BASK ROBBED.

Press, Volume LXI, Issue 18548, 25 November 1925, Page 8

BASK ROBBED.

MYTHICAL CLIENTS. i i | MANAGER STEALS OVER £6OOO. (>3ESS AS3OOATIOK TZLEGEAIi.) j NEW PLYMOUTH, November 24. • The Supreme Court opened here today before Mr Jußtiec Oatier, who congratulated the Grand Jury on the comparative absonco of crime in the district. There were only two criminal cases for trial and one for sentence. Fifty-nine charges of falsifying the books of the bank, forging and uttering cheques, and stealing sums of money totalling £7208 3s Cd were preferred against William Kerr, ex-manager 'of the Stratford branch of the Union Bank of Australia, Kerr pleaded guilty to fifty-four of tho charges, and not guilty to the remainder, on which he stood his trial, being acquitted by the jury on four of the counts, and convicted on one of false pretences, a charge which the Judge had directed tbe jury to acquit. Kerr will be sentenced to-mor-row.

The charges to which Kerr pleaded guilty had reference to defalcations from* the bank totalling £6561 3s 6d. The defalcations had been made by accused opening accounts in the bank's books in fictitious names, receiving authority to make overdrafts, and then obtaining money by false cheques, and converting it to his own uso for investment in milling timber rights in the South Island. The five counts on which accused denied guilt referred to alleged transactions with William Henry Barlow, builder, of Stratford. These charges centred round two alleged transactions. In the first three charges it was alleged that 6n May 6th, 1924, the accused had committed forgery by altering one of Barlow's cheques for £3 to one for £350; that knowing the cheque to be false, he had caused tho bank to act upon it as if it were genuine, and that having cashed the cheque he had stolen the proceeds, amounting to £ 347. The other alleged transaction, which was made the subject of two charges, was also with Barlow. It was alleged against accused that on February 2nd, 1923, with intent to defraud, he had obtained from Barlow the sum of £3OO by falsely representing that one T. A. Sullivan wished to borrow that amount. On this same set of circumstances Kerr was charged with stealing the money thus obtained. It was on the firßt of these last two charges that Kerr was convicted.