A QUEER STORY.

Auckland Star, Volume XVIII, Issue 203, 31 August 1887, Page 5

A QUEER STORY.

The Confidence Trick in

Dunedin.

(BY TELEGRAPH—PRESS ASSOCIATION.)

Dtjnedix, this clay. At the Police Court yesterday, Henry Chalker was charged with conspiring with David McDonald, John Cohen, and Alfred Shirley, to defraud Robert McKinnon of £46. Prosecutor was the son of a farmer residing ab Clinton. He deposed that he arrived in Dunedin on Wednesday last, and cashed a cheque for £46 15s lOd on Saturday. He was met by McDonald, one of the men mentioned in tho information, and taken to the Rainbow.Hotel, where they found Shirley, and they had a drink together. The prosecutor got into conversation with McDonald and Shirley, the former of whom represented himself as a blacksmith, while the latter passed himself off as a retired draper. \Vhile conversing, Cohen entered the room with a newspaper in his hand, and apologised for intruding among strangers, and was begged not to mention it, and to sit down in the room. He consented to do so, and in the course of conversation said that he was a Fiji planter and that he had a dissipated brother resident about Dunedin. They had been left £60,000 between them by an uncle, and he was in search of this misguided brother. He then detailed an adventure that he professed to have had the night before, which started with his meeting two ladies at the Theatre, who expressed their disappointment with the play, and asked him to escort them home, as they were strangers to Dunedin. He placed himself at their disposal, and was agreeably entertained aba Bumptiously furnished residence, where there happened to be a captain among the guests. During the evening the military man introduced a game played with five matches and a coin for each player. One would toss a coin and win, and if an opponent guessed "if head or tail" correctly, he removed one of the matches from the table. If he guessed wrong the other player removed one of his, and whoever got rid of his matches first won the game. Cohen, according to his account, won a dozen of champagne from the captain, and then in order not to appear mean, ordered two dozen more at his own expense. After this little story had been narrated by Cohen, ho left the room, and Macdonald and Shirley immediately began to talk to prosecutor about what a fool Cohen must be, and suggested that prosecutor should join them in " having " him at the match game. Prosecutor declined at first, but on their saying that they could give the money they won from the Fiji planter to a Charitable Institution, he consented. Presently Cohen came back and a game was proposed. Prose cutor pub £40 or £50 up as a stake ; the others did likewise, the money being placed in the Fiji planter's hat. Shirley and McDonald sat so that they could see how prosecutor put his coin down and gave Cohen " the office," so that he knew how to call, and prosecutor of course lost his money. Cheques were then introduced, and though prosecutor said he had no banking account lie was persuaded to write cheques for £100 or so more, the other men writing cheques also, and saying tlrab it was only a matter of form, as they had no account either. Prosecutor lost this £100 also, and at last light began to dawn on him, and he perceived that he had been swindled. Then he began to kick up a row, but the man held over him the threat that he would be had up for forgery, inasmuch as he had been signing valueless cheques. They also suggested that the only plan for all of them was to clear away by train at once for fear of being arrested. Prosecutor, however, went out to get a constable, and while in. the street was got hold of by the accused, Chalker, who, after trying without avail to get him to go to the railway station, sfcid the matter would be set all right. Prosecutor, however, persisted in informing che police. The Bench said that no doubt a swindle had been perpetrated, and that tho prosecutor went to the hotel as a greenhorn, and was a dupe, but he appeared to have hadno compunction in joining McDonald and Shirley in attempting to dupe the alleged wealthy Fijian planter. Unfortunately, he did not know the company he had got into, and it was, no doubt, hard that he should have been robbed of his money ; but there was no evidence before them to connect the accused Chalker with the three other men. Possibly he was an associate, of theirs, but there was nothing to^ show that. The Bench were quite satisfied that a conspiracy did take place, and that a crime was committed, but so far as they could see at present there was no evidence to connect Chalker with it. If the police had asked them to remand the case until they had got hold of the other three men, he would have been glad to do so. The detective remarked that the police intended arresting the other men, and hoped to have them in their hands in the course of a few hours.

The Bench said that in the position of this case they had no alternative but to dismiss it).