484 



ANNUAL REPORTS OF DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



the decree of the court provided that the product should be sorted and 

 tliat portion found unfit for food should be destroj^ed. 



At the close of the year 967 cases were pending, of Avhich 330 were 

 criuiinal prosecutions and 637 were seizures. 



In addition to the cases reported by this department to the Depart- 

 ment of Justice, the food and drugs officials of the various States and 

 the District of Columbia, collaborating with the department in the 

 enforcement of the act, are shown by the records of this office to have 

 reported 55 cases to the TTuited States attorneys which were termi- 

 nated during the year. Of these, 42 were criminal cases and 13 were 

 seizures. In all of the criminal cases there were pleas of guilty or 

 nolo contendere, or the collateral deposited by defendants was for- 

 feited on account of their nonappearance. In all of the seizure 

 cases, except one in which the goods were not located, decrees were 

 entered and the products released on bond in 4 cases, destroyed in 6, 

 and ordered sold in 2 cases. The fines or amounts forfeited as col- 

 lateral in the criminal cases were as follows: 



Fines in food and drug cases hegun hy United States attorneys.^ 



1 One personal bond taken. 



Three hundred notices of judgment were published during the year. 



FOOD AND DRUGS CASES OF INTEREST. 



In the case of the United States ^'. 141 bottles, etc., of drug products 

 (F. & D., 0377), involving the seizure of a drug known as '' A Texas 

 Wonder" in the Southern District of Texas, which was labeled in 

 such manner as to claim for it certain therapeutic and medicinal 

 properties, the intervening claimant pleaded res adjudicata by reason 

 of a verdict and judgment of not guilty in a criminal proceeding in- 

 stituted against the shipper of the article in the Eastern District of 

 Missouri. In the present case the court denied the plea of fonner 

 judgment for the reason that 



an essential element of the offense under this act is the statement of mind of 

 defendant, a factor necessarily subject to constant change. To contend that a 

 prosecution or proceeding which turned not, as most offenses do, on the com- 

 mission of the overt act, but on the state of mind of the defendant, would con- 

 stitute a bar to a proceeding based upon the defendant's state of mind at a later 

 date, is essentially unsound. 



In commenting on the fraudulent character of the labeling the 

 court said : 



The defendant admits that he is not himself a physician, though many of his 

 circulars and advertisements declare him to be " Dr. E. W. Hall," nor does he 

 claim for himself any special medical skill or knowledge. He relies most 

 largely upon the fact of the sales to thousands of purchasers, and the numerous 

 and glowing testimonials about cures, which he no doubt received, as an evi- 

 dence that he could not be guilty of fraud in the matter. But the slightest re- 

 flection upon the well-known fact that persons given to self-medication are 

 credulous and partisan, and prone to deny nature credit for their recovery, and 



