100 years ago in Eastern Washington: More details emerged in the rum-running bust out of Okanogan County

O.J. McCullough, in jail as part of the rum-running caravan foiled in Okanogan County, denied paying the sheriff or anyone else “protection money” for safe passage.

This seemed to contradict reports that he took Sheriff Wilson aside during the bust and said he had paid $500 for safe passage. McCullough denied it.

“I absolutely did not say that either Sheriff Wilson or any of his deputies ever took money for protection,” he said from his cell. “There is no man in the world who could ‘fix’ Wilson. No federal officers, so far as I know, received any money. Other rum-runners in jail also deny that any protection money was given to either local or federal officers.”

Yet he may have employed a ring of “spies” to keep tabs on the sheriff and deputies and alert his gang to their whereabouts. This information allowed the bootleg caravans to proceed on a “supposedly safe route.”

When asked about this spy network, McCullough said, “I don’t care to talk.”

Whatever method was used by the bootleggers, it didn’t work. Authorities said they believed that the spy system failed in this case because the caravan was delayed by five hours and Sheriff Wilson had come back early from another assignment.

McCullough and seven others were scheduled for trial soon and “it is anticipated that they will be given fines of $500 each.”

“The (Okanogan) county jail is not able to accommodate prisoners for any length of time,” said the Chronicle.

The rum-runners hoped to avoid federal charges by pleading guilty to the county charges.

From the manslaughter beat: John Hardiman, 22, was sentenced to a 4- to 20-year term at the Monroe prison on manslaughter charges in the gunshot death of his “sweetheart,” Goldie Flaugher.