Word: bucketshop
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Charles E. Brickley (famed Harvard football captain, fullback and dropkicker of 1914) was sentenced to 15 months in jail for running a bucketshop (TIME, March 12). The judge, the prosecuting attorney, the assistant court clerk and Mr. Brickley's counsel were all Harvard men. Said Mr. Brickley to the judge: "I want to thank you for the fairness and consideration shown me during my trial. I am very sorry that anyone lost money through my trading in the stock market, and if the wheel of fortune ever turns my way again I hope to be able to pay back...
Both the New York Stock Exchange and District Attorney Joab H. Banton have declared their intention of wiping out bucketshops. Yet each has proposed a different cure, and this has been the occasion of rather heated dispute between them. Mr. Banton declares that the only solution to the problem is to license stockbrokers. The Stock Exchange, on its part, maintains that the only way to stop bucketing is to put bucketshop keepers in jail and keep them there, and that what is needed is enforcement of old laws rather than enactment of new ones...
Whatever the solution to the bucketshop problem may be, there is evidently force to the Stock Exchange's contention that bucketshoppers are inadequately punished. Recently, attention was drawn to the case of one Jules Rabiner, who failed in 1922 owing about $500,000 to his customers. After being tried, convicted and sentenced, Rabiner recently appeared in the white light district. An indignant customer forced an investigation and it was found that after serving about three months, the bucketshop keeper had been paroled...
...firm, was found guilty of trading against the account of a customer. He must undergo a prison sentence of from three months to three years. Ruskay has appealed the case, however, so that even this slight punishment has a very theoretical aspect. In spite of the ex-bucketshop keeper's plea that he was penniless, he presented what has been termed a "brisk apearance" in court and seemed to be able to command the services of expensive legal counsel...
...moral thus far to be drawn from the Ruskay episode is twofold: 1) the risks of conducting a bucketshop are small in comparison with its possible profits, and 2) if you are going to steal your customers' money be sure and get several millions at least...