Show BURGLAR LOSES MONEY AT TRADE AND QUITS Idl idleness in Jail Lawyer Fees Fees' and Recoveries by Police Take Much More Than Profits of Quarter- Quarter Century Career fl 7 The Tol Special New Neal I S rl LOS ANGELES Dec 2 Moral Moral aspects entirely aside burglary doesn't pay Richard Powell time four loser master at the shady profession profession profession sion and mathematician of parts has figured it out After twenty-five twenty years of scientific house breaking he announced that he will wUl seek another calling not calling not because he has repented but because as an economic proposition proposition proposE proposE- tion thievery is a failure Powell put in seven busy years tho the technique of burglary I before he considered himself pro pro- He accepted penitentiary sentences and large fees to lawyers I as an Inevitable accompaniment of his accepted calling accepted them philosophIcally philosophically phI ph- ph I call y as IlS a a. matter of course Now he figures enforced idleness in Jails has cost him U lawyers' lawyers f fl fes es have totaled thousands of dollars and the cost of crime would steadily rise lise as he grows older did he not try In honesty for a change So he told Public Defender Pope he is going to tobe tobe I be honest and confidently expects he will realize more money money as a shoemaker shoemaker shoemaker shoe shoe- maker in an Arizona town than he ever made In quest of loot The announcement followed an act of kindness on the part of Mr Pope In September the burglar was freed from San Quentin where he he had served two years for his latest Job jobS The The- police here immediately arrested him on gener general l principles and charged him with vagrancy T ere was was' no evidence to connect Powell with recent burglary the man is Ja a sufferer from tuberculosis and Mr I Pope had him released j I Rusts With Ago ASO I Powell Powe gave Mr Mr Pope an unusual analysis of a burglars burglar's life He de declared declared de- de dared an old one cannot compete with younger thieves and cannot cope with the law Unlike members of the legitimate professions the longer he follows his calling the rustier he gets and more significant cant the better the police know him making more and more frequent arrest arresta a certainty The only way to come out ahead in the profession of burglary Powell said sald is to be clever to get caught An And l there never was a burglar who could do th that t. t It is true that if it we were caught for every job we never be out of jail b but t on the other othe hand no burglar can count on oncoming coming out ahead Jf if he is sent up up more than once In his own case Powell figures one oile more job would run the total of his losses Josses up up to for he ho is certain he would be caught and convicted and would get the maximum sentence fifteen years because of his past record His time he reckons as worth 1500 a veer vear ThI Thug I one job he J thinks would and and he would have to look far for loot that would yield commensurate returns So for Powell the cost of burgling has i become prohibitive I And it took him twenty-five twenty years to figure it out Besides at the end end of a fifteen fifteen- year sentence he would be six fifty years old and that age is too advanced for a master burglar he 10 says sas Matter of Finance Without signs of remorse he told Mr Pope how he h had deliberately rl ely trained himself to become a burglar because he thought that th the easiest way in which to make big money The results he achieved as shown by figures s which he seems to think cp creditable are in reality pitiable even 1 years when ell he was ige unknown to the police pollee and and- andre re remained re- re 1 d' d dout out of prison prison for for long periods An average average of a 03 month was his gross haul during his first seven years ears ars that passed without one conviction con con- Later becoming more proficient proficient proficient pro pro- he averaged a month But from the time he turned crooked crook rook rook- ed he e sa says s 's his m money ney went like mist before the sun Wine Vine and arid women claimed much of it during those first seven years lawyers got some som of it Then after his first conviction lawyers lawyers' got most of all he stole There was just one fallacy In my calculations calculations' when I became a a. burglar hur- hur glar he lie said I forgot that after a criminal is once convicted capture and conviction become increasingly easy finally easy finally almost Inevitable And I the length of time in which he may I operate between convictions grows I shorter and shorter First I schooled myself year after year learning every angle angie of the business the moods of locks how to effect quick and quiet entrances where to look Jook for valuables and where I and how to dispose of them Costly Years Then I went to work and stayed at It seven years before I was cinched I served one year Then going back to my trade with a a. de determination determination determination de- de termination to be more wary I was able to keep out of the reach of the I law only six years Again I served t one ne year Before my first conviction i I stole an average of cf 1200 a a. year or ato t n T ur my next six years of freedom I 1 sl l l altogether about When sent up the second time I hadn't a cent the cent the lawyers had taken most of it When i got out I was known as I a repeater and was Was a m marked man I should have realized that long before before be- be fore that time I was slipping And when a u burglar lr begins bogins to slip he ought to quit It took me twenty- twenty I five years to learn that Well after that second time outI out they nailed me rae the very first Job JobI I I got ten years and served seven anil and a half As I had been making 1500 a a. year at my profession I figure that bit cost me as each of the others had cost me 1500 That made lost in prison But I determined to try again and stole 80 from the home of a church deacon While climbing out of a window I stepped on a a. flower lower pot and fell spraining my ankle EO so police caught me the me the very first job again and again and I was sent to San Quentin for two years Another to add to the account of lost time or altogether Bleak Outlook If I should continue to work at that business I would would- surely be beI j I caught again in short order and given the maximum ma sentence of fifteen years That would bring my loss up to and leave me six fifty years old too old too old to get away with any anymore anymore anymore more ore crime If It I should however try again at that age I r would either wIndup wind windup windup up my life lite in prison or be turned loose a broken old man and anti with another year fifteen-year term tenn behind me would be out In wasted timo time It wont won't pay Tuberculosis he Boye arvys must be added to the heavy toll he has paid as he contracted the disease while serving his longest sentence Powell said Defender Pope is the only man I I. I have met in my ex exper experience ex- ex I per perl nce wIt with criminals whose brain absolutely fails faUs to register moral I sense I have seen so-called so moral imbeciles but Powell is the tho first who chose chos crime just because he coldly coldly coldly cold cold- ly reasoned out ut it would pay best He does not even seem scent to comprehend why his religious mother disapproves of ot what he has done though he knows such is the case His only regret I se seems scorns ms to be that he has spent his life at a calling he now sees was foredoomed foredoomed foredoomed fore fore- doomed to be a financial failure And y yet t as poorly as he has done Powell says that if he had had to serve for all alt his jobs he would n not t have been out of Jail in a million I years years years' |