of him, the said James L. Gruver, as letter-carrier, aforesaid, and intrusted to him for delivery to the person to whom the same was addressed, to wit, H. W. Kinsman, at said Charleston, and which letter contained a check of great value, to wit, for the sum of fourteen dollars and twenty-nine cents, drawn by Edward Roberts on the Produce National Bank of Philadelphia, in the state of Pennsylvania, to the order of said H. W. Kinsman, contrary to the act of congress in such case made and provided, and against the peace and dignity of the United States of America. (Signature and indorsements as in Form No. 10731.)

b. For Larceny of Contents of Letter.'

tents of any letter, packet, bag, or mail of letters; and that the stealing or taking" the contents of said letter, etc., is a crime and the only crime punishable under section 5467. The court sustained the demurrer, holding that said section did not provide for two offenses, but that a person could be punished only when he embezzled, secreted or destroyed the letter or packet containing value or representative of value, and, in addition to this, stole or took the contents. This decision and several other decisions of a like character have been overruled by the case of U. S. v. Lacher, 134 U. S. 624, which decided that section 5467 did create two classes of offenses, one relating to the embezzlement of letters, etc., and the other to stealing the contents. By reason of this construction the above form undoubtedly charges an offense of the first class.

See generally, supra, note I, p. 99. 1. Requisites of Indictment, Generally. - For the formal parts of an indictment in a particular jurisdiction see the title INDICTMENTS, vol. 9, p. 615.

Jurisdiction of Post-office Department Over Letter. The indictment must show that the letter, the contents of which was stolen by the person em

ployed in the postal service, was one which had by some means come under the jurisdiction and into the possession of the post-office department. Hall v. U. S., 168 U. S. 632; U. S. v. Winter, 13 Blatchf. (U. S.) 333.

That letter was intended to be delivered need not be alleged in the indictment. Hall z. U. S., 168 U. S. 632.

Description of Letter. When practicable, a description of the letter, by stating to whom it was directed and by whom it was written, is generally given, but it is seldom in the power of the prosecuting attorney to state these facts, and such allegations are not necessary. U. S. v. Lancaster, 2 McLean (U. S.) 431. And where the indictment describes the letters and packets as "sundry letters and packets," with an averment that the number and particular description thereof is yet unknown to the grand jurors. it is sufficient. U. S. v. Golding, 2 Cranch (C. C.) 212.