TWO CHANCES IGNORED.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 171, 21 July 1928, Page 11

TWO CHANCES IGNORED.

DISHONEST IMMIGRANT. BENEFACTORS DEFRAUDED. STOLEN CHEQUES EASILY CASHED. (By Telegraph.—Own Correspondent.) HAMILTON, this day. One of the youths who eame out to New Zealand two years ago under the Salvation Army's immigration scheme, and was employed on the Army farm at Putaruru for some time, has not proved a very desirable addition to the population of the Dominion. On leaving the Army farm, Robert Hulme, aged 19. worked for different farmers in the Putaruru district. This year he has been convicted twice, once in Auckland, of theft, when he was admitted to twelve months' probation, and in the last month at Rotorua, where he received a further period of probation for a similar offence. The lenient treatment accorded him apparently had an effect which was the reverse of that hoped for, as during the past month Hulme stole a number of cheque forms belonging to Mrs. Roberts, who has tearooms in Putaruru, filled them in for varying sums, and cashed them. Hulme was for some time an inmate of the Waikato Hospital, and when he was discharged he was helped by the Sunshine League, who fitted him out with a suit of clothes, on condition that he paid for it by instalments. He was also given 10/ bj Mr. Empson, the tailor from whom the suit was purchased. Recently Hulme presented a stolen cheque, which he had filled in for £7 10/, to Mr. Empson, tellinghTm to take out of it £2 on account of the suit, and the 10/ he had borrowed. This Mr. Empson did, and he handed the youth £5 change. Hulme then went to the shop of Mr. L. R. Eady and bought a gramophone, paying a deposit of £1. Later he presented a cheque for £10 10/, telling the assistant to take £2 out of it as a further instalment. This was done, and Hulme received £8 10/ in change. He cashed another cheque for £10 with a butcher named Taylor at Mamaku. and forged a further cheque for £10 10/ in the name of George Porter. Hulme, who is a native of Wigan. pleaded guilty to all charges in the Police Court to-day. The magistrate. Mr. Platts, S.M., commented on the ease with which accused had been able to pass the cheques. He said Hulme had been given two previous chances, which he had ignored. He would be committed to the Borstal institution for two vears.