'THERE'S NOTHING
TO IT'; JONES
IT'S NONE OF THE PUBLIC'S
BUSINESS, HE SAYS.
POLICE SCANDAL.
DOESN'T FAVOR ARRESTING THE
PARASITICAL VAGS.
"What Good Would It Do? Listlessly
Inquires the Commissioner --
Mayor Hangs Fire on
Investigation.
Lavender women, their friends the dude vagrants, the thief, the thug and the saloonkeeper, may go on threatening the police; they may predict their removal and the prediction may come true so far as Elliott H. Jones, a member of the board of police commissioners, seems to care.
"There's nothing to it," he said yesterday. "I never met Mickey O'Hearn in my life until inauguration day in April, but a man tells me that he says neither he nor any of his friends ever threatened the police. And Chief of Police Daniel Ahern says he never moved men on Mickey's account -- so that settles it."
"But would you not think it proper to call in the six or eight men who have been taken out of plain clothes in the last six months after they were threatened, told they would be moved, and hear them tell you that they were moved on the very day that certain men and women set for them?' the commissioner was asked.
"It's none of the public's business why men were moved, and I for one shall not ask the chief to give his specific reasons for so doing."
"Do you know that a written resolution which stated that no more men should be moved from one beat or district to another without an absolute order from the board or the chief's written reasons for so doing, was unanimously adopted last July?" Mr. Jones was then asked.
"I BELIEVE GALLAGHER."
"This board is not governed by any orders of the previous board," he said promptly. "Anyway, Commissioner A. E. Gallagher tells me that no such resolution was adopted. I believe him."
When it was known that men were being moved after they had been threatened, Chief Ahern was asked if he moved them without the order of the board.. He said he moved men each month and knew of n o order to the contrary. Then an investigation was made and the following was learned:
James E. Vincil, secretary to the board of police commissioners -- "Yes, I remember the resolution well, but I think it was only made a verbal order to the chief. I have looked and it is not of record."
Former Chief John B. Hayes -- "The resolution was introduced by Frank F. Rozzelle, then a member of the board. It was in writing, as I remember, and was unanimously adopted."
Frank F. Rozzelle, former commissioner -- "During the trial of Captain Weber, Chief Hayes testified that Commissioner Gallagher had ordered men moved from one district to another and the members of the board knew nothing of it. I introduced a resolution in writing, as I remember, to this effect: 'Resolved, That in the future the change of any member of this department from one beat or district to another shall not be made with out the order and full consent of the board.' "
IT WAS IN WRITING.
Former Mayor Henry M. Beardsley -- "I recall that Commissiner Rozzelle introduced the resolution in writing. It was unanimously adopted. As I recall it, the resolution stated that in future no changes of men should be made without the order of the board, or, if it became necessary, for the chief to move a man in an emergency, he was to furnish the board his specific reasons in writing for doing so. I was so sure that such a resolution had been adopted that I asked Secretary Vincil about it and only a short time before I left the mayor's office. He remembered it as much as I did, but, strange to say, it was not of record in his office."
Besides these men of reputation who recall the adoption of the resolution there were at least five newspaper reporters present who remembered the occurrence well -- and the necessity for such a resolution.
According to Commissioner Jones, however, even if such a resolution was adopted by the board as previously constituted, the present "reform" board will not take cognizance of it -- at least, he intimated, that he and his colleague, Mr. Gallagher, would not.
HE'S WILLING, BUT SHY.
"So far as I am individually concerned," said Mayor Thomas T. Crittenden, Jr., "I would favor a thorough investigation into anything concerning the police where serious charges are made. But as I am so new at the business, I would prefer that an older member of the board take the lead."
When Commissioner Jones was told that the police were well acquainted with most all of the well dressed vagrants in No. 4 district, the men whose sole support for years has been fallen women, and was asked if a special order would be issued to arrest all such men and ring them into police court, he replied:
OH, WHAT'S THE USE?
"What good is to be accomplished by it? Other men would take their places and we might fill up our workhouse with men for the city to support."
While Commissioner Jones was talking he had before him a large envelope which contained a record of the changes made in the police department June 1. They had been made by the chief, he said, and he would not know what they were until he had read it. He said that he or other members of the board might request a change, but in the aggregate the board would not know why changes were made unless the chief was asked for his specific reasons, Mr. Jones says, he refuses to make public.
