Nature of the Case
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Facts
Ds were convicted of a conspiracy to violate the National Prohibition Act by unlawfully possessing, transporting, and importing intoxicating liquors and maintaining nuisances, and by selling intoxicating liquors. Seventy-two others in addition to Ds were indicted. Some were not apprehended, some were acquitted and others pleaded guilty. The conspiracy involved the employment of not less than fifty persons, of two seagoing vessels for the transportation of liquor to British Columbia, smaller vessels for coastwise transportation to the State of Washington, and the purchase and use of a ranch beyond the suburban limits of Seattle, with a large underground cache for storage and a number of smaller caches in that city, the maintenance of a central office manned with operators, the employment of executives, salesmen, deliverymen, dispatchers, scouts, bookkeepers, collectors, and an attorney. In a bad month, sales amounted to $176,000; the aggregate for a year must have exceeded two million dollars. (That is when $1 million was worth something.) Olmstead (D) was the leading conspirator and the general manager of the business. He made a contribution of $10,000 to the capital; eleven others contributed $1,000 each. The profits were divided one-half to Olmstead (D) and the remainder to the other eleven. In their chief office, there were three telephones on three different lines. There were telephones in an office of the manager in his own home, at the homes of his associates, and in other places in the city. One of the chief men was always on duty at the main office to receive orders by telephones and to direct their filling by a corps of men stationed in another room -- the 'bull pen.' The call numbers of the telephones were given to those known to be likely customers. At times the sales amounted to 200 cases of liquor per day. Federal prohibition officers inserted small wires along the ordinary telephone wires from the residences of four Ds and those leading from the chief office. The insertions were made without trespass upon any property of the defendants. They were made in the basement of the large office building. The taps from house lines were made in the streets near the houses. The agents gathered evidence for many months. Conversations of the conspirators of which refreshing stenographic notes were currently made, were testified to by the government witnesses. They revealed the large business transactions of the partners and their subordinates. Men at the wires heard the orders given for liquor by customers and the acceptances; they became auditors of the conversations between the partners. All this disclosed the conspiracy charged in the indictment. Many of the intercepted conversations were not merely reports but parts of the criminal acts. The evidence also disclosed the difficulties to which the conspirators were subjected, the reported news of the capture of vessels, the arrest of their men, and the seizure of cases of liquor in garages and other places. Ds were arrested indicted and convicted. Those convictions were affirmed. Ds appealed.
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