AMAZING RECORD.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 62, 15 March 1938, Page 5

AMAZING RECORD.

72 GAOL SENTENCES.

EXPLOITS OF FIFTY YEARS.

CONFIDENCE MAN'S FEATS

(From Our Own Correspondent.)

SYDNEY, March 12.

There came before Judge Thomson at the Quarter Sessions last week an old man who has been convicted and gaoled on 72 occasions within the past 50 years.

His exploits have extended through New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland and New Zealand, and Dominion readers may be interested to know that twice on "the other side" he has been declared an "habitual"—in Christchurch in 1909 and in Wellington in 1917. Arthur Robinson is now 79 years old. He started life as a share farmer in the Wollongong district, but as far back as 1886 he forsook this comparatively dull occupation for one which offered more excitement. He became known to thej police of several States as a "confidencej man," and some of his exploits re-J counted by the detectives in Court last: week said a great deal for his ingenuity and enterprise. Bold Methods. Not for Robinson the monotonous task of inducing "mugs" to wait a minute while he absented himself to lodge a bet for them or invest a few pounds in shares on their behalf.

His methods were surprisingly hold! and simple, and though some of them suggest the truth of the American ap-| horism that "there's one born every niin-j unte," there was about them a neatness' and effectiveness that extorted admiration even from the police. On one occasion, posing as a bank manager in a country town, he ordered a wedding cake from a pastry-cook in Victoria The cake was to cost £60. for it stood nine feet high, and/four men

came with it to Robinson's house to set] it up. Unfortunately Robinson had only a cheque for £200, and he couldn't cash it because all his friends happened to be out of town and the local bank was, closed.

The pastrycook, a resourceful man, had brought plenty of change along, as well as his cheque book. Robinson handed over his cheque and received in exchange £120 in cash and the trades-' man's cheque for the balance. Robinson then made a hurried "get-away" into other parts, but they caught up with him at Brisbane and an unfeeling Court refused to listen to his pleas of extenuating circumstances. Coffins Forwarded. In another case he posed as an undertaker in an upcountry district and he ordered a dozen "of the best" from a large funeral director's stock in trade. The coffins were forwarded to a rural railway station, and there they stayed for some days till the railway officials became curious. Nobody seemed much interested, least of all Robinson. For he was far away—having paid for the coffins with a large valueless cheque and having received a number of notes of high denomination in exchange. In a way Robinson was conscientious, for he would take a large amount of trouble in "dressing up the situation" so as to make the circumstances look probable —as Gilbert has it, "to add verisimilitude to an otherwise bald and iuninteresting statement." | Once he went to a grazier and him that he had 1500 sheep on the way to market and that he wanted paddocking for them. Rather Regretful. Having signed an agreement about the grazing, he took it to a local store, and on the strength of it induced the shopkeeper to arrange with him to supply some problematical drovers who were supposed to be looking after the hypothetical sheep for a fortnight. Once more he "got away with it" to the extent of a considerable number of | pounds handed over by the deluded storekeeper in exchange for a valueless j cheque. He seemed rather, regretful this time when he was caught, for he explained to the police that he meant toi go next day to a moneylender and borrow £100 on the security of the injvisible sheep with the help of the other [documents then in hU posneseion.

I Only a year ago he had to answer 108 separate charges of false pretences of this sort, and 12 months concurrent on each charges has only just expired. Possibly it may yet occur to Robinson that, counting in all his 72 sentences, he has had to work harder on the confidence lag than ever he would have needed to work at the innocuous pursuit of sharefarming, which he forsook for a criminal career more than 50 years ago.