Jasper County Democrat, Volume 5, Number 11, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 June 1902 — QUEEN OF SWINDLERS. [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

QUEEN OF SWINDLERS.

Mme. Humbert, Principal in the Moat Colossal Fraud of the Age. Mme. Humbert aqd her husband, who are fugitives from Paris and are being Bought by the New York police, have in

twenty years secured $8,000,000 from French bankers on the security of an alleged inheritance left them by an American and locked up iu a safe pending a compliance with certain conditions made by the testator. When the safe was opened by creditors recently it

tvas found to be empty. The Crawford brothers, who were purported to have left the fortune to Mme. Humbert, are believed to have been myths, as no one, has ever been able to secure any information in regard to them. Not since the Dreyfus ftfal has any one topic so monopolized the public attention in Paris. ’The affair, which has already brought about the resignations of eminent magistrates and notar'es and has given rise to half a dozen libel suits, and has become a potent factor iu French politics. M. and Mme. Humbert have been living in Paris in regal style, and had an imposing chateau in the country. There have been a number of suicides ns a result of losses through the loans, and the expected failure of an insurance company and other affairs in which the Humberts were interested will affect thousands. Prominent men in France, including judges and politicians, are suspected of complicity in the swindle.

MME. HUMBERT.