Thirty Years a Detective
Excerpt from chapter X
Confidence and Blackmail
Of all the criminals of which I have attempted to write,
the most insidious and pernicious are the confidence man or woman
and the blackmailer.
The confidence operator of which I shall speak first,
is one of those insinuating personages
who approach unsuspicious people in their daily walks,
and sometimes at their places of business,
and who by artfully identifying themselves
with their personal affairs and business arrangements
endeavor to so win their confidence that they may impose upon their credulity
to their own dishonest profit.
The confidence game is generally practiced in large cities,
and upon verdant looking strangers,
whose manners and attire evince the easy-going and susceptible victim,
though occasionally he will be found traveling through the country,
and imposing upon the honest and industrious
farmers and country store-keepers.
One of the latest dodges of the confidence man
has been recently brought to light,
in which it was found that several wealthy farmers had been defrauded
by the wiles of this fraudulent practitioner.
The operator, in this instance,
was a fine looking and clerical appearing old gentleman,
who traveled through several counties in Illinois,
and who pretended to be engaged in buying sheep
from the breeders in that section of the country.
In addition to this occupation,
the venerable old swindler announced himself as a warm advocate
of certain needful reforms of a public nature,
in which all good citizens ought to be interested.
He carried with him a number of petitions
addressed to the legislature of the state,
requesting them, among other things,
to reduce taxation, and the salaries of public officers,
and one to tax church property the same as other real estate.
As may be imagined,
he obtained numerous signatures to such important documents, and,
in many instances, he succeeded in deftly transforming the simple petition,
which the public-spirited farmer had duly signed,
into a promissory note for a moderate sum of money,
on which the signature of the farmer could not be disputed,
from any doubt of its genuineness.
These notes would then be transferred to innocent purchasers,
whose knowledge of the makers of the notes,
was such that they willingly received their promises to pay,
and loaned their money without a moment's hesitation.
By this little scheme the daring swindler realized several thousand dollars
before his operations were detected,
and by that time the smooth-tongued confidence man
had disappeared effectually from the neighborhood....
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