 |
Sign the
Resolution |
General Histories | Ancient History | 1800-1850 | 1860
| 1870 | 1880
| 1890 |
|
The New York Times March 9, 1930
______________
NARCOTICS BUREAU IS URGED BY TUTTLE
______________
He Tells House Committee of Facts Found in Secret Drug Traffic Inquiry Here.
______________
WOULD SUPERVISE OUTPUT
______________
Says the Only Result of Seizures Under Present System Is to Raise Prices.
______________
WASHINGTON, MARCH 8 (AP). -- A report on new york's recent grand jury investigation into narcotics was placed today by District Attorney Charles H. Tuttle before the House Ways and Means Committee, which is considering a bill to create a narcotic bureau.
The testimony of two months of grand jury sessions was incorporated into the committee's records.
As chairman of the survey, Mr. Tuttle urged on the committee members "one central bureau to deal with this great social menace, which lies at the very heart of crime."
He asked stationing of a Federal chemist at each narcotic factory to prevent illegal diversion of drugs and urged the arrest and conviction of "higher ups," and of the "people behind the traffic who shield themselves in a series of screens, grading down to the lesser men."
It is impossible, Mr. Tuttle said, for customs officials to know the names that are "red flags" in the narcotic traffic, adding that the liaison between customs officials and narcotic enforcement forces is not now sufficiently close to capture the "higher ups."
The only solution, he said, is an international agreement to cut out the enormous surplus of drugs manufactured.
Mr. Tuttle said the chief narcotic control difficulty is its spread through three bureaus.
"The New York Customs officials have made seizures," he said, "but in connection with none of them was there arrest of anybody."
He cited nine huge cases of drugs consigned to F. Klein, Philadelphia, and marked brushes, which were seized on the Rochambeau. Under the drug traffic system, he said, eight cases contained drugs, while the ninth placed attractively for inspection, held the brushes.
"F. Klein is an imaginary character," Mr. Tuttle said, "I have here records of huge consignments of unseized cocaine, morphine and heroin billed to that name as rolling pins, brushes and other articles."
The New York District Attorney contended that by employing ordinary police detective methods the entire Klein traffic system could have been exposed. But the customs officials, he said, naturally thought only in terms of contraband.
"Seizures but no arrests--so it goes on!" he exclaimed. "There should be somewhere at reach a cooperative power with ample authority to take up the police work.
"The only effect of a seizure is to put up the price of drugs."
Dealer Boasted of Secret Factory.
Two trunks of opium were seized on the Ile De France, Tuttle said, but the people who brought them in, even those who had the cabin, were not arrested.
He told of how his office made purchases across the counter at "a thousand dollars a throw," in order not to deal with the small peddler, but to get his employe[r] out of the back room.
The ruse was successful, he added, and a big dealer in drugs boasted he could "supply $1,000,000 worth of drugs in twenty-four hours," and that he had a "secret factory in New jersey."
"All the government gets is paper reports from the factories," said Tuttle.
Representative Estep, Republican, of Pennsylvania, a committee member, interrupted to say that he "believed control of the narcotic situation is more important than control of the prohibition situation."
Doctor Opposes 'Undue Supervision.'
Miss Ellen N. Lamotte and Mrs. Hamilton Wright, who were decorated by the Chinese
Government Feb. 9 for their activities against opium, and Mrs. E. Crane Chadbourne urged
the narcotics bureau bill now before the committee.
Dr. William C. Woodward, legislative counsel for the American Medical Association, protested against "undue supervision" of physicians.
"A stool pigeon can trap an innocent man," he asserted. "A doctor is powerless to avoid trouble except as he compromises the case."
Forty-two per cent of narcotic selling cases against physicians are dropped he asserted.
He branded "unfair and unjust' any statement that physicians' addictions to drugs constituted a serious factor in enforcement.
The American Medical Association, Dr. Woodward said, continues to protest against the original Porter bill, providing for the Narcotic Bureau. The physicians of the United States are well satisfied with the present Federal Narcotics Board, he asserted, adding that he believed a Narcotic Bureau in each State would be the most sensible solution of the problem.