I hope they don’t have rats at that bank, because it sounds like just about anything would set that alarm off.

New Burglar Alarm Set Off by Vibrations of Heartbeat

THERE have been numerous inventions to foil bank bandits in their hold-up attempts but the latest one is the most original. The vibrations of the human heart-heat set off an alarm bell.
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Tricks of the Rum Runners

A Chicago bootlegger recently remarked that there was at least one honest official in that town—Pat Roche, chief investigator for the State’s Attorney—who couldn’t be “fixed.” For eight years Roche was a special agent for the treasury on the trail of crooked dry agents. He tells here the inside story of the rum runners, and why they flourish.

by PAT ROCHE

Former Special Agent – U. S. Treasury

IN TWO weeks’ time a few years ago, on the strength of a set of credentials purporting to show that I was a prohibition agent, I had $85,000 in bribes handed me as my share of the money being paid a small ring of dry agents in New York.
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Lens Detects Bogus Coins in Subway

THE days when iron slugs and Chinese taels could safely operate the turnstiles of the New York subways is past, for the transit company has recently equipped the coin boxes controling the turnstiles with lenses that magnify the coins to twice the size of a silver dollar. This makes it possible for inspectors to detect spurious coins at a distance of 15 feet from the machine.
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Glass Banks Will Foil Hold-Ups

BANK hold-ups may soon become things of the past if the common-sense but revolutionary ideas of Francis Keally, New York architect, are put into effect. He suggests that banks be constructed with glass walls and that office partitions within the building likewise be transparent, so that a clear view of everything that is happening inside the bank will be afforded from all angles at all times.
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Robot Guards Foil Uprising in Biggest Jail

WITH one foiled jail break to its credit, a new electrical communication and alarm system installed recently in the five-story county jail at Los Angeles, Calif., is believed to make the institution proof against an uprising of prisoners or an assault by armed gangsters from without.

This ultra-modern skyscraper jail, called the largest in the country, occupies the top of a tall building whose lower floors are used as courtrooms. A prisoner attempting escape has the choice of a sheer drop of ten stories, or a desperate dash for freedom through the corridors and elevators. Read the rest of this entry »

Suicide or Murder? ~ Science Tells Which

NO LONGER can a murderer defeat justice by placing the gun in the hand of the victim to mislead the coroner’s jury into returning a verdict of suicide. On the other hand, it will no longer be possible for an innocent man to be convicted of murder on circumstantial evidence if the deceased fired the shot which ended his own life, for science can now identify positively the hand that fired the gun. Whenever a firearm explodes, the generated gases expand and blow backward as well as forward. No firearm has yet been built in which some of these gases do not escape backward. Read the rest of this entry »

“Alarmball” Warns of Burglars

THE “alarmball,” illustrated in accompanying photo, is a clever little device to prevent burglaries. Placed against a door or a window, its own weight pushes the three small legs down and stills a bell, which is controlled by a clock-like arrangement within the walls. The least little movement of door or window upsets device causing the legs to thrust outward, ringing the bell and warning its owner that there’s a burglar on the premises.

Bank Teller’s Cage Has Fourteen Ways To Foil Holdups

No matter what tactics a robber may attempt, the teller in the special bank cage pictured at the right has a card up his sleeve to foil him. Installed in the demonstration room of a company manufacturing protective devices for banks, stores, warehouses, and other places of business, the cage is equipped with fourteen separate electrical devices, most of which are hidden and capable of secret operation while the teller apparently obeys the orders of his armed “customer.” In the photograph, the teller is shown operating an alarm button under the counter with his left hand while handing over cash with his right.

This doesn’t sound like such a smart idea.

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Beating the Thug to His Own Gun

Chicago Police, Trained to Handle Armed Men, Show, in Series of Pictures, How Weapons Can Be Wrested from Footpad

WHAT TO DO AND HOW. Photos on this and following page give a good idea of how officers are taught to disarm a thug even after he has them covered. Above, Sergeant John Leonard, right, and Detective William Foley, of the Chicago Police Department, pose for the first of the pictures in the series that proves that an armed man has not an unbeatable advantage even though he has his weapon in his hand and is desperate enough to use it. Read the rest of this entry »

“Water Auto” for Police Hits High Speed

Like a streamline automobile without wheels, the odd “water auto” shown above in a trial run along the Thames River in England, can hit a top speed of thirty-five miles an hour although it is driven by a motor rated at only nine horsepower. Designed especially as a police patrol boat for emergency work on the waterfronts of large cities, the craft has its engine forward and a three-place passenger cabin perched over the stern. The center windshield section forms part of a hatch through which entrance is made into the cabin, which provides all the comforts of a luxurious motor car.

Latest equipment for the English bobby is a miniature radio receiving set with which he picks up instructions from police headquarters while on duty. The set is so small that the policeman carries the complete outfit in his pocket.

Cops get a dome light
Japanese motorcycle cops are being outfitted with these new helmets, which have a flashing light on top. Police can use the light to flag down drivers or to control traffic on heavily traveled city streets.