Advising the District Attorney to file an information for forgery of the letter, Judge Milton J. Helmick of the United States Supreme Court for China, handed down an opinion yesterday in the case in which Frank Arthur Simon and John Doe were alleged to have filed an application at the American Consulate in Shanghai for the registration of the firm known as the American Chinese Ca., and to have issued certificates of repistry certifying that certain vessels owned by Chinese were the propert: of the firm. The defendant and associate were further charged with selling these worthless certificates to Chinese shipowners.
Outlining the case, Judge Helmick stated that ihe defendant filed an application for registry of his firm at the Consulate and that he had printed so-called certificates of registration. The information added that he procured American flags for use on the junks and that he had induced the American authorities to write him a letter upon official stationery relating to the registration of the company which letter, the information continued, had been altered in tenor by the defendant, who had delivered certificate of registration to Chinese owners of vessels and obtained money therefrom.
After describing the certificate of registration, Judge Helmick stated that there was no question that the information was sufficient to charge a conspiracy to commit an offence against the United States—the offence of obtaining money by false pretences. The District Attorney, however, was not interested in the false pretences aspect of the charge because it would require the testimony of Chinese witnesses, who were pecuniarily defrauded, in order to obtain a conviction.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.