Most recent edit on 2008-02-13 11:03:06 by MarD

Additions:
From the World Encyclopedia of Con Artists and Confidence Games

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Oldest known version of this page was edited on 2008-02-12 13:12:53 by MarD []
McDonald, Michael Cassius (AKA: Big Mike), 1837-1907, U.S., org. crime. Michael McDonald, a tall, robust, good-humored gambler, appeared in Chicago in 1855. He worked in the gambling halls on the near south side and, during the Civil War, recruited for the Union army, which was then paying $300 to each enlistee. McDonald encouraged thousands of recruits to join up, then desert, return to Chicago, and enlist again under a different name--each splitting their $300 entrance fee with McDonald. Following the war, McDonald campaigned for mayoral candidate Harvey Colvin. When Colvin took office he turned over control of virtually all gambling in Chicago to McDonald, who organized all the gambling dens and saloons, demanded and got 40 percent of all profits, and then split these considerable funds with Colvin.

From that point on and for the next thirty-five years, Big Mike McDonald was the underworld boss of Chicago. All gambling and prostitution came under his control, along with all other gang activities. Forty percent of all money taken in went directly to McDonald, who, in turn, paid off officials in city hall and the rank and file of Chicago's police force. By the 1880s, Big Mike was a multimillionaire. His rule was law and during his reign Chicago was known as a gambler's paradise. Hundreds of confidence men operated freely in the city, as long as they returned 40 percent of the profits to Big Mike.

These sharpers included Lou Ludlum, Red Adams, Tom and John Wallace, George W. Post, Charley and Fred Gondorf, Snapper Johnny Malloy, Charley Drucker, Kid Miller, Sniter the Kid, Jim McNally, Red Jimmy Fitzgerald, Dutchy Lehman, Dutch Bill, Boss Ruse, and Tom O'Brien, who was known as "king of the bunco men." Enterprising youths such as Joseph "Yellow Kid" Weil and Fred "Deacon" Buckminster grew up in McDonald's wide-open Chicago, learning the skills of the con man from the dozens of sharpers operating around the clock in McDonald's many gambling dens.

In addition to buying a new mansion and squandering thousands of dollars on diamonds for the many showgirls he squired about, McDonald's fertile brain was forever scheming up new ways in which to earn a dishonest dollar. He preyed upon the city coffers like a hungry vulture. In 1887, Big Mike ordered his bribed alderman to approve of a coat of "preserving fluid" which was applied to City Hall, guaranteed to keep the stately building intact for a hundred years. The bill came to more than $200,000, which was paid in cash the day after the job was completed. Two days later it rained and the "preserving fluid" washed away. There was no refund from Big Mike.

The World's Fair in Chicago proved to be a gold mine for McDonald and his host of confidence men. Millions of dollars were gotten from the armies of tourists and spectators flocking to the fair. All manner of gambling flourished and every known confidence trick, from three-card monte to the old shell game, was practiced on each street corner while the police and fair officials looked the other way. As usual, Big Mike's collection agents, numbering in the dozens during the Fair, arrived each night to collect McDonald's 40-percent take. By the turn of the century, McDonald went into semi-retirement. His domain was by then being taken over by his hand-picked successors, aldermen Michael "Hinky Dink" Kenna and John "Bathhouse John" Coughlin, who, in turn, were grooming a former street sweeper, James "Big Jim" Colosimo, as the new underworld boss of the city. McDonald's personal life, by 1907, was a disaster.

Though he possessed untold millions, lived in a huge mansion, and was waited on hand and foot by a stream of servants, his love life was a great disappointment to him. His first wife had died of natural causes. He second wife, an attractive showgirl named Mary Noonan, ran off with a local priest. His third wife, burlesque queen Dora Feldman, carried on a long-term affair with a young man, Webster Guerin. When Guerin rejected her, Dora murdered him. Learning the details of this last affair was too much for Big Mike, who took to his sickbed and died on Aug. 9, 1907, saying before he passed on: "I'm that glad to be rid of the whole pack of you!"

McPherson, Aimee Semple (Aimee Elizabeth Kennedy), 1890-1944, Case of, U.S.,
fraud. Wealth, fame, and power awaited this minister's daughter from Ingersoll, Ont. when she took to the podium to preach her own fiery brand of revivalist gospel. Aimee Semple McPherson was a caricature of the crazy times in which she lived, personifying the 1920s, when Americans lived vicariously through the media heroes they created. "Sister" Aimee was a captivating huckster whose meager oratorical skills and forcefulness of personality stole the hearts--and wallets--of an entire generation.

Aimee Kennedy was born on a farm to a Bible-thumping Salvationist. "Ma" Kennedy, a steadying influence through much of Aimee's life, saw to it that she was indoctrinated to fundamentalist religion early in life. At the age of seventeen Aimee fell in love with an itinerant preacher named Robert Semple, who appeared at a tent meeting in Ingersoll one day. His powerful words struck her heart like a "swift-flung arrow." She married the Pentecostal evangelist in 1908 and moved to China, where together they worked as Christian missionaries. Semple died in Hong Kong in 1910, leaving his wife and infant daughter penniless in a foreign land. Aimee earned her passage back to America preaching to the sinners on board the Empress of China. When the wealthy passengers responded by giving her enough money for a ticket and a few dollars to spare, Aimee Semple was suddenly face to face with her life's calling.

In 1912, she married a grocery store clerk named Harold S. McPherson. Their marriage produced one child before ending in divorce nine years later. Her career began in earnest in 1917 when she began to preach to her followers about a "Foursquare Gospel Evangelism." Moving to Los Angeles a year later, Sister Aimee, by her own account, "worked by day and dreamed by night in the shadow of the tent." The tent she imagined for herself was Angelus Temple, which opened in Echo Park on Jan. 1, 1923. The chapel, an auditorium with a seating capacity of 5,000, and a specially constructed radio station that carried her message across the state, was built at a staggering cost of $1.5 million. It was all made possible by her celebrated "healing sessions" conducted in such remote locations as New Zealand, Australia, Canada, and the backwater towns of the U.S. A few of her followers who suffered from incurable diseases had suddenly recovered, and the publicity surrounding these "miracles" elevated her to celebrity status. "I am not a healer," she often said. "Jesus is the healer. I am only the little office girl who opens the door and says, "Come in."
McPherson had a decided flair for the dramatic. She pandered to the sensational by appearing in long, flowing translucent gowns. On one occasion she wore a policeman's uniform to deliver a sermon on "God's Law." With her own magazine, a Bible School, some 400 branch churches in the U.S. alone, and the publication of two books, This and That (1919), and In the Service of the King (1927), McPherson had become one of the most influential religious figures in America. Her Angelus Temple payroll exceeded $7,000 a month, an impressive figure in those days. Her appearance on the alter of the temple was not only awe-inspiring, but erotic according to the recollections of Carey Williams. He wrote, "She suggested sex without being sexually attractive. The suggestion was to be found, perhaps in some quality of the voice; some radiation of that astonishing physical vitality. While constantly emanating sex, she lacked the graceful presence, the subtlety of manner, the mysterious reticence of a real siren."

Far from being the simon-pure Christian faith healer that her followers imagined, McPherson had a secret lover, Kenneth G. Ormiston, who worked quietly behind the scenes as McPherson's radio operator. The ubiquitous Ormiston already had a wife, but still "comforted" McPherson. "You sound as though you were tired tonight," he would tell her in soothing tones. "You have done splendidly tonight." Ormiston and McPherson registered under assumed names in various hotels in and around the Los Angeles area. It was for Ormiston that she staged her famous "disappearance" on May 18, 1926.

With her secretary Emma Schaeffer, McPherson registered at the Ocean View Hotel in Venice Beach, Calif. That afternoon, as the evangelist worked on her next sermon, she asked Schaeffer to run an errand for her. When she returned Schaeffer found that her employer had vanished. After another hour had passed Schaeffer notified the authorities. Ma Kennedy who was always there to lend encouragement to her daughter's endeavors, created a scene by hysterically yelling "Drowned!" Thousands of McPherson's friends and supporters combed the beaches, but there was no trace. The police dragged the floor of the ocean with grapplers, believing that McPherson had somehow been caught in theundertow. Others maintained that she had been abducted and killed by gangsters for her unrelenting war against sin.

A paranoia seemed to grip the country as McPherson's disappearance was reported in the newspapers. There were reports of miracles. One of her followers claimed to see her walking on the waters of the Pacific Ocean. He was removed to an asylum for evaluation. Twenty-six-year-old Robert Browning dashed into the ocean near Venice in a vain attempt to "rescue" McPherson. After running out of energy he slipped below the waves and died. Minnie Kennedy, meanwhile, commanded the followers to raise a $25,000 reward. She also chartered an airplane and, in a symbolic act, dropped lilies over the patch of ocean where her daughter was thought to have drowned.

The police concluded that McPherson had been abducted, though it seemed very peculiar that she could be dragged from a crowded beach without one person able to come forward to provide a clue. Days later a Long Beach attorney named R.A. McKinley reported to police that two men named Wilson and Miller had demanded a $25,000 ransom payment in return for her life. On June 4, Sheriff William Traeger received a communication from "Willow of the Wisp," who said that McPherson was being held against her will in Santa Barbara. These were among dozens of false leads the police received, some coming from as far away as Edmonton, Alberta. On June 19, Minnie Kennedy received a letter asking for $500,000. It was signed by the "Avengers." There were those who said that Kennedy wrote the letter herself, then had it sent special delivery.

The protracted drama ended happily on June 23 when McPherson turned up on the doorstep of John Anderson, a resident of Agua Prieta, Mexico, just across the border from Arizona. She was sleeping peacefully on the front porch when he came home. "She had a pillow under her head," Anderson told police, "and a quilt thrown over her." McPherson filled in the missing details. She said that she had been approached by a woman on the beach who asked her to bless a sick baby in a nearby car. When she peered into the automobile three people named "Rose," "Steve," and "Jake" pulled her inside and then drove to Mexico. "The woman, Rose, treated me very nicely, and the men did not molest me with any undue attention," she said. "I prayed constantly and talked to them of God. I'll bet they were tired of hearing my preaching." She went on to say that on the night of June 22 she sawed through the rope that bound her hands by using a jagged tin can. The cabin was deserted, so she ran across the moonlit desert to freedom.

A team of posses went to search for the kidnappers despite the vigorous protest of Mexican officials. There was an international incident in the making, which added to the luster of McPherson's star. She was greeted by 100,000 well-wishers lining the streets of Los Angeles for a glimpse at the motorcade. District Attorney Asa Keyes was skeptical though. He questioned McPherson's motives and the strange way in which she vanished. Reporters asked the question in the minds of the LAPD, "Forgive me, Mrs. McPherson, but didn't you really have a reason to vanish?" McPherson stood by her story, as unbelievable as it was beginning to sound. It was only then that the police learned that Ormiston had disappeared the same day. Keyes pieced together a likely scenario. In order to be with her married lover and not arouse undue press attention, McPherson herself concocted this amazing piece of fiction. He secured an indictment against the evangelist charging her with obstructing justice during the disappearance and using the postal system to defraud.

To support his contention Keyes located a blue trunk that Ormiston had brought from New York to California. In it were found a collection of McPherson's nightgowns, hosiery, and other personal items. Mrs. Lorraine Wiseman came forward to refute the story, but finally admitted under a barrage of police questions that McPherson and her mother had paid her a large amount of money to help dispel the gossip. McPherson accused members of the criminal underworld of trying to "frame" her, an unsupported charge that did not hold up in court. But it was equally difficult for the district attorney to prove his case even with a spate of circumstantial evidence. On Jan. 10, 1927, Keyes moved for a dismissal. The next day McPherson jubilantly began her "Vindication Tour," but many of her fans had become disillusioned.

Aimee Semple McPherson continued to preach the gospel through the 1930s. Her temple became a popular tourist attraction, but the enthusiasm and immense base of support she enjoyed in the 1920s eroded a decade later. In September 1944 McPherson ended her own life by consuming a lethal dose of barbiturates, leaving behind a tottering religious empire that was taken over by her adoring son Rolf.

MacDonald, David Rowland, (AKA: John Edgar Davis), prom. 1938, U.S., hoax. In
1924, a Pennsylvania man realized that his wife was unhappy with him. Rather than divorce her, he chose to fake his own death. On Feb. 14, 1924, David MacDonald left a suicide note acknowledging his failure in business and as a husband, along with his clothing on the bank of the Allegheny River near Pittsburgh. His wife had MacDonald declared dead, collected on three insurance policies and soon remarried. MacDonald, in the meantime, became John Davis. When, fourteen years later, in 1938, Davis was arrested in Pasadena, Calif., on a minor charge, his fingerprints were found to match those of David MacDonald. The insurance companies accepted his claim that he had done it all for his wife, and chose not to prosecute him.

MacPherson, James, 1736-96, Scot., fraud. With the publication in 1760 of Fragments of Ancient Poetry, Collected in the Highlands of Scotland, and Translated from the Galic or Erse Language, the poems of Ossian were introduced to the world. James MacPherson claimed to have discovered these treasures which were unlike any other verse ever recovered from Scotland. The work, and subsequent works, including Fingal and Temora, were enthusiastically received by critic Dr. Hugh Blair. Napoleon Bonaparte eagerly read the poems, and it was believed that the works inspired two poems of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and the poem "Hours of Idleness" by George Gordon Byron. However, not everyone was impressed with the Ossianic poems' authenticity.

At the urging of friends, Dr. Samuel Johnson journeyed to the Hebrides of northern Scotland to determine whether the poems were truly ancient works. He discovered that there were no Ossian stories among the traditions and legends of the area. The Highland Society reported a similar finding in 1805. While MacPherson argued that he had simply found the manuscripts in libraries, scholars countered that whoever wrote the poems was not well versed in the Gaelic language, history, or archeology. To MacPherson's credit, a monument to him stands at Bellville, Kingussie, for which he bequeathed £500, and he was granted permission to be buried at Westminster Abbey.

Macdaniel, Stephen B., See: Berry, John

Mad Anesthetist of Matoon, prom. 1944, U.S., (unsolv) hoax. In the summer of 1944 the residents of rural Matoon, Ill., were visited by a nocturnal prowler--a thin, wiry man clad in a black skullcap carrying a flit gun. Nobody knew who this person was, or why he would shoot a chemical substance through the open bedroom windows of Matoon residents. By the time the astonished victims could recover their senses, the "Mad Anesthetist" was gone.

The victims suffered from nausea and temporary paralysis when the sweet-smelling chemical was sprayed into their rooms. The Illinois Criminal Investigation Laboratory examined a piece of cloth belonging to Mrs. Beulah Cordes that had allegedly been sprayed by the phantom. There was no sign of unnatural chemicals on the cloth, though Mrs. Cordes had been taken to the hospital complaining of burns and paralysis.

By September, the town of 17,000 was in an uproar. Newspaper reporters sent down from Chicago phoned their city editors complaining that they too had been afflicted by the strange potion. Citizen patrols were organized, and the police were put on twenty-four hour alert, but no tangible clues of the Mad Anesthetist were found.

Maelzel, Johann Nepomuk, 1772-1838, Aust.-Cuba-Fr.-U.S., fraud. Johann Nepomuk Maelzel began his career as a Viennese music teacher in 1792 but soon took to manufacturing automatic machines, which proved to be far more profitable, especially with his introduction of an automatic chess player known as the "The Turk." Maelzel claimed he purchased the invention in 1805 from the son of its inventor Baron Wolfgang von Kempeln. The Turk had the appearance of a Turkish man with a movable wooden arm with which he played his moves.

For the next twenty years Maelzel and The Turk toured Europe drawing large crowds and even prominent opponents. Emperor Napoleon I even challenged the machine to a game, but when The Turk realized Napoleon was cheating, it swept aside all of the playing pieces in disgust. In 1825, Maelzel took his machine to the U.S., where, despite similar success, he would meet his own Waterloo.

As in Europe, crowds and famous onlookers came to see this amazing invention, one of whom, P.T. Barnum, later would employ many of the tips on showmanship he learned from Maelzel. In May 1827, The Turk was exposed as a fraud. The Turk was not really an automatic machine but merely a wooden chest into which Maelzel's confederate would hide. When he first arrived in the U.S. Maelzel employed a young Parisian girl, whom he taught the fine arts of chess, but not long after, once again, was working with William Schlumberger, who had worked in Europe with him. One night in Baltimore, Md., two young boys observed Schlumberger getting into the apparatus. The Baltimore Gazette announced the discovery the next day. The two con men took the rest of the summer off, but returned to tour the U.S. until completely exposed in 1837 by the French magazine Pittoresque, which told its readers, and inevitably Maelzel's audiences, the intricate details of the fraudulent Turk. Maelzel and Schlumberger traveled to Cuba, but Schlumberger contracted yellow fever and died in June 1838. Maelzel finally abandoned his scheme, headed for Philadelphia, and died en route on July 21.


Marquis, Arthur, prom. 1930s, Brit., fraud. In 1933, Marquis was a prospering confidence man, persuading investors to take a chance on his British Cocoa Pools Ltd. In three short years his venture grew from a small back-room operation into a suite of prosperous West End offices with nearly £50,000 capital. But his "business" was based on lies. "Investors" would purchase "unit certificates" for £20 each, and every three months each £20 share would render a £3 bonus. Marquis' clients had no complaints until the one autumn day in 1936 when young Marquis sailed away to Paris with £25,000 in his pocket and never returned. Soon his investors realized that the whole venture was a fraud.

A year later photos showing Marquis enjoying a skiing extravaganza in St. Moritz were published in all the society pages and he was recognized by Scotland Yard detectives who sought him in Switzerland--too late. He had escaped to Spain, just in time for the civil war.

While national strife in England served fugitive Marquis well, the police being occupied with domestic unrest, it turned out they could only ignore a wanted criminal for so long. In time, some partisans at a small Madrid caf spotted him and accused him of being a Franco spy. They beat him, robbed him, and left him to be found by the police, who locked him up and sent for British officials.

In a desperate attempt to escape the British authorities, who would certainly arrest him on swindling charges, Marquis stole away from Madrid on a midnight train, dropping off near a farm. There, he worked as a hired hand until Franco's men raided the farm and took him prisoner, keeping him a few days until they themselves were captured by Republican forces. Both sides tortured Marquis until they realized he knew nothing. He was moved from a series of prisons and eventually spent two years in a crowded dungeon in the north of Spain.

Marquis escaped by stowing away aboard an England-bound ship that was to be met by Scotland Yard detectives anxious to bring him to trial. Despite the trials he had already endured, Marquis was found Guilty of fraud and sentenced to three years' penal servitude.

Mason, Arnold Caverly, See: Garland, Wallace Graydon

Mason, John Archibald Campbell, b.c.1869, Brit., fraud. John Mason, the son of a U.S. judge, began to gamble and live expensively while he was attending Harvard University. He married a woman from Baltimore and honeymooned in Europe, where they quickly used up their funds. They went back to the U.S., where Mason's wife died. Later, he became acquainted with the daughter of a rich Lyons silk manufacturer, to whom he proposed marriage. She accepted and loaned him £500, whereupon he vanished. After he swindled another girl out of £4,000, Mason met a British girl in December 1913, and also offered her a phony proposal. He took £500 from her, supposedly to pay for a visit to his rich aunt, and used the money to support himself. The woman went to the police. In 1914, Mason was arrested, tried at the Old Bailey, and sentenced to three years in the Portland Convict Prison.

Mathews, Robert (AKA: The Prophet Matthias), 1788-1837, U.S., fraud. While riding an omnibus in New York City one day, a businessman named Elijah Pierson experienced a revelation. An "angel" in the form of a man appeared before him and asked him to prepare for the coming of the "Prophet." The angel went on to say that Pierson was a reincarnation of Elijah the Tishbite. In his eagerness to prepare for the unearthly visitation, Pierson organized a "Holy Club" of disillusioned Methodists and Baptists on Bowery Hill. There were rumors that the club did little more than license orgies, where the "daughters of Mary Magdalene," procured from the streets, pranced about the altar. The "Prophet Matthias" appeared at Pierson's door in 1822. The cook answered. "Art thou the Lord?" she asked. "I am," was the reply. The stranger was ushered to the study where he met Pierson, who believed the savior had at last graced his door. The "savior" in fact, was one Robert Mathews, formerly of Hudson, N.Y., who, at the age of nine, "discovered" his own divine powers. At sixteen, he roamed through upper New York state, quoting scripture and challenging ordained ministers about technicalities of the Bible, thus acquiring the reputation as a "Jumping Jesus." Mathews eventually settled down and raised a family. But his wife and children found that life was not easy with the self-appointed "Messiah." One day he took his hungry brood into the woods outside Albany to live a communal existence. Days later, a posse had to come and fetch the children back to civilization. They were half-starved.

Mathews remained behind in his wooded retreat. When at last he decided to re-emerge in civilization he was no longer Mathews, but "Matthias the Prophet." He moved to Manhattan where there was no shortage of believers. A wealthy businessman named Mills kept Mathews in the lap of luxury, against the wishes of his family. Mill's relatives had him committed to Bloomingdale Lunatic Asylum and had Mathews incarcerated at Bellevue while doctors tried to figure out what was wrong with him. Following his release, Mathews looked up Pierson, who proved to be nearly as gullible as Mills. Through Pierson, Mathews was introduced to Benjamin Folger, another wealthy businessman who desperately wanted to believe.

In September 1822, Mathews accompanied the Folgers to their summer house in Ossinning, N.Y. Impressed with the size of the house, Mathews told them he would give them forgiveness of all their sins and the blessings of God in return for their promise to provide him with food and shelter. Folger and Pierson surrendered their collective properties to Mathews and agreed to live a communal existence with him at "Mount Zion"--Folger's former residence. Mathews claimed Mrs. Folger as his wife, while pacifying her mystified husband with the gift of his own married daughter Isabella. For this he was charged with abduction by his son-in-law. Mathews survived this dilemma to take total control of the family's lives. They heaped praise and devotion on Mathews and turned over their small fortunes to him. But in August 1834, their existence was shattered by Pierson's sudden demand for a return of his property. Doubts and skepticism had set in, and Pierson was slowly tormented by the belief that he had been hoodwinked.

After being threatened with possible exposure, Mathews and his two sons served some blackberries to their host. It was Pierson's favorite fruit, and that night he ate two plates full. He was soon seized by a violent illness which Mathews claimed to be the work of the devil. Pierson lingered for several agonizing days. Mathews, meanwhile, offered to treat the stricken man personally. The treatment consisted of pouring ice water down his throat from a height of five feet. Pierson died. Sensing growing skepticism on the part of the Folgers, Mathews warned them of dire consequences should they challenge his authority.

Nearly bankrupted by the whole sorry episode, Folger ordered Mathews out of the house. On the last fateful day, Mathews took his leave, predicting that illness and death would soon descend on the house. Later that day all but the maid took sick. Mathews had poisoned the morning coffee. From his sickbed Folger swore out a warrant for Mathews arrest. He was picked up in Albany and returned to New York City for questioning. Mrs. Dratch, a long-time friend of Pierson, filed a complaint in Westchester County charging Mathews with murder. On Nov. 11, 1834, Mathews was arraigned on a charge of murder. The trial began five months later, in April 1835. His brother-in-law, Andrew Wight, said he had known Mathews for twenty years. He believed him to be "partially deranged but of shrewd and bargaining disposition."

Physicians, who at this time were still unable to accurately discern the presence of arsenic, testified to the presence of a "white, chalky" substance in Pierson's stomach. Since he supposedly suffered from epilepsy, now known as a symptom of arsenic poisoning, it was impossible to determine the real cause of death. The jury acquitted Mathews of murder, but he served three months in prison on an assault charge brought by his son-in-law, as well as thirty days for contempt of court. In later years, Robert Mathews attempted to bring his gospel westward but soon found that the scandal of the Pierson-Folger affair won him few converts. He met briefly with another prophet of note, the Mormon Joseph Smith who led his flock to Nauvoo, Ill., in 1838 before encountering religious persecution of a different sort. Of Mathews, Smith would say: he had "a brilliant intellect but a mind full of darkness."

Mead, William Elmer, prom. 1900s-30s, U.S., fraud. By 1910, Elmer Mead established himself as one of the most skilled flimflam men in the business, a master of the traditional "Wallet Drop," and his unique "Country Send." But his real talent lay in swindling country people of their wagering money in fixed foot races. Mead and his confederates first contacted the local sheriff--one known to take money on the sly--and offer two bribes, one to allow the race to be held and another to fake a police raid to arrest illegal bettors.

Next he would carefully select his victims, the local sports who enjoyed a game of chance and rarely passed up an opportunity to lay down a bet on the side. Mead, acting as the official "backer" for the foot race, would convince the victim that the smart money was on the favorite. Then on the day of the race, Elmer Mead and his capers would express great concern over the likelihood of a police raid. But the race would proceed according to schedule with the favorite bolting out to an early lead. The townsman who had followed Mead's advice and placed money on the "sure thing" was ecstatic as the man pulled ahead by twenty, even thirty paces. The gulled sportsman believed that he was about to pocket $50,000 to the $10,000 he had put up.

At the moment victory was certain the favorite suddenly dropped in his tracks, faking an epileptic seizure. As he gasped for breath the other runners streamed by him to the finish line. While the victim stared at the prone runner, Mead would jostle the man back to reality. "My God, run! It's the sheriff and his boys!" Elmer would assist the sucker to the local train station, assuring him that they would meet again in the next town, a lie of course. Grateful to have avoided the scandal of arrest and imprisonment, the duped bettor temporarily forgot about his losses. Later, Mead would send a telegram ahead to the next town informing the mark that the stricken racer had died from his seizure. "All is lost. Keep on going." Not wanting to be implicated in murder, let alone illegal gambling, he usually did.

Mead's unofficial headquarters was Denver, Colo., home to an army of bunco men, con artists, and green goods practitioners. It was known in those days as the "Big Store," the place where Ben Marks made his name in the 1860s, sponsoring rigged horse and foot races that no doubt inspired Mead to pursue this line of work.

Means, Gaston Bullock, 1879-1938, Case of, U.S., boot.-fraud-forg.-polit. corr.-mur. Arch swindler, forger, detective, and author, Gaston Bullock Means was many things to many people. To J. Edgar Hoover he was the "greatest faker of all time." A talented detective, he always seemed to be embroiled in trouble or at the center of a controversy.

He was the fourth of seven children born to William Gaston and Corrallie Bullock, wealthy landowners from Blackwelder's Spring, N.C. Raised in the nearby village of Concord, Gaston left the University of North Carolina in 1898 a year shy of completing his degree program. In 1904, he landed a job with the Cannon Mills Company of Concord, a leading textile firm. Means spent the next decade as a traveling salesman (or drummer) for the firm, canvassing the lucrative New York and Chicago markets. His extensive knowledge of the industry convinced the editors of the New York Journal of Commerce to hire him as a "stringer" to report on the latest goings-on in the textile markets.

In 1910, he quit the business to pursue the far more glamorous career of private detective for the William J. Burns agency. In the course of proving his worth to Burns, who called him "the greatest natural detective ever known." Means began digging around Washington in search of new ways to augment his income. He made the acquaintance of Captain Karl Boy-Ed, the naval attach to the German embassy, and when the European war began in August 1914 Means made a deal with Boy-Ed to supply the embassy with sensitive data about allied shipping. For this he was paid a weekly salary estimated to be between $700 and $1,000. Means also volunteered his services to transport top-secret documents for the allies. The money he earned from these ventures enabled Means to furnish an elaborate Park Avenue apartment to entertain society
friends.

It was about this time that Means accepted his most lucrative assignment: safeguarding the interests of Maude King, widow of millionaire lumber baron James C. King, who had left the bulk of his fortune to his young and vivacious wife. King thumbed her nose at the social mores of the age. She led a riotous life in the capitals of Europe, spending her deceased husband's fortune in a variety of foolish ways. Deciding that he should become the beneficiary of her extravagance, Means wormed his way into King's good graces by faking a holdup in which he saved the lady's honor and purse through an act of gallantry. After that she made him her closest confidant and financial manager. By July 1917, he had swindled her of more than $150,000. That August, King became concerned about the manner in which her finances were being handled. Means reassured her that everything was in order and suggested that perhaps what King really needed was a short vacation to put her mind at ease. He invited her to Concord for a hunting trip in the woods.

Maude King was certainly not the outdoors type. She and Means went hunting together, but Means returned from the dense forest alone in a state of agonized grief. He claimed that King, while playing with his gun, shot herself in the head. "Mrs. King, poor soul, was very lightheaded," he said. There were no other witnesses to the tragedy.

Gaston Means was indicted for murder, but his trial was held in Concord, where the sympathy of the town and his father's name and reputation weighed in his favor. Means was acquitted despite the testimony of ballistics experts, who explained that the shot could not have been fired by Maude King's own hand. In 1918, with his wartime adventures over, and King's ashes scattered to the wind, Means rejoined the Burns Detective Agency.

Warren G. Harding of Ohio became the nation's twenty-ninth president in 1921. His administration established new lows in bureaucratic inefficiency and corruption, as he filled sensitive federal offices with some of the greediest politicians the U.S. has ever seen. Gaston Means was one of Harding's key players. It took several months of behind-the-scenes "negotiations," but Means secured an appointment to head up the Bureau of Investigation, forerunner of the modern FBI, for his employer, Burns. Burns had ordered Means to come up
with letters of recommendation from key congressmen who might be persuaded to intervene with the president on his behalf, but Means took a more circuitous route. He found the skeletons in the legislators' closet and used them as a bargaining tool.

Burns was appointed to head up the agency in October 1921. He rewarded Means for his stellar work by naming him special investigator, much to the chagrin of J. Edgar Hoover, then a low-ranking department functionary. In the few months that Means occupied this office, he spent much of his time conniving with Ohio political boss Jess Smith, who occupied offices at the Justice Department. Hoover complained to Burns, but not much was done until the press became interested. Means had recently been implicated in the forgery of a will and had brought a fraudulent claim against the Southeastern Express Company less than a year earlier. The unfavorable publicity this caused the administration led to a public clamor that resulted in Attorney General Harry M. Dougherty suspending Means on Feb. 8, 1922, but Means remained on the payroll as an informant. On May 30, 1923, Jess Smith committed suicide amid rumors about wholesale corruption and graft within the "Ohio Gang."

The opportunistic Means involved himself in a variety of shady deals in the next few years. He was indicted in October 1923 for the illegal withdrawal of government liquor from federal warehouses using Arthur Mellon's signature on a forged document. Then, in March 1924, he was charged with extorting $65,000 from some stock promoters after promising them he would rid them of pending indictments on charges of mail fraud. Before the trial began he revealed to a Senate investigating committee that key government officials were receiving graft payments. Means produced two large bundles of supposed "hour by hour" accounts of his investigative work, but then this evidence disappeared. Means claimed that the records were now in the hands of Senator Smith W. Brookhart and produced a signed note from the senator, but the document was later proven to be forged. Means was indicted on a charge of forgery, but the case never
went to trial. However, he was convicted on two earlier charges in April 1925 and was sentenced to spend two years at the federal penitentiary in Atlanta. While occupying a cell Means concocted his biggest scam to date. He persuaded Mrs. May Dixon Thacker, a minister's wife involved in prison reform, to help him write a sensational expose about Warren Harding. In it he accused the president's wife of poisoning her husband during their fateful West Coast trip in 1923. Mrs. Harding had done this, Means alleged, because of his affair with Nan Britton, an ingenue who supposedly gave birth to the president's child out of wedlock. The Strange Death of President Harding appeared in 1930 and was a runaway best seller, with some eighty thousand copies snatched up by the American public, but Thacker expressed her misgivings about the book when Means failed to produce documentary evidence to support his wild allegations. Writing in the Nov. 7, 1931, issue of Liberty, Thacker completely repudiated the work, calling it pure fiction.

In March 1932, Gaston Means stepped into the limelight for the final time. He agreed to locate the kidnapped Lindbergh baby for Mrs. Evalyn Walsh McLean, a Washington, D.C., socialite. McLean agreed to supply Means with $104,000 in ransom money. Working with an accomplice, one Norman T. Whitaker, Means staged two imaginary rendezvous with the so-called kidnappers at Aiken, S.C., and El Paso, Texas. He sent news back to Mrs. McLean that an additional $35,000 was required. At this point the woman notified the police, who promptly ordered Means arrested. He was convicted of grand larceny and sentenced to fifteen years at the Leavenworth Penitentiary. The $104,000 was never recovered, and Means refused to reveal where it was hidden. His remaining years were spent trying to regain his freedom. Means approached the FBI with an offer to help them solve a backlog of unsolved cases in exchange for his freedom, but Hoover was not interested. Gaston Means died at the Medical Center for federal prisoners in Springfield, Mo., on Dec. 12, 1938.

Mesmer, Franz Anton, 1734-1815, Aust.-Fr., fraud. Mesmerism, the forerunner of modern hypnosis, was named after Franz Anton Mesmer, the German physician who held that each person gives off "animal magnetism" that can influence the internal, invisible substance in others, which he called "fluidium." He began to treat patients, especially hysterics, in his Vienna clinic by using his own "animal magnetism" to eliminate the symptoms that were bothering them. The rest of the medical profession, however, viewed his treatments as quackery and drove him out of Vienna in 1778. He went to Paris, where he concentrated on the healing powers of magnetism.

He soon opened a luxurious clinic where aristocratic ladies could come to be treated at Mesmer's special magnetic "Baquet," a large and ornate vat filled with water and magnetized iron filings. The women would sit around the vat, touching each other to share the magnetic field, while handsome, specially selected young men rubbed various parts of their bodies, supposedly to assist the magnetism in bringing the women to a crisis point, which strangely resembled sexual orgasm. Mesmer also continued to use animal magnetism to cure patients. When both the king's mistress and his queen became involved in the strange practice, he listened sympathetically to the doctors who wanted Mesmer investigated. An inquiry board that included the American diplomat Benjamin Franklin concluded that the apparent cures did happen, but perhaps only in the mind, or in some physiological manner that had not yet been discovered.

Mesmer toned down his treatments, but did not close his clinic until 1792, when the Reign of Terror drove him to Germany. He later returned to France briefly, but lived the rest of his life in Switzerland.

Milken, Michael R., 1947- , U.S., securities fraud. The economic excesses of the 1980s was probably best personified by the career of Michael Milken, a high-powered financial con artist credited with the invention of the junk bond. As a bond trader for Drexel Burnham Lambert, a New York-based securities house, Milken engineered leveraged buyouts, made huge fortunes, and gutted formerly productive corporations with reckless abandon.

Prior to Milken's rise to prominence, a "junk bond" was a securities issue made by a troubled industry giant that might, with a new influx of capital, become competitive again. Milken's financial instinct told him that because small and mid-sized companies had much greater difficulty borrowing money than a giant had, such issues would make a dynamic difference in making smaller companies more profitable. In helping smaller companies resolve debts by selling the debts off to speculators, Milken ushered in the era of coporate raiders--super-rich traders who could buy up a company's debts, then use the economic leverage they gained by doing so to take over proprietorship of the company. In some cases, this led to a newly invigorated business. All too often, however, the corporate raiders swooped down like vultures to suck the life's blood of profits from dying businesses, while thousands of loyal workers were laid off or fired.

Milken's financial empire became so extensive that at one point he was able to add $500 million dollars to his personal fortune. Then, in 1989, the roller coaster ride came crashing down, as Milken was indicted on 98 counts of securities violations in federal court. He was implicated in the national Savings and Loan scandal, as the Congressional House Banking Committee subpoenaed his records of land deals with Irvine, California's Lincoln Savings and Loan Association, which was chaired by Charles H. Keating, Jr., another financier whose ethics were being questioned. In 1990, Milken pleaded guilty to six counts of "technical" violations (while denying any deliberate fraud), and was sentenced by Judge Kimba M. Wood to ten years in prison. Judge Wood later acknowledged that she intended Milken's actual jail time to be less than half that, with the sentence meted out on the assumption that Milken would qualify for parole much earlier than the full sentence prescribed. Later, Judge Wood recommended Milken for just such a parole.

Milken reported to the minimum-security Federal Correctional Institution at Pleasanton, California, where his federal prisoner number was 16126-054, in early March of 1991. While there, he was appointed camp tutor for inmates seeking high school equivalency diplomas, reorganized the prison law library, created educational puzzles for other inmates' children, and worked toward settling hundreds of millions of dollars worth of civil suits brought against him by angry investors burned in leveraged buyouts. Altogether, Milken was estimated to pay around $900 million dollars in settlements and penalties, with Drexel Burnham Lambert kicking in another $300 million and insurers $100 million to make good the loses to others in the scandal.

In June 1992, Milken testified against a former colleague, Alan E. Rosenthal, in the latter's federal conspiracy trial in Manhattan. Although officials of the Securities and Exchange Commission questioned whether Milken's testimony really helped the prosecution's case against Rosenthal, it was taken into consideration when Judge Wood ruled two months later that his sentence could be cut. By allowing him released after less than two years in prison, Judge Wood kept him behind bars for a shorter time than convicted co-conspirator Ivan Boesky had to serve. Milken left the Correctional Institution, where he was regarded as a model prisoner, for a halfway house in Los Angeles in early January 1993.

The last portion of his sentence was yet to come. Milken was expected to do 1,800 hours of unspecified community service. He announced that, over the next three years, part of his service would be to teach mathematical skills to children in poor Los Angeles neighborhoods. Friends of Milken believe that he was made a scapegoat for the economic troubles of the 1980s. Drexel went out of business during Milken's stay in prison. Although, according to Milken's lawyers, he had given over $360 million dollars to charity in the 80s, Milken left prison with an estimated half-billion dollar fortune intact. He has been barred from securities trading for life. See: Boesky, Ivan; Keating, Charles, Jr.

Miller, William Franklin, b.1879, and Ammon, Robert Adams, prom. 1899-1920, U.S., fraud. Twenty-year-old William Franklin Miller worked as a clerk at a New York brokerage firm in 1899. Starting with some young men with whom he had read the Bible for years, he offered, for an investment of only $10, a weekly interest payment of $1 for ten weeks, plus the return of the original $10. As others have done, however, he used the money to get others to invest, whose money he used to pay the first group. His investors believed that Miller had inside tips.

Miller soon launched a major advertising campaign. He deposited the huge amounts of cash he received in many different personal accounts, though he did pay up to fifty clerks to handle the $80,000 a day investors sent to The Franklin Syndicate. The new investors, who lined up at one window in the deliberately grubby office, could see earlier investors collecting their dividends at another window. Mailmen and express drivers who delivered at the offices in New York and Boston, were so impressed that they contributed too.

When newspaperman E.L. Blake warned the public about Miller's "discretionary game," Miller called him "a blackmailer." Miller, worried for the first time by the slander suit Blake brought against him, called in lawyer and confidence man "Colonel" Robert Adams Ammon. Ammon stopped a run on the syndicate's funds by worried investors, but not before the manager in Boston, Edward Schlesinger, fled to Europe with $150,000 in cash. Miller himself began to panic, and disappeared to Canada, taking almost $2 million and leaving Ammon to care for his family. That same day, a Friday, investors continued to support Miller, aware of the strict rule that only those funds invested by the close of business on Friday would get interest the following week. However, on the following Monday, Miller did not reappear, and the courts stepped in. The enterprise had lasted eleven months.

When Kings County authorities insisted that Ammon appear before the grand jury, he urgently sent for Miller, who came home, stood trial for fraud, and was sent to Sing Sing for ten years. Ammon was very stingy in his payments to Miller's family, and Miller himself soon became ill in prison, so he chose to testify against Ammon. The lawyer was disbarred, convicted of receiving stolen money, and sentenced to four years at hard labor. In return for his testimony, Miller was pardoned in 1905. Fifteen years later, he was running a grocery store on Long Island, and refused to tell reporters what had happened to the $2 million he took to Canada. Newsmen who asked Miller's neighbors what kind of reputation he had were told his nickname was "Honest Bill." See: Ammon, Robert A.,

Milne, Caleb, IV, 1911- , U.S., hoax. First, the young, wealthy Caleb Milne IV tried writing, spending long days and nights creating detective stories. But no one wanted to buy them. Then Milne, who lived with his younger brother in a Manhattan apartment, decided to try acting. To get both experience and publicity, the 24-year-old Milne set about kidnapping himself. He prepared a note with words cut out from newspapers and put the watch his grandfather had given him in a box. He mailed the package to his grandfather, and put the note on a train so that it would be found and mailed later to his brother, Frederic. Then he dashed from his apartment, telling his landlady that Dr. Green had called him to his sick grandfather's bedside. The next morning, Dec. 15, 1935, Frederic Milne received the letter and called the police.

When the grandfather received the package containing the watch and a demand for $50,000, Caleb's father called in the FBI. A jurisdictional dispute over the case reached J. Edgar Hoover's headquarters in Washington, and the front pages of the newspapers. Hundreds of agents searched the Northeast for a sign of the young man. The family refused to say whether or not they had paid the ransom. But on Dec. 19, on a road near Doylestown, Pa., a driver saw something moving beside the road. Summoning help, he found Caleb Milne IV tied up, his eyes and mouth taped and his wrists fastened to his knees. The sleeves of his coat had been torn off, and there were needle marks in his arm. His story of being kidnapped, drugged, and taken to a deserted farmhouse was accepted until a New York City policeman caught him in a simple lie. Milne said that his watch had been taken immediately after the kidnapping, but he said he knew what time it was when he reached the farmhouse by looking at his watch. Once challenged, Milne broke down and told the truth, that he had done it all for the publicity to help his acting career. On Feb. 20, 1936, Milne was brought before a grand jury, which could not indict him because kidnapping oneself is no crime. No one ever determined whether or not his grandfather paid the ransom.

Minor, Wilma Francis, prom. 1928, U.S., hoax. In late 1928, the Atlantic Monthly magazine published a series of articles about Abraham Lincoln, written by Wilma Francis Minor, which included thirty unpublished letters acknowledging Lincoln's relationship with Ann Rutledge. Critics immediately challenged the authenticity of the letters, and Ellery Sedgwick and Nelson J. Peabody, the magazine's editor and publisher, respectively, began a full investigation. They interviewed people in Emporia, Kan., purporting to be the sources for the letters, and announced they were continuing on to the sites of other Lincoln documents. Wilma Minor concurred with the investigation, but on Jan. 21, 1929, Sedgwick announced that he was convinced that material lacked the authenticity the public needed, and the series was withdrawn.

Mizner, Wilson, 1876-1933, U.S., fraud. One of the celebrated Hollywood wits of his era, Wilson Mizner once advised his drinking pals, "Always be pleasant to the people you meet on the way up. They are always the people you meet on the way down." Mizner was a hustler, bon vivant, and gifted storyteller who produced stage plays popular in both New York and Chicago. After he moved on to Hollywood he churned out scripts for Warner Brothers. He described the West Coast film capital by saying "Hollywood is a sewer with service from the Ritz Carlton."

The Ritz Carlton was a long way from the Alaskan gold fields where Mizner first embarked on his career in the 1890s. He was one of three sons born to a missionary named Lansing Bond Mizner, who took his brood to Guatemala in 1889 seeking to convert the natives to Christianity. Wilson returned to the U.S. and studied at Santa Clara College between 1892 and 1894. Three years out of school, he yielded to his craving for adventure and headed north to Alaska. In Fairbanks he met Sid Grauman, who went on to become one of Hollywood's most famous theater moguls, but in the Klondike was just another down-on-his-luck miner. Grauman toiled from dawn till dusk in a soup kitchen, dispensing food to hungry miners at inflated prices. He extended credit to his friend Wilson Mizner, but after awhile he advised him to go out and find himself a niche, legal or otherwise.

Mizner, who had never believed the things his missionary father had preached, enlisted an attractive waitress he had found in one of the local dives to help him enact a badger game against the miners who had struck it rich. Mizner played the outraged husband to the female accomplice's cheating "wife." A bartender who took pity on Mizner clued him in one day that the girl was two-timing him. "The dame came to me and told me the whole story," the bartender said. "Only she tells me that she will split the boodle with me if I leave you to the old man's shotgun." Mizner thanked the bartender for his tip and went back to a cabin where the waitress was setting up a miner. Brandishing a tomato can wrapped in newspaper made over to resemble a bomb, Mizner threatened to blow them all through the roof. "Prepare to meet your maker!" he screamed. The terrified miner held up his gold belt. "Take it--there's fifty thousand worth of dust in that," he said, and ran out the door. Turning to the woman, Mizner tossed her the tomato can. "That just got me fifty thousand dollars. See what it can do for you," he said, and walked out of the cabin.

Mizner perpetrated dozens of cunning frauds from Atlantic City to California. He moved to Florida with his brother Addison in the early 1920s to get in on the land boom in that state. Speculators were earning millions of dollars buying up property for commercial and residential development. Addison Mizner was an architect who built houses for the nouveau riche of the 1920s. His style was described by author Alva Johnston in his book The Legendary Mizners as the "Bastard-Spanish-Moorish-Romanesque-Gothic-Renaissance-Bull Market-Damn the Expense Style." With Wilson providing the direction, Addison promised to create a vast subdivision which he called Boca Raton ("Rat's Mouth"), south of Palm Beach. Competitors called the scheme "Beaucoup Rotten," but thousands of wealthy Northerners bought lots from the Mizners in 1925. When the choice lots were all sold, Wilson peddled land that disappeared when the tide came in. One angry customer told a judge that he was promised prime farmland. "He said I would be able to grow nuts, and I can't grow a damn thing because my land is underwater," he complained. Mizner's flippancy at the hearing caused the judge to ask him if he was showing contempt for the court. "No, your honor, I'm trying to conceal it," Mizner replied.

Wilson Mizner eventually moved back to California and got to know the giants of the burgeoning film industry. Lionel Barrymore was a friend, as was William Sydney Porter, better known to the literary world as short story writer O. Henry. Mizner and O. Henry's friendship dated back to the turn of the century, when they had roomed together in New York. Some scholars believe that Wilson Minzer was the author of the O. Henry stories, not Porter, but Mizner would stand for no attacks on Porter. When Jim Tully, for example, suggested that he was a far better writer than Porter, Mizner, well-known for his insults, called him a "digger in the garbage of literature" and an "impudent red-headed cur."

Perhaps it was due to Porter's influence that Wilson Mizner took up writing to sustain himself. His talent entailed a natural, ingrained appreciation for the absurd. When told that prizefighter Stanley Ketchel, whom he once managed, had been shot to death, Mizner, although crying, allegedly quipped: "Have someone start counting over that kid--he'll get up at the count of nine!" Several of Mizner's stage dramas became lucrative hits, including The Only Law, The Deep Purple, and The Greyhound. In Hollywood, he wrote scripts for Jack Warner, head of the Warner Brothers Studio, who was no fan of writers--he called them lazy bums. Mizner endured the insults for a time, but took his revenge when Warner called upon him to write a "really big epic" for the studio. Mizner stalled until Warner was beside himself. Finally, he delivered a package weighing several pounds to the Hollywood titan. "Here you go," Mizner said, "probably the biggest epic Warner's will ever produce, a cast of tens of thousands." After Mizner had left the office, Warner unwrapped the bundle and found a copy of the New York Telephone Directory.

Wilson Mizner died on Apr. 3, 1933, after a long coma. Just before his death, he emerged from his coma temporarily. At his bedside, a priest said, "I'm sure you'll want to talk to me." Mizner, not missing a trick, replied: "Why should I talk to you...I've just been talking to your boss."

Moccia, Luigi, prom. 1927, Italy, hoax. Claiming in 1927 to have found a fifth gospel predating the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D., Luigi Moccia revealed to the Christian world the Gospel of Joseph. The gospel was fascinating to many believers and scholars who saw in it a more pure rendering of Jesus of Nazareth, as it claimed authorship while those who knew Jesus still lived. Moccia claimed it was completed as the Romans sacked Jerusalem. Joseph hid the manuscript, writing, "Whoever of you finds it let him pass it on without delay." The mother of Emperor Contantine, Helen, found the manuscript near Solomon's Temple in a small house. She sold it to a group of Israelites, and around 332, it stayed in the National Library of Alexandria. The library was burned in 640 but the manuscript somehow survived. Moccia bought it from an old pilgrim returning from Palestine who refused to divulge how he came into possession of it. Perhaps the most historically significant part of the gospel is the preface in which Joseph wrote: "Fearing that this writing may be modified and destroyed by some of our opposers, I have left four copies to our excellent brothers: Matthew of Capernium, Mark of Jerusalem, Luke of Antioch, and John of Thesda.

The Gospel of Joseph was a hoax according to the late, highly respected University of Chicago biblical scholar Edgar J. Goodspeed who claimed it merely ran together the four canonical gospels. He further claimed that the author had no sense of the historical development of Christian thought or of first century manuscripts. Furthermore, the parchment upon which the manuscript was written was of modern manufacture, and it was written in Renaissance Greek, not Koine (New Testament) Greek. Yet others such as the Reverend Salvatore Riggi, for no apparent reasons other than faith, were convinced of the gospel's authenticity and hoped it would become part of the canon. Today, the Gospel of Joseph is regarded in most scholarly circles as a hoax.

Moders, Mary, 1643-73, Brit., theft-blk.-big.-fraud-esc. Mary Moders, daughter of a chorister at Canterbury, was well read and determined to live an adventurous life. After the deaths of two infants from her marriage to a plodding shoemaker named Stedman, she ran away and married a wealthy surgeon. She was caught and tried for bigamy. Stedman could not afford to travel to court, however, and the charge was dismissed.

Moders fled to Europe, and in Cologne, Ger., entered a brothel where she quickly became the star attraction. She enticed an old man of the court with a promise of marriage, but after extracting money from him in preparation for the event, she fled back to England.

At Billingsgate, she convinced some young gentlemen that she was a highborn German lady banished by her father for loving an unacceptable man. The young men promised to help her, and gave her gold to pay for good rooms. Within days, "the German princess" married wealthy John Carleton, the brother-in-law of the owner of the inn where she stayed. But Carleton's father received an anonymous letter accusing her of bigamy, and Moders was arrested. But again, no one came forward to testify against her.

A theatrical producer hired Moders to star in a play about herself, The German Princess. Her popularity in the play again won her many wealthy admirers, most of whom she blackmailed. She also stole from the wealthy homes she visited. Abandoning the theater, she turned to con games, and was eventually reduced to straightforward theft. She was caught, tried, and sentenced to death. Her sentence, however, was commuted to transportation to Jamaica. But someone slipped her money, with which she bribed her way back to England. Caught once again, she was condemned to death for having returned while under sentence of transportation. Mary Moders, only thirty years old, was hanged on Jan. 2, 1673.

Mokanna, al- (Hashim ibn-Hakim), d.c.780, Per., fraud-suic. Religious humbug who in 774 mysteriously appeared in Khurasan pretending to be sent from heaven. He wore a hooded veil to conceal his supposedly luminous face. To avoid capture, he committed suicide in about 780.

Moore, Lloyd J., b.1888, U.S., fraud. In 1936, Lloyd J. Moore convinced a friend to appear on the national radio show We the People and tell the story of a major vein of gold-bearing ore upon which two prospectors stumbled in the 1880s. One murdered the other and then hiked to Moscow, Idaho, leaving a wheelbarrow to mark the location of the vein. The wheelbarrow, however, was covered by an avalanche and the vein was never found...until now, claimed Moore. He had found the wheelbarrow, and a rusty rifle, and a skull with a bullet hole in it. He was certain he had found the lost vein. Now, all he needed was a few investors.

Moore got more than a few: 1,200 people sent him money in return for promises of a big payoff. When, in 1943, the Securities and Exchange Commission finally checked on his story, he slipped quietly over the border into Canada and continued to ply his trade to Canadians, leaving behind forty counts of fraud in the U.S. Ten years later, British Columbia was also closing in on Moore when he suddenly returned to the U.S. and pleaded guilty to one of his pending fraud charges.

Moore was sentenced to three years in prison and fined $2,000 for his "lost wheelbarrow mine" fraud.

Moreno, Anthony (AKA: El Chorro), prom. 1960-68, Fr., fraud. Moreno was known to his neighbors in Marseilles, Fr., as "El Chorro" because he was a "fountain" of money. The gypsy came by this money in a fraud in which he forged birth certificates and school registration forms to "create" children for whom he could collect Social Security benefits. This scheme would not have seemed so extraordinary if it were not for its magnitude: between 1960 and 1968, Moreno claimed to be the head of 197 families and the father of 3,000 children. The charlatan was never caught, disappearing into Spain in 1968 with almost $6.5 million for his retirement, courtesy of the French government.

Murray, David, prom. 1752, Brit., fraud. In the General Advertiser of June 17, 1752, appears the earliest record of what would become a police line-up. David Murray was brought before Justice Henry Fielding and charged with fraud. Porter Nathan Holmes was to deliver a box to a gentleman. When Holmes asked Murray where he might find the addressee, Murray claimed to be the man's servant. When Holmes returned empty-handed from the tavern, Murray and the box were gone. Holmes notified the authorities, who soon captured Murray. At his hearing, the justice made Murray change costumes with a barber's apprentice, then asked Holmes to identify the man who had robbed him. Holmes picked out Murray, who was taken to await prosecution.

Musica, Philip (AKA: F. Donald Coster, George Dietrich), 1877-1938, U.S., boot. -brib.-forg.-theft.-consp. According to the 1938 Who's Who In America, the financial wizard of the drug world, "F. Donald Coster," was born in Washington, D.C., and held a doctorate from Heidelberg. But the distinguished-looking man who had purchased the 105-year-old drug firm of McKesson and Robbins for $1 million in 1926 was not what he claimed. His financial speculations nearly sent the vaunted drug firm into bankruptcy. The $18 million he removed from company assets were used to pay for his extravagant lifestyle. When the bubble burst, F. Donald Coster, who was really Philip Musica, retreated to his bathroom and put a gun to his head.

Musica's saga began on the Lower East Side of New York City in 1883, when his immigrant father, Antonio, opened a barbershop in the tenements. Determined to "be somebody," Philip helped his father branch out. Together they started up a small food importing company. The business prospered through the son's astute management. The Musicas made so much money peddling their wine and cheese in Little Italy that they were soon able to afford more lavish quarters. They moved into the fashionable Bayridge section of Brooklyn and began to mingle with opera stars and leaders of the Italian community in Greater New York. In 1909, the business suffered a sudden reversal when Philip was convicted of bribing customs officials to mark down the weights of imported cheeses, the resulting lower prices permitting the Musicas to undercut their competition. Philip stoically accepted the blame and was sentenced to the Elmira Reformatory for a year. Impressed by the loyalty he had shown his father, President William Howard Taft pardoned him after just six months.

Released in 1910, Musica started a new business, the United States Hair Company, which sold genuine human hair pieces to the society ladies of New York. A year later, the company fell apart after Musica borrowed $1 million on invoices signed by his "branch offices" in Paris, Naples, and London. When detectives dropped by his home in Bayridge, they discovered that Philip had fled. He was tracked down in New Orleans on board a boat about to cast off for Honduras. "I am disgraced!" cried the elderly Antonio, who was a party to the scheme. Philip was extradited to New York and sentenced to three years in the Tombs. Released in 1916 with a suspended sentence, he worked for a time as an informant in the employ of District Attorney Charles S. Whitman, who was arresting German spies in the U.S.

Prohibition provided Musica with new opportunities. With his new partner, Sicilian gangster Joseph Brandino, the wily con man began manufacturing hair tonic in Mount Vernon, N.Y., under the name of Girard & Company. The government sold Musica large amounts of raw alcohol, believing the business to be legitimate. But there was no hair tonic called "Dandrofuge." It existed only in Musica's imagination and in a few sample bottles adorning his desk. The government alcohol was being converted to a cheap Scotch, which was then sold to New York's bootleg gangs at a fabulous profit. When Brandino crossed him, Musica had him reported to the district attorney as someone who had "misused" government permits. Brandino went to prison as a result.

At about this time, Musica began calling himself F. Donald Coster, a name that lent an air of respectability to the firm. In 1925 he was introduced to Julian F. Thompson, employed by the investment firm of Bond & Goodman, Inc. Thompson looked over the books of Girard & Company and found them to be in good order. His findings were supported by the auditing firm of Dun & Company (later Dun & Bradstreet), which reported Girard's annual profits to be $250,000. Thompson personally extended Coster's credit and arranged for a substantial loan to help him purchase McKesson and Robbins, a transaction completed in 1926.

Coster soon became rich selling his bootlegged liquor through the McKesson and Robbins front. In 1928, the firm showed a $600,000 profit under his direction. A syndicate of underwriters floated a $10 million stock issue and with that money Coster built a nationwide distribution network. A year later, the stock market crash put an end to wild speculation on Wall Street. But Musica-Coster came through it surprisingly unscathed. He had swindled the crude drugs division out of $640,000 and then covered his tracks by "reinvesting" it back into nonexistent inventory. The company survived the worst of the Depression in remarkably good shape. But in 1937, the board of directors ordered Coster to convert $2 million of the crude drugs into cash to bolster sagging profits during an unexpected downturn in business conditions. Coster balked at this, demanding that the directors obtain a $3 million loan for improvements instead. At this point Thompson became suspicious and ordered an investigation. Thompson determined that the Dun report was a forgery and the W.W. Smith & Company name Coster had been using as his "distributor" was a fiction. The matter was reported to officials of the New York Stock Exchange. Coster was identified as Musica by a former employee from photographs published in New York newspapers. When police arrived at the family home in Brooklyn, they found company official George Vernard (actually Arthur Musica, Philip's brother) hastily packing up the family car for a vacation. Under questioning he admitted his true identity.

U.S. marshals arrived on Dec. 16, 1938. They found Philip Musica, his cover already blown by the newspapers, lying dead in his bathtub. He had shot himself in such a way that his blood would not stain the imported carpet on the floor.