Person Page 73

On the last Saturday of January 1899, Franklin W. Thornton, a married man with five children employed as stamp clerk in the postoffice, at Pasadena, went missing. He was an employee in the Pasadena post office for several years and was a steady, industrious worker. No motive was immediately clear for his disappearance. He was last seen when Assistant Postmaster Carrothers bade him good-night. Carrothers said that Thornton's work was up to date and that his accounts were perfectly straight. Before going to work at the post office, Thornton was engaged in the grocery business with another individual.

After he fled, it was reported he was thought to have embezzled over $700, when it was discovered by Postal Inspector Flint, during a brief visit to the Pasadena postoffice this morning that Thornton embezzled a large sum from the government during the past two months.

The method pursued by a dishonest stamp clerk would be very simple. He had merely to retain money taken in from the sale of stamps, and to steal the stamps themselves. The sale of stamps averages in Pasadena, it is said, from $100 to $150 a day. By making daily false entries of receipts in his books, Thornton could escape detection for thirty days. On the first of each month an invoice of stamps on hand is taken, and the stamp clerk's books are balanced.

The reason that Thornton's alleged perculations could continue over two months is that on January 1, Postmaster Wotkyns was seriously ill with nervous prostration and was unable to attend to the taking of the stamp stock and the examination of accounts--duties he always looked after personally. Although in precarious health, Mr. Wotkyns has lately attended to these duties.

The approach of the first day of the present month warned Thornton that his shortage must soon be discovered. Harassed with a thousand fears and vain regrets he fled, leaving behind him his family, home and good name.

On discovering the shortage, Mr. Flint hurried back to his office in the federal building in this city and busied himself setting in motion the machinery of the government's secret service, by which the fugitive will eventually be found and brought back, no matter how far he wanders before being overtaken. The government never quits in its search for those it would accuse of wrong doing in its service.

The inspector naturally is reticent as to the methods to be pursued to secure Thornton. A letter was received yesterday by the wife of the absent clerk. The missive was apparently written on a Southern Pacific train between this city and El Paso, Tex., as it bears the postmark of the last named city. Thornton tells her not to grieve over his sudden flight, and not to worry about him for "it will come out right." He writes that he was tired of Pasadena, and left to seek his fortune.

Thornton's reputation was so good in Pasadena, where notwithstanding his reserved, silent temperament he had scores of friends, that the news of his downfall will be received with astonishment and regret. He was burdened with debt, it is said in his behalf, and had become discouraged over the prospect of extricating himself on his meager salary of $50 a month, and supporting at the same time a wife and five children. Two of the children are by a former wife. Of the other three the youngest is an infant in arms. Mrs. Thornton is heart-broken over this domestic tragedy. She declares there has never been any unhappiness in their home and that, until she heard from her husband, she feared he was dead.

The secret service officials were on the trail of Franklin W. Thornton. Two hundred copies of his photograph have been made, and were sent out in various directions which he might have taken in his flight, although he was thought to have gone to Mexico.

It became apparent not only that Thornton had taken the money, but how he took it. He is believed to have taken the money from the stamp sales and covered his tracks so cleverly that the first investigation did not reveal the theft. When, after waiting a reasonable length of time for him to report for duty, the postmaster made an examination of Thornton's accounts and looked through the money orders, everything was straight and nothing was missing. A more searching investigation by the postmaster and his assistants and Inspector Flint led to different conclusions. Lying in his bed, ill from overwork and nervous prostration, Postmaster Wotkyns told the story of Thornton's methods to The Times correspondent. "Thornton had been employed in the office five years," he said, "and I had the utmost confidence in him. On the first day of November, however, unknown to Thornton, Mr. Carrothers and myself made a thorough account of stock and found everything all right. All of Thornton's stealings must have been carried on since that date. During the holiday season we did an enormous business. I thought our sales of stamps must have been considerable larger than for the same time in the previous year, but when we footed them up we found but a slight increase. It now turns out that a part of our receipts went into Thornton's pockets.

"Our 2-cent stamps come in packages of 5,000 stamps each. It was an easy matter for him to abstract a few sheets from a package without detection. When the stamp sales were at their height in the holiday season, or even at present when there are so many visitors here, he could take $10 or $20 from the till in a lump without it being missed. He could take enough sheets of stamps from a full package in the safe, to put into the broken packages left at night, to make the day's accounts balance. This is only a speculation on my part, but I am quite sure he operated in this way, shifting sheets of stamps from one package to another, to make his cash check up correctly. As his stealings increased in amount, he had to make larger and larger drains upon the stamp reserves. There were big holes in some of the packages we examined this morning, the total deficit being $762.

"It has been the custom of the inspector of the department to go through our office soon after the first of January, but he was detained by other matters and did not come this year. For the whole of that month I was out sick, broken down by the strain of standing all day at the windows during the holiday rush, and then working till 9 o'clock at night to keep up the accounts. I had improved in health considerably last week, and Thornton knew that I would be down the first of the month to foot up things. He could not keep up his game of shifting stamps from the packages, as he knew every sheet would be counted. It was for this reason, I suppose that he took flight."

It was rumored this afternoon that Thornton had engaged in mining speculation, but Postmaster Wotkyns scouts this theory. He believes that Thornton took most of the money with him. It is his conclusion that the fugitive deliberately salted down the $762 or thereabouts, for the purpose of getting away with it when his game was up. The fact that Thornton stole all the money within a few weeks, goes to sustain this theory. Thornton lived in an humble way, and had no extravagant habits. Nobody knows of any expensive vices of his, which could have eaten up the money. He had not seemed particularly flush of late. All the circumstances point to the conclusion reached by Postmaster Wotkyns, that the absconder took his pot with him to Mexico, or parts unknown. Nothing further has been heard from him by his family.

Thornton was a general favorite with coworkers. Retiring in his disposition, accommodating to his coworkers, a man of few words, and those always pleasant, punctuality itself, he was looked upon by the postmaster and all as a model official. "He was the last man in this town whom I would have suspected of such a thing," is the general comment in the postoffice. There have been no reports of missing registered letters or money orders.

In July of 1899, Franklin W. Thornton was arrested by Deputy United States Marshal Farley. He was found by Farley at a boarding-house at No. 47 East Town Street in Columbus, Ohio, and made no resistance.

Immediately after the robbery last winter, Postoffice Inspector Flint, with headquarters at Los Angeles, sent to the Columbus marshal a photograph and description of Thornton. A few days ago Thornton was said to have returned to his old home. Saturday afternoon Marshal Farley passed the house where Thornton was staying, and at one glance recognized him as the man accused of the California robbery of six months ago.

He returned to his office and telegraphed Postoffice Inspector Vickery at Cincinnati, asking if Thornton was still wanted. Vickery replied in the affirmative, directing Marshal Farley to wire Inspector Flint at San Francisco for further directions.

Thornton denied that he stole stamps. He said he was not at liberty to divulge the reason for his hasty departure from Pasadena. He seemed thoroughly tired and disheartened, and was seemingly willing to be taken into custody. He came here from Uhrichsville, he said, and had intended to go to Dayton.

At the news the Times of Franklin's arrest in Ohio, members of his family could hardly believe it at first. But the details of the transaction compelled them to unwillingly accept the report as true. A Times reporter called at Mrs. Thornton's home on Delacey street and found her prostrated by the intelligence. She was confined to her room with a raging headache all day, and could not see anybody. Her mother said they had all hoped that Thornton never would be captured. "If he is guilty, we know that he deserves punishment," she said, "but we could not help wishing that he might escape. The affair had quieted down and we were recovering somewhat from the shock; now this stirs up all the trouble again, and makes it very painful for Mrs. Thornton and all of us." She and other members of the family said they had not heard a word from Thornton since he left town till they read of his arrest in The Times this morning.

A story at the time stated, "It is thought that Thornton will make a determined fight in court, and will never acknowledge that he took the stamps or misappropriated any of the money. The government has not so strong a case against him as it might have. Somebody took the stamps or their equivalent in cash, and Thornton ran away. A postoffice official says that if he had remained at home and faced the music it would have been difficult to prove who was the thief unless he had been caught in the act. Thornton's friends declare that he can never be convicted before a jury. It is said that he was implicated in an affair of a similar nature in Iowa before he came to Pasadena."

His trial began in early October of 1899. A principal witness against Thornton was United States Marshal Fagin, of Ohio, who brought this prisoner back. Mr. Fagin testified that Thornton made admissions of guilt to him, and that he said "he might as well come back and face the music, for he was penniless and couldn't hope to elude the Federal officers much longer."

The evidence at trial tended to show that Thornton disposed of the stamps which are alleged to have been stolen before he left the post office, by selling them over the counter and then reporting his sales less than they really were, pocketing the difference. He was found guilty in the United States District Court of embezzling $762 from the Pasadena postoffice. Thornton took the stand in his own defense and denied his guilt. He said in explanation of his hasty flight from Pasadena that his domestic relations were unhappy, and he desired to get away from his family. He said that we went from Pasadena to St. Louis, Mo., where he obtained work in a photograph studio. Afterward he went to Columbus, Ohio and it was there he read in a newspaper that there was a shortage in the Pasadena postoffice, and that he was wanted on a charge of embezzlement. He said he at once gave himself up to the authorities, desiring to come back here and clear his name of the charge. The jury took no stock in Thornton's story and found him guilty as charged after deliberating about an hour

Judge Wellborn sentenced Franklin W. Thornton, the convicted embezzler of post office funds from the Pasadena office, to three years, imprisonment in San Quentin penitentiary. The prisoner heard the judgment with accustomed nonchalance, and made no comment on the sentence.

Before judgment was pronounced, Attorney Metcalfe made a brief plea for judicial clemency on behalf of Thornton. The prisoner, Mr. Metcalfe said, had been for many years a hard-working, faithful employe of the Pasadena postoffice. His salary had been small and his family large.

The court replied that, while he sympathizes with any man in Thornton's position, he did not feel that clemency is deserved. If Thornton had pleaded guilty instead of standing trial and perjuring himself on the witness stand, the judge said, he might have regarded the matter differently. The maximum penalty for the offense of which Thornton was convicted is five years.