TOOK RING AND RAN.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 97, 26 April 1928, Page 10

TOOK RING AND RAN.

THIEF IN JEWEL SHOP.

CONCEALED IT IN SOCK. CAUGHT BY DETECTIVE. (By Telegraph.—Own Correspondent.) this day. The story of how a taxi driver, who posed as a racehorse owner, stole .a single stone diamond ring valued at £750, the property of Jenness and Partridge, was told in the Police Court today, when Trevor Leonard Richard Cun ningham, alias Reginald Smith, alias [Jack Smith, aged 28, pleaded guilty.

Jenness said accused came into his shop about 3.30 p.m. on April 17 and asked to be allowed to look at a big diamond ring in the window. He took the ring from the window and handed it to eccused, who said he was "Mr. Lowry, the racehorse owner, of Hawke's Bay." Accused took the ring to • the door, as if to see it in a better light, and then ran away with it. Witness gave chase, but it was not till later in the afternoon that accused was found.

Detective Jarrold said he found Cunningham in the bar of a hotel in Willis Street, showing the ring to someone. On seeing him, accused appeared to put the ring into one of his socks. When questioned he denied having the ring, and when witness told him he was going to search. him he resisted and objected to being removed from the bar.

"I found the ring in his sock on his right foot," said the detective, "and accused said, 'What a fool I was to put it in there. I suppose you will "lag" me for this.'"

Cunningham was committed to the Supreme Court for sentence and an order was made for the return of the ring to its owners.