While there will be plenty of sympathy felt for the insurance companies fu Shanghai who are being forced to pay between $8,000 and $10,000 anually in compensation for' damage done by the "look see" racketeers whose activities are exposed in today's Issue of this journal, it must be admitted that the police have by no means an easy task. A constable patrolling in the neighbourhood of may suspect several sees with apparently. nothing to do, of being members of the racket. But unless he can catch them in the act of damaging a car or {threatening to do damage unless they are paid, he is helpless. He can only farrest and charge the suspects with foitering, for which the penalty imposed by the Chinese courts is almost negligible. The racketeers are not fat all alarmed at being charged with joltering, and the police have no alternative charge unless they can arch the men red handed. Many owners also prefer to pay the small fee demanded by the racketeers to reporting them to the police. In the first place they have a guarantee that their cars will not be molested, and in the second place they are saved the trouble of appearing in the Chinese court the next day as complainants in what must be admitted to be a very JSoubttut action. The racketeer docs not threaten damage if he is not paid: the just does it next time, It is no fence for aman to ask for a cumshaw" for looking after a parked vehicle, and the owner, If he complains to the police, has the burden of proof of the suspected offence laid pon him, In these circumstances, the only methods of checking the racket seem t9 be closer ce-operation Between the motor car owners and ithe police and sterner sentences of! loiterers by the courts.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.