The Inside Dope

City Editor Al Reck of the Oakland Tribune (circ. 182,876), who likes nothing better than to beat the San Francisco dai lies across the bay, thought he must be having a pipe dream. State Narcotics Agent Fred Braumoeller had walked into the city room and promised him a beat on a hot story in return for the services of a Tribune photographer.

Agent Braumoeller explained that agents of his bureau often have trouble proving cases against dope peddlers because it is simply the word of the agents against the word of the seller. He wanted the Narcotics Bureau to hire a photographer to snap pictures of meetings between agents and peddlers to use as evidence. Would Reck assign a photographer to make a test? Gladly, City Editor Reck called in Keith Dennison, 54, his veteran chief photographer.

Three weeks ago, Dennison stationed himself in a third-floor window overlooking the busy Oakland intersection, 14th and Jefferson, two blocks from city hall. Across the street, "Eddie," an undercover agent who had already made several small buys from a heroin peddler, waited for another meeting. When the peddler approached him, Dennison snapped picture after picture of the two together. Several were clear enough to make positive identifications of buyer and seller.

Last week Agent Braumoeller was ready to spring his big trap. A second agent had arranged a meeting with the same peddler at another busy street corner (19th and Harrison), and again Photographer Dennison was behind a window shooting the encounter. The two men--peddler and undercover agent--met in the agent's car, where the agent bought the dope with marked money. Suddenly other agents sprang from hiding and pulled the peddler from the car (see cut). The agent who had made the contact stepped out carrying the dope in a paper bag. The Tribune, owned by the family of California's Senator William F. Knowland, spread its exclusive pictures across Page One and eight columns inside. The arrested man turned out to be Roy Mac Arthur, 31, a pilot for Transocean Airlines, who has been flying a C-54 between California and Japan on the Korean air-freight run. The pilot, said Braumoeller, had been bringing in from Japan each trip as much as four pounds of uncut heroin, worth $32,000 in the underworld. After MacArthur was charged, his lawyer told Agent Braumoeller: "I don't know what he needs a lawyer for. What are we going to deny when you come to court with pictures of the whole business?"

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