Newspaper Page Text
VOLUME I. NUMBER 10.
Career
I
of Daring
Swindler
at an End
ROME, ITALY.—Nerve was what
kept this phenomenal rascal
skating gracefully over the
- thinnest kind of ice. And his
nerve has not deserted him,
now that the ice has broken under
him and he has’sunk overhead in the
muddy waters of trouble, writes a
correspondent of the New York World.
Behind his prison bars he seems, in
deed —like most clever criminals —to
take a sort of professional pride in
his achievements. When he realized
that denial was henceforth futile he
shrugged his shoulders and said:
“I congratulate the Roman police. I
have traveled all over the world and
got away with many hundreds of
thousands of lire. I have always suc
ceeded in evading the police, and in
two days I should have left Rome. My
ability is so great that once when I
was arrested in France under the
name of Prince di Belmonte a lawyer
wanted to defend me for nothing, and
the public prosecutor said to me: ‘You
are the most intelligent man I have
ever known.’
“However, that which I stole I stole
from the rich. I never trimmed any
one for less than 100,000 lire ($20,000).
What a pity that the law must punish
me! I have helped an infinite num
ber of poor priests. Today I had an
appointment with another prelate; in
stead, I am in jail. What a pity!”
This unique scoundrel is a sort of
combination of Tartuffe and Barry
Lyndon. He posed as a priest and
wore priestly garb, but he was not
content with that, for he wore purple
at his throat and a purple girdle,
which indicated that he was a mon
signor of the church, and his visiting
cards always bad "Monsignor” pre
fixed to the name. This latter varied.
It was changed frequently, but always
it sounded noble and was generally
the patronymic of some family famous
in the councils of the church.
Son of Hotelkeeper.
The bearer of these noble names
and ecclesiastical titles had no right
to any of them. He was never a
priest. He had no right to wear even
a cassock, much less the purple of a
prelate. He is just plain Giovanni
Battista Gindri, son of a respectable
Turin hotel keeper. He obtained his
familiarity with church affairs while
receiving his education in an eccle
siastical seminary. His father prob
ably hoped that he would become a
priest. But the youth found his voca
tion along very different lines.
Just when he began his career of
swindling is uncertain, but it must
have been when in his teens. He is
now twenty-seven years old. Eight
years ago, in 1904, he was arrested
and sentenced to six months in prison
for swindling Father Bleageville, a
French missionary.
But recently he has been having
comparatively easy sailing, although
he has had to be careful, as warrants
I ' '' I n
"He Ingratiated Himself Here and
There by Conspicuous Acts of
Charity and Piety.”
for his arrest had been issued in Tu
rin, Milan, Novara, Saluzzo and other
cities, and the police of all Italy,
France, Germany and Austria were
looking for*him.
Only by his supreme nerve did he
elude them. His name changed like
the colors of a chameleon. Here he
wes Mgr. the Abbe Jean de Sevigne,
there the Right Rev. Marquis de Saint-
Mars, elsewhere the Right Rev. Prince
Granito di Belmonte; in some places
ali c gii 11 di n
he was Mgr. Jean Boni de Galller des
Marquis de Vlllarmoir; again he posed
as the Rev. Mgr. Edoardo Lanzettl. In i
one of his swindling games he was
“private secretary to the archbishop
of Paris ”
At his boarding bouse in Rome he
was simply Edoardo di Santo Stefano,
theological student.
Secret of His Success.
It was only by such lightning
changes of name and residence that
he succeeded in keeping the fraudu
lent game going with impunity for so
many years.
It would be Impossible and useless
to make a list of those he has swin
dled. It is believed he has got away
with several millions of francs in all.
The greater number of his victims
have made no formal complaint
against him, preferring to pocket their
losses rather than to suffer the chaf
fing of their friends because of their
gullibility. But it is known that among I
the sufferers are cardinals, archbish
ops, abbots of monasteries, mother su
periors and abbesses of convents and,
noble men and women who are chari
tably disposed.
How did he do it? In many ways
He forged letters of introduction from
one bishop to another. He ingratiated
himself here and there by conspicuous
acts of charity and piety and so got
genuine letters of introduction from
prelates and nobles.
Among those upon whom he im
posed was the Dowager Duchess of
Genoa, mother of Queen Margherita
of Italy, in whose private chapel at
Novara he said mass, and from whom
he received a present.
About to Say Mass.
When caught in Rome he was about
to go to St. Peter’s to say mass, the
authorization so to do being signed
by Cardinal Respighi, which signature
is declared to be a forgery. At the
Pontifical academy called “del Nobllt
Ecclesiasticl,” In the Piazza della Mi
nerva,, letters addressed to him had
been piling up for several days.
They were all directsd to “The Rev.
Granito di Belmonte,” a name he was
using in certain quarters where he had
posed as a nephew of Cardinal Gran
ito di Belmonte. Many of these let
ters were in feminine hands and dain
tily perfumed. They were a puzzle
to Mgr. Francesco Sogaro, archbishop
of Armida, the president of the col
lege, until he heard of Gindri’s arrest
and read the list of names the fellow
had used. Then he sent all the let
ters to the police. They are said to
ilrOhjr JU
. —
“He Seemed an Attractive Person, Both in Face and Manners, Although
Rather Affected and Slightly Too Unctuous.”
throw a brilliant light on Gindri’s
methods.
The police were astonished when
they searched the trunks in Gindri s
room in the Pension la Bella, in the
Via del Babuino. His trunks and
valises were of the finest leather,
with gold plated mountings. They
were full of sacredotal garments of
the finest broadcloth lined with silk
and satin; laymen’s suits made by the
most fashionable tailors in Europe;
canes and umbrellas with gold han
dles; the collars and cuffs were in a
box of carved ivory; there were a few
ecclesiastical vestments of rich dam
ask, a collection of richly illuminated
and artistically bpund breviaries;
boxes containing stationery with
embossed monograms, crests, coats-of
arms and coronets; two antique re
liquaries, an ivory statue of the Virgin
Mary, a gold watch and chain, and
many photographs of famous person
ages bearing their autographs, and
some of them affectionate messages.
Had Some Scheme in View.
The police of Rome have not yet
discovered just what game he was
up to when they caught him. He had
been there only two days, having come
from Turin. He had called upon an
engraver and ordered 200 visiting
cards bearing the high-sounding name
"Monsignor Jean Boni de Gallier des
Marquis de Villamoir,” half of them
with “Tours” as his residence, half
with "Rome.” He had paid four lire
—about 80 cents —deposit on them,
and had given as his address "No. 42
Via di Santa Chiara," which Is that
of the French ecclesiastical sem
inary.
The following day he had ’.-isited the
studio of the Cavaliere Felice, offi
cial photographer of the Vatican, and
expressed a desire to buy the photo
graphs of some cardinals. At his ease
in a big arm chair the bogus prelate
IRWINTON, WILKINSON COUNTY, GEORGIA, FRIDAY, MARCH 22, 1912.
turned the pages of a big album, from
which he selected pictures of Cardi
nal Merry del Vai, Cardinal Rampallo
and Cardinal Granito di Beltmonte,
which he took and paid for.
A high personage at the Vatican de
scribed the adventurer thus:
“He seemed an attraetve person,
both in face and in manners, al
though rather affected and slightly too
unctlous. There was a certain inde
scribable something about him that
made one hesitate to trust him fully.
From the few sentences I exchanged
with him I formed the impression that
hl", culture was a layer of plating cov
ering base metal.
“It was easy for him to penetrate
the seminaries and the monasteries.
Every one of these has a weak spot
somewhere, and he bad but to discov
er this. Remember how Mme. Hum-
I I
I
"The Police Were Astonished When
They Searched the Trunks of Gln
dri's Room in the Pension la Bella,
In the Via del Babuino.”
bert swindled in Paris, and what a
joke that rascal of Kopenlk played
on th'e German army? Well, Gindri
has been our Mme Humbert and our
Captain Kopenik combined.”
Varied Methods of Swindling.
Gindri’s methods were as varied as
his names, and depended always upon
the character of the man was plain-
ning to entrap. He solicited aid for
charitable or philanthropic objects,
more often real than imaginary; he of
fered reinvestments of capital at high- :
er rates of interest; here and tuere
when he had an ambitious and not too
scrupulous man to deal with he pro- I
pounded schemes for this man's pro
motion by means of bribes placed in
the right quarters.
There was nothing new about his
swindles; they were the old, well-worn
devices, with which every one ought
to be familiar, but which work just ■
as effectively today as they worked in
the time of Gil Blas.
Getting forged checks cashed was
another very simple method of obtain
ing money. When searched Gindri
had In his pocket a check book on the
Credit Lyonnais, which has branches
all over Europe. The stubs In this
book showed.that checks aggregating
many thousands of francs had been
cashed for him by ecclesiastical digni
taries, although the only deposit he
had made was one of 500 francs. In
his pockets were also a solid silver
purse containing S4OO in foreign
money, several diamond rings, and a
gold watch set with diamonds.
This extraordinary young scoundrel
is tall and slender, with a hooked
nose, black eyes and black hair. He
speaks Italian, French, German, Eng
lish and Greek.
He is to be sent successively to I
each of the cities where he is "want
ed;" in each of them he will be tried
and. If convicted, will be sentenced.
So he has the prospect of four or five
prison terms, one after another, in dif
ferent parts of Italy.
, The Job He Had.
“Clarissa’s Italian count was killed
on a gondola in Venice.”
“I'll bet he was handling the
sweep."
t
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A
Milledqeville, Ga.
*
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SI.OO A YEAR.
