Berlin Forgers Implicated in Publication of Anti-jewish Documents

The interest of the American government in the case against the forgers of diplomatic documents involving Senators Borah and Norris, which is now being conducted by the Berlin Police Department under Vice-President Weiss, assisted by Governmental Director Windisch, Chief of the Political Division of the Police, and Police Councillor Wilhelm Weitzel, was expressed by the American Embassy to the German Foreign Office. The American government hopes that the investigation will be carried to completion and that a repetition of such incidents thus will be prevented, stated De Witt Clinton Pool, counselor of the American Embassy, who called at the Foreign Office.

The investigation is of special interest in view of the fact that Vladimir Orloff, who with Michael Sumarakoff was arrested when they attempted to sell forged documents to the “New York Evening Post” linking Senator Borah and the Soviet government, was implicated in the preparation of documents said to have been required by Henry Ford’s counsel in the libel suit which Herman Bernstein brought against Henry Ford, subsequently settled out of court. It was declared possible here that Orloff’s associates will be examined and it is not unlikely further arrests may be made.

Orloff explained his participation in the Ford-Bernstein trial by saying he had been employed by Henry Ford to pass judgment on certain documentary material which Herman Bernstein intended to introduce into the trial or which Mr. Bernstein had published be fore the trial.

In the negotiations which Orloff said he carried on with “Attorney Nicol” of New York, Orloff was asked if he could refute the allegations Bernstein had made about the treatment of Jews in Imperial Russia. Orloff asserts that by presenting Ford with evidence of the incorrectness of Bernstein’s material he was able to collect a large fee from Ford.

The police, however, are not convinced that this is necessarily an accurate description of Orloff’s part in the Ford-Bernstein affair.

Delancey Nicoll, of the firm of Nicoll, Anable & Nicoll, attorneys, who represented Henry Ford in the $200,000 libel suit brought against him by Herman Bernstein, in an interview with a representative of the New York “Evening Post” refused to reveal whether he knew Orloff or whether he had met him in Berlin.

“I do not talk about the affairs of my clients,” he said. Told that one New York newspaper had quoted Orloff as saying that he had been paid 31,000 marks for services by representatives of Mr. Ford, Mr. Nicoll again said: “I do not talk about the affairs of my (Continued on Page 4) (Continued from Page 3)

Mr. Nicoll, who is the senior member of the firm, went to Europe to take depositions from Russian emigres concerning the Jewish problem during the Czarist regime and presented the documents in court.

In a statement to the Jewish Daily Bulletin Mr. Herman Bernstein said:

“The American correspondent in Berlin who was instrumental exposing nest of Russian international forgers and is bringing about their arrest deserves the highest praise.

Vladimir Orloff and Michael Sumarakoff, who confessed that they forged many documents including the absurd charges that Senators Borah and Norris had accepted bribes from Soviet Russia, are apparently the ring leaders of a criminal band of Russian Monarchist forgers who have been operating since the Revolution in various countries.

“I pointed out, as far back as 1921, when I exposed the so called “Protocols of the Wise Men of Zion” as forgeries, how agents of the Soviet Secret Police had sought to discredit the Jewish people and to justify the pogroms by fabricating documents purporting to show that the Jews were conspiring for world dominion. Out of scrap heap of Russian autocracy came a number of unscrupulous charlatans in various lands who made forgery their only source of income and who stopped at nothing in their efforts to assassinate reputations of integrity. Fortunately they overreached themselves by making Senators Borah and Norris the targets of their fabrications and thus brought about their own undoing.

“It is to be hoped that this will end the criminal activity of these Russian international forgers.”