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Show mm? corw ' BFIXTEB; DOESN'T KNOW Witt $100,000 WENT - j L03 ANGELES, March 27. Admit-! Admit-! tin&'that 1200,000 was sent from Los j' Angtlss to secure a franchise for the j noma Telephone company in San rran-: rran-: Cisco, that $25,000 was paid for the I franchise and that $75,000 was given to j the relief committee, A. B. Cass, president presi-dent of the local H;pme Telephone com-! com-! piny, declares he does not know what . became of the remainder or $100,000. He declares, that a portion of it was .returned to Los Anjreles; how much, he nys, he does not know. rasa would not admit that a portion ylthe sum mentioned had been nsed ?o bribe officials of the city and county of Ban Francisco to secure the franchise. fran-chise. Neither would he deny it. -According to President Cass, "things in San Francisco in connection with the alleged bribery were somewhat mixed. Upon one point President Cass was positive. He declared that neither be nor, so far as he knew, any other member of the Los Angeles Home Tele- pone company was a party to the bribery brib-ery of the San Francisco supervisors. It was in the very next sentence that Cass professed not to know what had become of half of the $200,000 that had been taken from this city to San Francisco Fran-cisco by the agents of the corporation. Names Three Men. Declining to state who it was that had furnished the $200,000 which was taken north by the agents who engineered engi-neered the deal, President Cass named three men who acted as the principals of the Home company in the deal for the franchise. The three men named were J. 8. Torrance, secretary of the Home Tele-phone Tele-phone company; James R. Martin of the Adams-Phillips compsny, dealers in stocks and bonds, who in the main financed the shares and bonds of the Los Angeles Home Telephone company, and A. K. Detweiler. According to President Cass it was Torrance who carried with him from this city a sum amounting to between $190,000 and $200,000 with which to secure se-cure a franchise for the Home company in San Francisco. -Martin had preceded Torrance and opened negotiations. When Torrance arrived with the cash the deal had been practically closed. Although Cass is the president of the Los Angeles Home Telephone company and states that he with other capitalists of this city has underwritten the bonds of the San Francisco Home Telephone company, he declares that he does not know how much of the money taken north was brought back to this city. He was unable to account for the difference dif-ference in the amount taken north and the amount paid for tbe franchise, $25,000 plus the donation of $75,000 to the relief fund. "Some of the money was returned to this city," said Cass. "It was brought back by the men who took tbe money north. Jnst how much or how. little of the money was returned to Los Angeles I am nnable to say. One thing I do know and that is that no officer of the Los Angeles Home Telephone company was a party to the bribing of any official offi-cial of the county of San Francisco. The two concerns, toe San Francisco company com-pany and the Los Angeles company, are entirely distinct and separate. "Then how does it come that the Los Angeles company furnished a sum amounting 4o $200,000 . to secure the franchise for San Franeiscoti' he was asked. Doesn't Deny Bribery. ; "The Los Angeles Home Telephone company did not furnish that money. It was furnished by individuals who may or may not have been members of the Los Angeles company, but they furnished fur-nished it as individuals. "Were you one of those individuals, and if so who were the others!" 'I will not answer that question. I will not be interviewed. Ask Mr. Tor-ranee. Tor-ranee. He knows all about it and should be willing to give all the information.. infor-mation.. "Mr. Torrance followed Mr. Martin, who opened the negotiations and carried car-ried the money With nim when be went. He knows what became of it I understand under-stand that a portion of that money was brought back to this city, but I do not know how much.' . Mr. Torrance will explain. ex-plain. Ask him.' ''Things are mixed np north. That bribery story is not auita straight. "What is the straight of itt" the president was asked. mixed; that's all." . "Do you mean to say that the supervisors super-visors who confessed did not tell the truthf Do you mean by saying 'things are mixed' that the supervisors were not bribed as it is charged they weret" "I will not answer that question. I refuse to be interviewed. I have already al-ready said more than I should have said," was the closing remark of President Cass. Then he finished abruptly ab-ruptly with a terse "good night."- -: v ' |