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(There is a photo of District Attorney COLLINS)
CHARLES VOIGT TAKES THE STAND
In Circuit Court at Oshkosh He Tells How DE RYDER and MORAN Swindled Him Out of $6,300 -- Case Attracts Wide Attention -- Will Be On Most of Tomorrow -- District Attorney Says Evidence Will Be Direct.
Oshkosh, Wis., Jan. 22 - The state closed its case this afternoon at 3:30 o'clock with the testimony of Joseph PHALLER[?]. cashier of the Bank of Sheboygan. The attorneys for the defendant DE RYDER moved for his discharge, Judge BELDON denying the motion and the defense will have its closings tomorrow. The defense will be very brief and in all probability the case will go to the jury Thursday afternoon.
Oshkosh, Wis. Jan 22 - Attorney Charles VOIGT, who lost $6,300 was the principal witness for the state in the DE RYDER case.
After the case was called for trial yesterday afternoon, District Attorney W. B. COLLINS read the information, setting forth the crime charged against the defendant and the latter entered a plea of not guilty. He was thereupon ordered committed to the Winnebago county jail in default of furnishing $5,000 bail pending the disposition of his case. The process of securing a jury was then begun and completed without much trouble, as it was necessary to excuse only three or four of the first twelve talesmen sworn. One of them was excused because he stated that he would be unwilling to convict a man upon circumstantial evidence. It is understood that considerable of the evidence to be introduced against the defendant is of a circumstantial character.
During the securing of the jury the defendant was represented by BOUCK & HILTON of Oshkosh.
After the jury was secured court took a recess until 9:15 o'clock Tuesday morning. Following are the names of the jurors in the case, the trial of which may occupy several days: Otto C. LAABS, Herman GINNOW, August NOLTE, Louis W. [?????], Albert A. SCHWARTZ, Frank SCHENCK, John J. DAVIS, Bert JONES, Gustave STEINKE, James LEE, Andrew FREDRICKSON, and E. S. HINMAN. Before the jurors were excused they were instructed not to talk about the case with anyone.
DE RYDER, or SMITH, is charged with having entered into a criminal conspiracy with Charles H. MORAN, alias Chappie MORAN, O. C. MAXON, alias O. C. JENNINGS, and others to cheat and defraud Charles VOIGT, out of $6,300, and that they succeeded in cheating and defrauding him out of that amount.
The alleged crime was committed in December 1910, and its operations included this city, Oshkosh and Decatur, Ill. DE RYDER, MORAN and MAXON, it is alleged, got the money from VOIGT through false representation concerning the stock of a mining concern in Colorado called the Queen Princess Copper Mining company. In the complaint against DE RYDER, who was the only one of the alleged swindlers caught it is charged that he succeeded in defrauding VOIGT “by false and privy tokens and subtle means and devices and by falsely impersonating another."
When circuit court reconvened Tuesday to go on with the trial of the case of the state vs Louis DE RYDER, alias George SMITH, Attorney Frank FAWCETT of Milwaukee appeared as counsel for the defense instead of W. B. RUBIN, who was expected to be here, as he had been retained by the defendant, with BOUCK & HILTON of counsel.
Mr. FAWCETT started out by interposing objections to the taking of testimony in the case, the form in which the information was drawn etc., all of which objections and motions were overruled by Judge BELDON. With the consent of District Attorney W. B. COLLINS of Sheboygan county, who is conducting the prosecution for the state, all motions made at this time by Mr. FAWCETT will stand in the record as having been made before the jury was empaneled, for the reason that the counsel for the defense did not know the case was to be called for trial yesterday afternoon.
To the first count of the information Mr. FAWCETT entered a demurer on the ground that its general allegations are insufficient and he also moved that the second count be stricken out entirely. When these motions were denied he asked information be separated into three counts instead of two, which request was not granted.
CONSPIRACY LAID BARE
The jury was then again called in and the trial of the case was begun in earnest, District Attorney COLLINS making a statement of the action and what the state expected to prove to the jury. Contrary to first impressions, Mr. COLLINS stated that the evidence against the defendant would be largely direct instead of circumstantial. He read the complaint against DE RYDER and went into the details of the case in order that the jurors might have a clear understanding of its nature.
Following Attorney COLLINS opening statement, Charles VOIGT, a Sheboygan lawyer, the complaining witness, was called to the stand and occupied the remainder of the forenoon session in telling his story of how DE RYDER and others entered into an alleged conspiracy to cheat and defraud him out of $6,300 through the sale of mining stock which it developed was worthless. Mr. VOIGT related in great detail all of the circumstances which culminated in the alleged swindle, which he declared DE RYDER, Charles H. MORAN, O. C. MAXON and others had worked upon him. MORAN he testified was the first man to approach him in the transaction, which had its inception in Sheboygan, and DE RYDER was the man, he declared, whom he met in Oshkosh under the name of George SMITH and to whom he paid $700 for $1,000 worth of the stock of the Queen Princess Mining company.
HOW IT WORKED
Mr. VOIGT testified that he did not lose on this transaction, for he sent the stock to a St. Louis brokerage firm, whose address was given him by MORAN, and in return received $1,500 for it. DE RYDER, or SMITH, had on the occasion of the visit of MORAN and VOIGT to Oshkosh consented to sell his stock for $700 and MORAN had paid him $50 for the option, good for ten days. Mr. VOIGT testified that after the stock had been disposed of through the St. Louis concern DE RYDER called him at Sheboygan and said he wanted to withdraw the option he had given, saying he had learned that the stock was worth considerable more then he had supposed. Mr. VOIGT could not give him back the option or return the stock and therefore paid him $700, the option price, making the payment with a check drawn on the bank of Sheboygan. This check DE RYDER cashed after being identified at the bank by Mr. VOIGT himself and the check was introduced in evidence. It was endorsed "George SMITH," to whom Mr. VOIGT had made it payable.
MORAN had brought Mr. VOIGT to Oshkosh to see "SMITH" who had some of the stock MORAN claimed he was trying to buy up because it was of far greater value then many of its holders thought and was found at the home of Mrs. Eliza SPIKES, 129 Light street, where "SMITH" had engaged a room and pretended to be engaged in the moving picture business. MORAN and "SMITH" also pretended they were unacquainted with each other when they first met here in VOIGT's presence, the witness testified.
UNABLE TO SELL
After the deal with "SMITH" was closed at Sheboygan and the latter had ostensibly returned to Oshkosh, Mr. VOIGT joined MORAN at Decatur, Ill., where the two had previously negotiated for the purchase of a large block of the same kind of stock from O. C. MAXON, alias O. C. JENNINGS. The deal was closed by Mr. VOIGT paying over $6,300 in return for which he was given the stock. MORAN then left Mr. VOIGT on a plausible pretext and the latter took the stock to St. Louis to dispose of through the firm that had taken the shares secured from "SMITH." The ostensible head of the firm, a man named COWAN, was not in the city and the man in charge said he was not authorized to negotiate any deal calling for the expenditure of so great an amount of money. To cut the story, Mr. VOIGT after making unsuccessful efforts to locate MORAN or MAXON and to dispose of the stock, realized that he had been made the victim of a conspiracy and swindle in which he believed DE RYDER, MORAN and MAXON and others were implicated.