Jasper County Democrat, Volume 13, Number 94, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 March 1911 — INDICTS SEVEN IN FRAUD [ARTICLE]

INDICTS SEVEN IN FRAUD

Officials of the Michigan-Alaska Development Company. At Detroit, Mich., the 'government investigation into Alaskan coal land frauds involving approximately 48,000 acres, valued at more than $50,000,000, resulted in the issuance of an indictment by the federal grand jury charging seven individuals with conspiracy against the United States. The defendants are W. W. Me Alpine, George W. Ross, F. D. Andrus, A. H. Rcehm, A. L. Holmes, M. C. Leßeau, and J. M. Bushnell. The foregoing are officials of a company known as the Michigan-Alaska Development company. John M. Bush nell is a Chicago inan The others live in Detroit. 1 . u . " The contention of the government is that the defendants conspired to induce between 200 and 300 individuals to become stockholders in the Mich-igan-Alaska company by making “fraudulent and fictitious locations of certain Alaska coal lands, thereby violating the land entry laws of 1910, which made it illegal for more than four persons to form a company for locating coal lands and taking out patents on more than 640 acres.”