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Show f TELLS STORY i OF PAST SINS ! Jean Valjean In Real ; Life Confesses to Es- cape Blackmailer I Philadelphia, Aug. 16. Jean Val- : Jean In real life was disclosed here ; today when TYilliara Burke, elected a city councilman on the reform tlc- ' ket, headed by Mayor Blankenburg last fall, resigned his seat and told how, under the name of Benjamin H. j Tripp, he had served a long term In I the Massachusetts state prison, after 1 a career of crime in New York. Com- ing to this city in 1907. after complet- 1 ing his sentence In the Massachu- ( setts prison, Burke earned a honesc J living as a wood carver, at a trade ? he had learned while in jail. Talcing i an active interest In reform politics, af he was prevailed upon to accept the 5Sj nomination to councilR. ijtt Shortly after his election he was 5jT recognized by a fellow convict and Igl! blackmailed until, driven to desper- M ation, he determined to resign and iV tell his own story. JM According to Burke's story appear- fM i"g in The Philadelphia Inquirer, to- day under his signature, for years 9 . before, he became a convict at Boston, QM;' he had led the life of a thief, a plck- m': pocket, and porch climber. When he iwl was arrested, previous to his con- Mli viction at Boston, he was called the iff "prince of flat workers.' He sas he II started in life as a. street waif on the k cast side of New York selling news- IfBt papers. He was hanging around the life corners of the east side, when be be- 'vy an l,ial llfe of a crook which he '"ill now, flbout in his 43rd year, has con- ; IXn I fessed to '! With Safe Crackers. JJ "Gopher men," the species of f crooks who confine themselves to I : cracking and robbing safes, were the ,JM i first of the underworld he fell in with, vf " They used him, so his story runs, to pjj ' visit establishments where they iS; thought a safe might be worth rifling, fjfj When he drifted in with r a gang - ;' of "moll buzzers" that class of ,0fj thieves who. he explains, arc pick HI f pockets who make a specialty of 0G I snatching women's hand bags. II After this Burke says he went west I with soveral "yeggmen'" and in Chi- j I cago, Kansas City and San Francisco. 1 in the SO's he wob the associate of desperate thieves. I Upon returning to New York, he d became a gambler and thena sneak f ' thler.Laifer1 decent to 'BostonT where?" ,v after robbing many houses, he was i caught and convicted Judge Bond : spntenced him on December 10, 1896 MM, to notJ less than seven years, Upon his release he settled in this city, Ion the northeastern Eectlon. where he worked at his newly learned trade and saved enough money to buy a ' little cigar store. He is married and has a little girl Burke insists he has done nothing wrong since the gates of Charlcs-r Charlcs-r town prison swung open for him and -l he stepped into the world. |