moved to town in the spring of 1911. Sylvester called him into the bank he said when he was preparing to move to Canada, where he owned land, having already packed his household goods. After several conferences he purchased $5,000 worth of bank stock for $6,500 and accepted a position in the bank. He was told by Sylvester that his duties at first would be selling insurance and otherwise making himself useful. "I’ll be the boss and you the hired man," he said Sylvester told him.
The trial of G. A. Stoltz, assistant cashier of the closed Plainview State Bank, has been proceeding in district court at Wabasha for a full week with a tedious production of evidence in the form of bank records and their explanation. The selection of a jury was accomplished before the close of the session on last Thursday. The jurors drawn are Jerry Keenan, Kellog; Walter Karstens, Oakwood; F. A. Wasman, Lake City; Frank Carrels, Wabasha; H. J. McDowell, Lake City; James Tittrington, Elgin; Clem Kreye, Hammond; Frank Ryan, Mount Pleasant; Wm. Howatt, Kellogg; Ralph Richardson, Elgin; J. A. Lamey, Kellogg.
With the actual trial of the case starting Friday morning, County Attorney John R. Foley called C. L. Mikkelson, deputy examiner in charge of the bank, to stand and put the presentation of evidence of the bank’s insolvency. Mr. Mikkelson has since that time been almost continuously on the stand. In presenting the books and papers of the bank the state has shown nearly 200 different items in books, notes, deposit slips, checks and other papers.
In stating the case Foley said that they would prove that a loss of $108,489.38 was incurred by the action of the officers of the bank in carrying paid up notes on the books as live assets. He began with testimony by Mr. Mikkelson that the two Sylvesters, Kennedy and Stoltz had notes in the bank totaling $18,000 which were carried as bank assets and were absolutely valueless. These four men also owned all the capital stock of the bank, $30,000 and that when the bank closed the assets listed totaled $698,481. With this beginning Foley then began to show the true condition of the bank. An item in the assets showed $4,179.41 to be due from the Merchants Bank of Winona where as the actual amount due was $2,169.95. This and other items were followed through.
On Saturday morning the prosecution opened its first direct attack on Stoltz. A sheet found in the bank’s papers by the examiners was produced with a list dating back to 1916 of various transactions whereby E. L. Sylvester had replenished his continuously overdrawn personal account. This list was proved to have been made by the defendant, G. A. Stoltz, and was made by him when he realized that Sylvester was drawing large sums of the bank funds. The statement has become known in court as the Sylvester IOU statement and has continually reappeared in the testimony.
In connection with the statement Mikkelson testified and explained from the bank’s ledgers that Sylvester was overdrawn at times as much as $5,000. Stoltz’s list contained a mortgage note of Otto Johnson for $11,000 which, without Johnson’s knowledge the note was sold to Wm. Koenig on Nov. 1, 1917. Johnson paid the bank $5,500 in principal and interest which was not paid to Koenig nor credited to Johnson’s account but was placed in E. L. Sylvester’s account. Sylvester however continued the interest payments to Koenig. This transaction resulted in a loss to the bank of $7,300 all of which was paid to Koenig.
A loss of $8,710 was taken on a note to David Hill for $9,000. Hill went into bankruptcy and only $290 was salvaged in the proceedings. Two notes one of $600 and one of $500 given by Frank Governor were a total loss to the bank when Governor went into bankruptcy. In the same way $300 was lost on a note given by N. T. Evans. Others of the notes listed in the assets were paid up and were as follows: Ida B. and Howard Amos $1,952.32, John Cunningham $700, Dennis Feehan $500, William Krusmark $7,100, Mike Klatt $2,300, John Lee $925 & $1,650, Pat E. Lyons $1,700, Arthur Lawton $200, Walter McNallan $4,500, J. J. Ryan $1,000, John Zimmerman

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