SCOTLAND YARD HUNT

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 55, Issue 241, 25 July 1935, Page 10

SCOTLAND YARD HUNT

COINING GANG CHIEF. Squads of .Scotland! Yard detectives have been searching for the mastermind behind' a gang of counterfeiters who are robbing cigarette machines in London and the provinces of hundreds of pounds’ worth of cigarettes weekly. The systematic thefts are made possible by the use of counterfeit shillings and sixpences specially manufactured for use m machines. At least a score of men are known to be employed as agents for the gang. They receive £1 a night for robbing the cigarette machines in this fashion, each man returning to the “headquarters” with £2 of cigarettes. Attention was focussed on the existence of the gang when Bernard Reid, aged -31, described as a salesman, of no address, was sentenced - to six months’ hard labour for stealing two packets of cigarettes from a machine outside a tobacconist’s shop in Goldhawk Road, Shepherd’s Blush, uttering counterfeit coins, and having 24 counterfeit shillings in his possession. “I get £1 a day—£7 a week—lor this, lie said to an officer. “What would you do if you were out of work?” It was stated that as the result of frequently finding counterfeit coins in his cigarette machine, Mr Samuel Blake, owner of the shop, kept watch with two police officers in an empty flat overlooking the shop. They saw Beid place two coins in the machine and! receive two packets of cigarettes, “It looks as if this sort ,of tiling is being conducted on a very big scale,” said the Magistrate (Sir Gervais Rentoul, K.C.) “If anyone ,'can afFord to pay, a man £7 a week for going .round doing this, it means there must be an enormous traffic going on.” “The men go out with about 40 counterfeit shillings,” said Mr Pashley, prosecuting. “Machines all over London get them nightly. As a matter of fact the thieving by means of counterfeit coins in automatic machines has been going on lor many months. The chief method is to drop them in the cigarette machines, but. another, •lucrative means of obtaining ‘ returns is to use them to “play” automatic gambling machines of which many are in use in various clubs throughout London and the large cities.

The reason the illicit traffic has not been exposed before is that it is extremely difficult to make an arrest. The thieves are nearly all well dressed, and Walk up to the machines with no fear of detection.