WHEN HE PAWNED HIS COAT.

Auckland Star, Volume LVII, Issue 103, 5 May 1926, Page 11

WHEN HE PAWNED HIS COAT.

WORE MOTBIB MAWS GABMEHT. THEFT CHARGE DISMISSED. Whea George Waterman {29} went to an apartment house in Hobson Street the other morning in quest of lodgings, the landlady Told him that he could have a bed if he paid for .it by 5 p.m. As she ■had to go to the Post Office to transact i some business, she left Waterman in her I house. On returnins she discovered that the eloriirag of another man who o:----i enpied the same room as Waterman had 1 been removed from a sugar sack. Water- j ! man returned at 7 p.m. when she j observed that oe was wearins a different c-oat from the one he had on in the morning. Sic then remembered thati Waterman had told her earlier in the day j that be was going to pawn bis suit. Anyway the police ■were called in. with the result that Waterman appeared at j the Police Court this morning on a I charge of stealing a coat, pair ot i trousers, braces and a shirt, of a total j value of £1 S/6. the property of Ernest i Korn. Accused, for whom yir. Schramm 1 j appeared, pleaded not guilty. Accused admitted takir J the coax from j j the bag in t-he room, thinking that it j j belonged to a man whom he knew. He ] ! took off his own suit and pawned it for j £2. and simply took the other man's \ coat to wear when going down to the ] pawnshop. He returned re to the room] afterwards. He could cot explain how j tbe coat and trousers came to be placed ■ under the mattress of another bed. How- j ever, there was a drunken man in the I room, and it was quite possible that he might have placed the garments there. Waterman added that he only borrowed ] the coat, and had no intention of stealing it. After the evidence of the pawnbrokers J assistant had been heard, the magistrate. ■ Mr. F- K. Hunt, gave accused the benej fit of the donbt. and dismissed the case. ==