FALSE PRETENCES

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 56, Issue 205, 12 June 1936, Page 6

FALSE PRETENCES

iii: OBTAINING A SUIT. AN OFFENCE' AT ASHBURTON. PAYMENT TO BBLMADE. (Per Press Association.) CHRISTCHURCH, This Day. “ ‘Cheeky’ is the only expression for it,” said Mr Levvey, S.M., when he was informed that John McLean, when he appeared in the Magistrate’s Court this morning, was wearing a suit he obtained by false pretences. “He wears a suit, does not pay for it, and obtains it by fraud, and then wants to be treated leniently,” added the Magistrate, addressing Mr Amodeo (McLean’s counsel). McLean was charged that on March 11, at Ashburton, he obtained one suit of clothes,' valued at £4 1s Ed, by falsely representing that a bicycle, ‘which he deposited as security, was his own property, and that he had paid £8 for it. He pleaded guilty. The police; said that McLean’s record was not a good one, as he had been sentenced to 14 days’ imprisonment on two charges of theft at Timaru. At Dunedin he had been sentenced: to two months’ imprisonment for false. pretences and one month for theft. All these offences had occurred in 1934.

“Your record is not ‘such a. good one,” said the Magistrate, addressing McLean, “and you had better be a little more careful.” The Magistrate ordered McLean to come up for sentence if cal-led within 12 months, repayment for the suit to be made through the Probation Officor.