SWALLOWED A RING.

Press, Volume LXIV, Issue 19201, 6 January 1928, Page 3

SWALLOWED A RING.

PROFESSIONAL, THIEF'S ACT;

(PRESS ASSOCIATION TELEGJUIC.)

WELLINGTON, January 5.

Alice Myra Mann, u dressmaker, aged 31, who bas a criminal record in Australia, and in Wellington, and who stolo three rings valued at £9O, swallowing one of them to evade the police, was treated by Mr J. H.- Salman, S.M., as a professional thief. To-day'she pleaded guilty to the theft oi ! a ring valued at £OO, the property of Clarke and Morris, jewellers, and two rings valued at £4O, the property of Dorothy Innes. The. story of the detectives was that accused''iMi- from At'-' lia and stayed at. a place in The Terrace, where a woman missed two rings, but no trace could be found of them. Nothing further was heard of them until last Friday afternoon, whe: 'accused visited a jewellery shop and asked to be shown a tray of rings. When she left, a ring worth £3, it was found, had beeu substituted for one valued at £SO. The accused was followed and questioned, and taken to the police station where she was searched. All this was without result, but when her correct address had been ascertained, her room was searched, and one of. the rings missing from the place in The Terrace was found. This led to the accused confessing that she had swallowed the £-!i0 ring. She was sent to hospital, and the ring was recovered. She had previously been in trouble in Australia. The Magistrate took the attitude that the woman was a professional thief. He convicted hev and ordered her to par medical expenses, £9 Is on the first charge, in default one month's imprisonment. Oil the second charge he sentenced her to three months' imprisonment.