ROBBED IN ROOM.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVIII, Issue 127, 31 May 1937, Page 8

ROBBED IN ROOM.

SOLID DRINKING.

CORONATION u PUB-CRAWL" SAW DOCTORS SENTENCED. Two young saw doctors who accompanied a taTlor on what counsel termed a "pub-crawl" on Coronation Day, kept each other company in the dock of the Police Court to-day. The saw doctors were Henry Goodfellow Farrelly, aged 27, and Joseph Arnold Harrison, aged 23. They were both charged with stealing a gold watch.' two suits, some underclothing, a hat and . a bottle of Indian ink, of a total value! of £17 5/3, the property of the tailor, Albert Frank Salter. Mr. K. C. Aekins appeared for both j accused, who pleaded not guilty. ! Salter said he was introduced to the ' two accused in a hotel about 12.30 p.m. 1 on Coronation Day. He was told that, they were two men from Christchurch. j Witness said that with the two accused he visited several other hotels with the result that he got fairly drunk. In one hotel he remembered being given a hock and soda. The next thing he remembered was lying on his bed in a Hobson Street boardinghouse. Remembered Whispering.

"I remember some whispering going on in my room and hearing drawers I being pulled out, but as I had my head I turned towards the wall I did not know j who was in the room," said Salter. "I then heard the door shut. When I! sobered up I found that my room had' been ransacked. My suits were gone also my watch and other things. I com plained to the police and ,on the Satur day I went with Detective Moore to a room occupied by the two accused in sy apartment off Symonds Street and there identified all the property as mine." Mr. Aekins: You were really on the pub-crawl on Coronation Day—you wenl from hotel to hotel drinking with these j men T —Yes. I You were drinking half handles of beer. You were drinking solidly for j nearly six hours?—l suppose so. i Witness denied that he gave his ' watch to one man and his hat to the < other accused. He also denied certain i allegations made by the two men as to something that they said occurred when they got to his room. Two "Pick-me-upa." Evidence was given by a barman in a city hotel that about 4 p.m. on Coronation Day the two accused and Salter were in his bar. Salter was drunk and was refused a drink by a barmaid. The two accused asked that Salter should be given a hock and soda to sober him up. Salter had two hock and sodas, paying for the drinks himself. The two accused drank beer. They were sober.

Detective Moore gave evidence that he had recovered the articles owned by Salter in the room occupied by the two accused. The gold watch was on the table in the room.Both accused gave evidence and alleged that Salter, after making improper overtures to them, gave them the suits and other property. They said they called at his boarding house the next day to see if he wanted them to keep the articles, but he was not there. They had not tried to dispose of any of the goods. Harrison said Salter gave him the watch in a hotel during the afternoon. Both men admitted to Detective-Ser-geant McHugh that they had previously been in trouble. Mr. Aekins submitted that there was no evidence of theft against either accused. It was not the action of men who intended to rob a man to buy him hock and sodas, which would have the effect of sobering up a drunken man. "There are none of the earmarks associated with ordinary thefts in this case," said counsel. "I think that Salter's story is more consistent," said Mr. Wyvern Wilson, S.M., "and that the story told by these two men is a concoction. I accept complainant's version that they came and took away his property. I think they robbed him in his room." Farrelly and Harrison were each sentenced t:> seven days' imprisonment.