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Press, Volume LIV, Issue 16118, 24 January 1918, Page 5

J There was a sensational kidnapping ! hoax in Hobart last week, when Mr C. ]E. Chosterman, a well-known timber | merchant, on returning to his home at ! Bayswater, Sandy Bay. with his wife and family, found in the garden a welldressed girl about 13 years of age gagged and bound. He took her to j the nearest police station, where, after • a short rest, she told the police that | while walking along Brisbane street, ! Hobart, a man drove up in a motorcar, accosted her. and pub a handkerchief smelling strongly of a drug over her mouth. !>ho remembered no more till sho woke up gagged and bound in Mr Chestennaivs garden, and found two gold bracelets and a pearl necklace missing. The polico tool: the girl to Dr. Ireland., who failed to find marks of violence or the effects of drugs. After further close questioning by Dotective-Sergeant Summers, the girl confessed that the whole story was a fabrication, and gave as a reason for the hoax that her mother had scolded her that morning. She addfd that sue had buried the jewellery in -Mr terman's garden, where the police subsequently found it.