Ticket Speculators Convicted for Occupying Streets Without Permit in Police Drive on Pasteboard Gamblers

On Friday morning a Harvard student appears before Judge Thomas H. Connolly in the Brighton Court to face the charge of violating a city ordinance, forbidding the distribution of material on city property without a permit. Unlike L. B. Cohen, Jr. '33, who was fined on the same charge for handing out Socialist handbills, the above-mentioned student fell into the tolls of the police when caught selling a pair of football tickets outside the Stadium before the Dartmouth game.

According to Captain Samuel Dunlap of the Brighton Station, it is almost impossible to convict a man on the charge of speculating, that is, selling a ticket at a price above fifty cents over face value, as it is very difficult to prove the amount of a transaction. For this reason the city ordinance, violation of which involves a maximum fine of $20, is resorted o.

The Brighton police, who have jurisdiction on the Stadium side of the river, are cooperating with C. F. Getchell, General Manager of the H. A. A. in a determined effort to wipe out ticket speculators. Three professional speculators were lately caught and fined $10 each, losing as well the tickets in their possession at the time of their arrest. Probably the only seats unoccupied during the Army and Dartmouth games were those held by the Brighton force as evidence of the unpermitted occupation of city streets. The plain clothes men cannot convict on a mere request to buy tickets, but must wait until they see the tickets change hands to place the speculator under arrest. For this reason, many of the professional men go free, but as they turn the ticket number over to the Athletic Association in return for money, the student selling them it almost always blacklisted.