MAGISTRATE’S COURT

Press, Volume LXXXVII, Issue 26511, 28 August 1951, Page 5

MAGISTRATE’S COURT

MONDAY (Before Mr Rex C. Abernethy, S.M.) IMPRISONMENT

Cyril Geoffrey Turnbull, aged 53, a labourer, pleaded guilty to five charges o£ false pretences. He was charged with obtaining £2 10s from Andrew Millar on December 23, 1949; £1 10s from Mary Ellen Halliday on the same day: £2 8s from Harry Powell on December 28, 1949; and £4 16s from Elizabeth Fraser Bergfeldt on December 29, 1949, by falsely representing that he was collecting coal orders for L. D. Richards, coal merchant, Papanui. He was also charged with stealing £lO, the property of Andrew Christie Finnie on February 1, 1950. For the police, Detective-Sergeant G. W. Alty said that the accused called at •the complainants’ homes and took orders for coal supplies. He took money and issued receipts. It was found that the accused had previously been an employee of L. D. Richards, but had no authority to collect orders for coal. In regard to the theft charge, accused called at the home of Finnie and told Finnie he was Detective Halliday from the Christchurch police station. He told Finnie that his (Finnie’s) son was held at the police station, and asked for £lO to bail him. The accused was arrested in Dunedin on August 16, 1951. Turnbull was convicted and sentenced to. imprisonment for three months on each charge, the sentences to be served concurrently. On a charge of obtaining £lOO from Edward Wilson, at Auckland, on July 31, 1950, by falsely representing that he was a draper at Rotorua. Turnbull was remanded to appear in the Auckland Magistrate’s Court on September 3. COMMITTED FOR SENTENCE John Mullany, aged"2«, a labourer and seaman (Mr J. R. L. Campbell), pleaded guilty to a charge tliat, on or about July 30, at Christchurch, he made a false cheque for £5, payable to Eric J. Cooper, by endorsing the name Eric J. Cooper, knowing the signature to be false, and with the intent that it should be acted upon as genuine. „ He was committed to the Supreme Court for sentence. ~ . In evidence, Eric John Cooper said he shared a room with accused during the latter part of July and the beginning of August. 1951. Cn August 2, two cheques were missing from his wallet. The cheque produced in Court was one of the two missing from his wallet. The endorsement was not in his handwriting. Russell Wilfred Bartley, a salesman employed by a firm of men’s outfitters, said that on August 8 a customer purchased clothing for which a travellers cheoue for £5 was presented. The customer said he was from Queensland. Witness gave the customer £4 Ils 6d In change.