THEFT MYSTERY.

Auckland Star, Volume LXII, Issue 102, 2 May 1931, Page 9

THEFT MYSTERY.

MAILBAG ROBBERY. Discovery Opens New Line of Investigation. AUSTRALIAN COUP. (United P. A.—Electric Telegraph—Copy right (Received 12 noon.) SYDNEY, this day. It has been, discovered that £.1000 worth of £,5 notes, reported to have been stolen between Sydney and Canberra yesterday, were included in a batch forwarded to the Wollongong branch of the Commonwealth Bauk. This discovery opens up a new line of investigation. Unless there has been a clerical error it proves conclusively that the fIO.OOU intended for Canberra never left Sydney. A man at Wollongong drew seven £~> notes from the bank. Ha found that the numbers on them corresponded with some of those reported as stolen. Officials at Canberra are reticent regarding the robbery, involving the loss of £10,000, but admit that those concerned were evidently fully acquainted with the method of transferring the money from Sydney to Canberra. The detectives also are convinced that the robbery was carried out by somebody who was conversant with the postal procedure, aided by an accomplice. The mailbag was registered by the Commonwealth Bank, conveyed to the station by an armed guard, and transferred to a steel cubicle in the guard's van. This is the customary weekly practice. The guards were changed at Goulburn, halfway to Canberra, and when the train reached the Federal capital it was found that for the mailbag with the bank notes there had been substituted the one containing stones and paper. The police do not rule out the theory that the mailbag was substituted before it left Sydney last night. The Commonwealth Bank is indemnified against loss. It has records of the numbers of all the stolen banknotes, a?id these are published in the newspapers to-day. , The public servants' salaries will be paid by cheque, instead of in bank notes.