VALUABLE FURS STOLEN

Press, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 25091, 24 January 1947, Page 5

VALUABLE FURS STOLEN

LUGGAGE OF NEW ZEALANDERS

INQUIRIES BY DETECTIVES (P.A.) AUCKLAND. January 23. Detectives in New Zealand and Canada are engaged in tracing thieves who stole expensive articles of clothing and jewellery from the luggage of an Auckland woman and her daughter who recently travelled to the United States, where the daughter married a Navy lieutenant. The property is conservatively valued at £l6OO.

The victims of the theft are Mrs Louise Lloyd Jones, of O’Neill’s avenue, Takapuna, and her daughter Mary, now Mrs James Grant, of Norfolk, Virginia. The missing property, which was packed in two wardrobe trunks and a large hatbox reinforced with steel, included a mink coat valued at £lOOO belonging to Mrs Grant, and a white Russian ermine cape worth £5OO belonging to her mother. The couple consigned the luggage to San Francisco in the ship Flyaway, which sailed from Auckland on August 3. On September 18 they flew to the United States, hoping their belongings would be awaiting their arrival. Because of the maritime strike in the United States the shi- was diverted to Victoria, British Columbia. As the luggage was declared “black” it could not be brought into the United States, and arrangements were made to have it stored.

When Mrs Lloyd Jones was about to return to New Zealand after several weeks in America she telephoned instructions for the luggage to be sent back to New Zealand in the Wanganella. The luggage arrived just before Christmas and remained on the wharves until it was delivered to the owner’s home on January 10. Mrs Lloyd Jones said to-day she was amazed at the battered appearance of her trunk. A crowbar had apparently been used to force it open. When Mrs Grant’s luggage arrived in Virginia the mink coat was missing. It is believed the thieves were experts, who fully appreciated the value of the luggage. The jewellery stolen included a jade necklace with a diamond cluster, valued at £6O, and a lalique necklace worth £lO. Little of the luggage was insured. ,