RECEIPTS ALTERED.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 76, 30 March 1928, Page 5

RECEIPTS ALTERED.

PURCHASE OF A CYCLE. BUSINESS CAUTION NEEDED. "I don't know why business firms give receipts in a form which can so easily be alteredsaid Mr. W. R- McKean, S.M., in the Police Court to-day, when imposing a fine of £5 or one month's imprisonment on John Richard Stevens (26), who had altered receipts that had been given to him.

The charge against Stevens was that on March 19 he attempted to steal a cycle, worth £16 10/, the property of Leo B. Clarke. The accused pleaded guilty. Chief Detective Hammond said that accused had bought the cycle at £16 10/ on the time payment system, paying £2 deposit with an arrangement for paying off the balance by instalments of five shillings a week. He paid £2 10/, and for two weeks' instalments obtained a receipt for 10/. The receipt he afterwards altered to read £16 10/, and showed this to a hairdresser, who was endeavouring to sell the cycle for him. He represented that, the machine was fully paid for. It really amounts to forgery, said Mr. Hammond.

Accused had never been in any trouble before, and it was his first appearance in Court. In imposing penalty the magistrate said that precautions should be exercised by business firms in giving receipts.