BANK FRAUD

Press, Volume LXXII, Issue 21813, 19 June 1936, Page 16

BANK FRAUD

YOUNG MAN ADMITS

FORGERY

POLICE CONGRATULATED BY

magistrate

IPEBS3 ASSOCIATION TBLBQBAM.)

DUNEDIN, June 18

“The police are entitled to congratulation for their promptitude and skill, said Mr H. W. Bundle, S.M., this morning, when James Alexander Fleming, aged 26, a former bank employee, pleaded guilty to two charges of forgery, being committed for sentence. The case was a sequel to a daring bank fraud on June 6, the accused being charged with forging a bill of exchange on the Bank of New Zealand at Wellington for £834 16s Bd, and with procuring a young woman to cause the bill to be acted upon. Alexander Chisholm, a teller, gave evidence that, at 11.20 a.m. on June 6 a woman presented a bill purporting to be signed by the head of the bills department. The document also bore what purported to be the initials of the bank manager, with instructions to cash it. Shortly after the woman left, witness became suspicious, and, after an enquiry, reported the matter to the police. A public typist, whose name was suppressed, said that on June 4 she received a letter through her letterbox which purported to come from one A. G. Spence. The envelope contained a pencilled letter and a pencilled bill of exchange and a blank bill. Witness’s instructions were to type the letter from the pencilled one, type the bank bill from the pencilled one, and forward the completed work to Spence, at the post office. Another young woman, a clerk attending a commercial college, stated that on June 5, the director of the college said he had given her name to a person applying for a clerk. Witness’s telephone number had been supplied to this person, and later a man calling himself Jenkins telephoned to her, telling her she was appointed to the position, and was to go to the post office for a letter, which she did, receiving papers and instructions to cash a bill of exchange, put the money in an attache case, and deliver at the office of Gold Band Taxis. Witness said she cashed the bill and followed the instructions. Joan Griffin, employed by Gold Band Taxis, said that the previous witness handed in an attache case and a letter which were given to a taxi driver to deliver, as the instructions said, to Cavendish Chambers, which he did. The remainder of the evidence concurred with preliminary statements made at the time of the arrest, describing how suspicion fell on the accused, resulting in his arrest some hours later, when £774 was recovered in the attache case and £26 in the accused’s pockets.