Over the years, many Customs inspectors develop a sixth sense for spotting travellers who are trying to conceal valuables they do not want to declare. Perhaps it is the way a man or woman walks, or the nervous manner in which a cigarette is lit. It may be slight hesitancy in answering a particular question—or nothing more than a general impression which the inspector himself cannot explain.
Inspector Joseph Koehler did not know at first what it was that drew his attention to Etta Hoffman. Koehler was a dark-haired, studious-looking, middle-aged officer who had joined the Service as a young man. He had watched travellers by the tens of thousands pass his inspection post. There was no reason why he should have paid special attention to Etta Hoffman when she approached his station along with other passengers arriving from Brussels.
Etta was a tall, neatly dressed, round-faced young woman who waited placidly in line for her baggage to be examined. A perky hat sat on her dark hair and there were touches of fur on her dark cloth coat.
Her baggage declaration showed she was alone. Her baggage consisted of a handbag and two suitcases of inexpensive make. The woman answered all of Koehler’s questions calmly and without nervousness. She gave no sign of apprehension when her bags were opened for examination. Yet Koehler simply could not shake a feeling that there was something wrong. Something about this woman triggered a small alarm in his subconscious.
Suddenly, Koehler realized what was bothering him. Etta Hoffman was too tall. Many tall women came through his inspection lane day after day. But Etta Hoffman’s tallness was unnatural. Her tallness was emphasized by the extraordinarily thick-soled shoes she was wearing. It simply wasn’t reasonable for a woman trying to look attractive to deliberately make herself unattractive.
Koehler quietly signalled a woman inspector, Mathilda Clark. Miss Hoffman was taken to a room set aside for questioning passengers. The soles of her shoes were hollow. When the inspectress pried them open, a handful of diamonds spilled out on the floor. Other gems were found in a false bottom of a suitcase. The diamonds weighed 3,377 carats, and were one of the largest diamond hauls ever made by Customs.
Etta Hoffman broke down in tears and poured out her story. She had dreamed for years (so she said) of coming to the United States and obtaining citizenship. She had come to Belgium as a refugee from Czechoslovakia and had succeeded at last in getting her name on the immigration quota.
After months of waiting and suspense, Etta received the necessary papers from the American Consulate. Then a strange man called at her apartment and offered to pay her fare to the United States and give her $100 in cash if she would smuggle the diamonds past Customs. He provided her with the trick shoes, the suitcase with the false bottom, and a plane ticket. Before she boarded the plane, he had given her a sealed envelope which he said contained the $100 which he had promised her.
Etta Hoffman handed the envelope, still sealed, to a Customs inspector. He tore it open and found that it contained only $80. She had been shortchanged by $20, and, to pile injury on insult, she was sentenced to eighteen months in prison.
Abraham Winnik was another of the more successful diamond and gold smugglers. This thin-faced Belgian was an expert procurer of carriers for an Antwerp syndicate. He arranged for diamonds to be brought into the United States, and after they were sold he engineered the smuggling of gold to Europe. The gold was carried in the false bottoms of suitcases fashioned by an expert leather worker in Brooklyn—who received $30 for each suitcase he altered.