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Show APPEARS BEFORE BANKRUPTCY REFEREE i VAN VLISSINGEN CONFESSED TO ROSENFELD. v Offered, Then to Go Before State's Attorney, At-torney, Confess and Take Punishment. Chicago, May 17.' Maurice Rosen-feld Rosen-feld and Hcrnhard Rosenberg, to whom I'eter Van Vllspingen. forger or more than a million dollars in mortgages, allege al-lege he confessed his crimes four years prior to his public admission of ruilt, appeared before. Rereree in Kanlrrupley Wean today, ro answer questions growing out of Van Vlisscn-gen's Vlisscn-gen's recent testimony. Van Vlissingen, who was Brought back from the penitentiary to assist In locating the assets of his estate, docleard that, in 1901. Rosenfeld, then cashier of the now defunct Chicago Chi-cago National bank, and Rosenberg, hrothcr ln law of the latter, .slated that several hundred thousand dollars In mortgages, which they had secured from hlni, were forgeries. "i offered then to go before the state's attorney, confess and take my punishment," ald Van Vlissingen when on the witness stand a rortnlglu ago. ""They said thev wanted their mouey. I told them 1 could get it. only by defrauding still other people They said that they did not want to hear about how I pot it; the point with them was that I was to get it. So I continued forging, and discovery was staved off for four years more," Mr. Rosenfeld, taking the stand, said he had known Van Vlissingen twenty year:, and had purchased from him many mortgages for himself and clieuts. "When did you first learn of his insolvency?" in-solvency?" asked Attorney Feake, representing the estate of the convicted convict-ed forger. "Xot until his arrest last winter." Speaking of the new set of books which Rosenfeld had opened on December De-cember 10, 1904, witness was asked his reason for doing so. "Recause." he replied, "on December Decem-ber 0 of that year Van Vlissingen confessed his forgeries to me." "Did he tell you the names of his victims?" , "He said there were none other than myself and the interests I represented" repre-sented" "Did you ask him?" " "Yes; I spoke particularly of Lefens & Scipp, and he answered that they had no spurious loans." "How did you make your discovery of the forgeries?" "I was in the Chicago National bank and, saw a. map of property at Forty-ninth Forty-ninth street and Cottage Grove avenue In the hands of John R. Walsh, president pres-ident of the bank. Mr. Walsh was about to buy the property from Van Vlissingen. I told Mr. Walsh I held a mortgage on the property, and then I went after Van Vlissingen. I kept after him' for three days until, on December De-cember 9, he finally confessed, breaking break-ing down and crying. 1 said to him: "'I am going to take this up with my lawyer; 1 am not going to 'compound 'com-pound a felony.' "To this he answered: "I am not going to run away, neither do I piopose to commit suicide. sui-cide. I ha've equities in real estate, and I can pay you "off." Mr. Rosenfeld was alone at this interview, in-terview, but en the following day he was accompanied by his brother-in-law, Mr. Rosenberg. "Van Vlissingen repeated his confession con-fession and I again declared I would not compound a felony. Then Van Vlissingen explained that his embarrassment embar-rassment was only temporary, due to loaning out too much money. "I suggested that his friends might help him out, but he said no, the amount was too large." "Did he agree to pay you and Rosenberg?" Ro-senberg?" "Yes. he agreed 1o pay us $l,00rt weekly. He owed us about $370,000, which he said he figured no could pav in two or three years. Ho said ho valued his equities in real estate at $300,000." |