United States v. William W. Holland

This case grows out of an investigation by the Post Office of a mail fraud scheme. Inmates of an Alabama state prison were operating, in true entrepreneurial spirit, a small business of their own during off hours. After receiving postal money orders mailed to them from accomplices not yet incarcerated, the inmates would alter the amounts and then pass the forged paper back to the outside world by means of the mails and cooperative guards.

In the course of the investigation, but before indictments had been filed or a grand jury called, postal inspectors through the United States Attorney…