Heart under Medals

At all great London fires for the past ten years, Londoners have seen inside the fire lines a tall, hearty figure in the black helmet and blue uniform of the Salvage Corps. He was Captain Brymore Eric Miles, chief of the insurance companies' special force to keep down unnecessary damage by fire & water. On his hefty chest glittered a row of medals, including the Military Cross and the Stars of Mons.

How venal a heart those medals covered Londoners first discovered last November, at the end of a scandalous trial of a huge arson ring. Before he was sentenced to 14 years in jail, the ringleader, one Leopold Harris, testified that he had had nearly every Salvage Corps officer in his pocket. Of the ring's -L-500,000 annual takings in insurance, Captain Miles had received a paltry -L-25 a month for overlooking cases of suspected arson.

Last week a jury in Old Bailey Court found brave Captain Miles guilty of "corruption and conspiring to pervert the administration of justice." Grimly the judge sentenced him to four years in jail.

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