LOSS OF £1000

Auckland Star, Volume LXXV, Issue 5, 7 January 1944, Page 2

LOSS OF £1000

ALLEGATION OF ROBBERY TWO MEN BEFORE COUKT (0.C.) SYDNEY, Jan. 4. A plantation manager now living in Sydney, Mr. T. G. S. Hammond, told in Dandennog Court (near Melbourne) how he had been assaulted and robbed of £1000. as he alleged, by two men whom he' had given a lift in a car. He was giving evidence against Neville Bates, 21, of Ascot Vale, soldier, and Raymond George Arthur, 20, of Moonee Ponds, both charged with robbing and wounding Hammond. Hammond said he went to Mount Dandenong in a borrowed car, stayed with a friend, and left at 9 a.m. the following day. After doing business with a Mr. Laidlaw, who paid him £1000 in cash, he was driving along the Monbulk Road, Belgrave, when Bates and Arthur hailed him. At Belgrave one of them said they had no money and he gave them seven or eight shillings. "We drove on and suddenly I saw lots of things in front of me," said Hammond. "I realised I had been hit. Bates caught hold of the wheel and the car stopped. "I put up my hands over my head and said, 'Why do this to me?' It was Arthur who had hit. me. Bates said, 'You must have some money, and punched me in the face. I opened the door of the car and fell to the road. Arthur and Bates got out. Bates bent over me and I was hit, on the head again by Arthur. I tried to struggle and was hit a third time. I asked them not to leave me there alone. Then I noticed that my vest was undone. I felt inside my pocket, but the £1000 was .gone." ' ' 1