CRIME: P.S. for Roguery

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As appointments secretary and trusted aide to President Harry S. Truman, poker-faced Matthew J. Connelly had a reputation in Washington for getting things done. Last week in St. Louis, a federal district court jury decided that Matt Connelly had tried to get too many things done: it convicted him of conspiring to fix a tax case. Also convicted was Theron Laniar ("Sweet Thing") Caudle, onetime Assistant Attorney General who shocked Washington in 1951 with his honeysuckle-toned stories of poorly concealed roguery in the Truman Administration.

Connelly and Caudle were accused of accepting gifts in return for their help in trying to head off the trial of St. Louis Shoe Broker Irving Sachs, who later pleaded guilty to income-tax evasion and was fined $40,000. What the jury decided Connelly got: a topcoat, two suits of clothes and an oil royalty worth $3,600 (Connelly said he had put up $750 for the royalty and did not know it had cost more). What the jury decided Caudle got: an oil royalty worth $3,300 (Caudle said he had angrily ordered Sachs's agent to get the royalty out of his name, and had "cut him to ribbons" for buying it).

To be sentenced next month, and facing a maximum of five years in prison and a $10,000 fine, T. Lamar Caudle wailed his innocence: "My conscience is so clear and open that when I face God, my sweet children and my friends, I will have no apologies to make for anything I have done." Matt Connelly, the man who could get things done, said nothing.