ATTACK WITH HAMMER

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22437, 25 June 1938, Page 16

ATTACK WITH HAMMER

■■ «' «P SHOPKEEPER INJURED POLICE SEARCH FOR YOUTH (fBKSS AB9OCIATIOK TKUKIBAIt.) AUCKLAND. June 24. Shortly before 5.30 o’clock this afternoon a youth walked into a cycle store kept by Mr W. H. Isdale, of New Lynn, and while the storekeeper’s back was turned attacked him with a hammer, severely wounding him just above the left ear, and decamped. Mr Isdale did not lose consciousness, but he lost a great deal of blood, and for several hours afterwards he showed obvious effects of his experience, but he refused to have attention from a doctor. Fingerprints on the hammer and a description given by both the injured man and a bystander outside the shop provided valuable clues for the police, who are conducting a widespread Mr Isdale said that he kept two shops, a small general store and a cycle shop, side by side. A well-built youth, about 16 years of age, entered the grocery store and i.sked him If he had any cycle ball-bearings the size of one he produced. Isdale went through the front door and into the cycle shop, followed by the youth. Isdale went straight to the shelves behind the counter, which is about two feet wide, and was about to take down a small box of cycle ball-bearings from a lower shelf when he was struck a hard blow on the side of the head. “I did not fall to the ground, but I felt very sick,” Mr Isdale said, “and I managed to turn my head in time to see the youth drop the hammer, which had been lying on the counter, and hurry out of the door.” Constable Boag arrived shortly afterwards, and as soon as Mr Isdale had informed him of the facts he ‘set off in his motor-car in search of the youth, who had gone on a bicycle. Constable Boag advised the Auckland detective office and men were dispatched in a police patrol car to scour the neighbourhood.