ELEVEN CHARGES OF CONVERSION

Press, Volume LXXXIX, Issue 27037, 12 May 1953, Page 11

ELEVEN CHARGES OF CONVERSION

MAN REMANDED FOR SENTENCE BREAKING AND ENTERING ALSO ADMITTED Kenneth William Joseph Kerr, aged 27, a labourer and cook, pleaded guilty to 11 charges of unlawfully converting motor-vehicles to his own use in the Magistrate’s Court, before Mr Rex C. Abernethy, SM., yesterday morning. He also pleaded guilty to charges of breaking and entering and theft He was remanded to appear for sentence oh Thursday morning. The total value of the vehicles Converted

was stated as £4615 and the value of the stolen property was £lO3. The accused’s first conversion was at Napier on March 12, where he took a motor-cycle, which he rode to Raetihi and abandoned there, said DetectiveSergeant E. G. Ward for the police. At Raetihi he took a truck and drove

it to Mount Maunganui. He abandonded it at the end of a blind road.

It was hidden in lupins and was not located for four weeks. The accused then walked along the beach into Mount Maunganui where he took a motor-car valued at £315. He abandoned the car at Te Awamutu and then walked and got lifts from motorists to Mangapehi. He returned to Hamilton by the same means. Accused then made his way by walking and begging rides again down the east coast to Gisborne, and on about March 21 entered a farm house 12 miles south of Gisborne and stole money and other articles of a total value of £l7 10s, said Detective-Ser-geant Ward. He made his way to Napier and to Wellington by bus. Accused converted other motor-vehicles in the North Island and also entered premises and stole money and articles. Accused then went to Lyttelton by boat and later by train. to Dunedin, said Detective-Sergeant Ward. He converted a car there on April 24 and another on April 25. He drove that car to Oamaru where he abandoned it. At Oamaru he took another car agd while driving it through Rakaia was chased and caught by Constable A. J. Adams on April 25.

Details of Charges The following are the details of the conversion charges: April 25, at Oamaru, a car valued at £425 owned by Barbara Cummings; March 12, at Napier, a motor-cycle valued at £l5O, owned by James Ernest Rice; on or about March 13, at Raetihi, a motor truck, valued at £BOO, owned by Raymond Lewis Littlewood; on or about March 28, at Eastbourne, a motor-car valued at £3OO, owned by May Blanche; on or about March 29, at Palmerston North, a car valued at £3OO, owned by Ernest Clarence Capp; on or about April 11, at Whangarei, a car valued at £550, owned by Edward Leonard Moore; on or about April 16, at the Chateau Tongariro, a truck valued at £7OO, owned by the New Zealand Government Tourist Department; on April 17, at Frankton, a car valued at £275, owned by William Geoffrey Ricketts; on April 25, at Dunedin, a car valued at £3OO, owned by Reginald Mervyn Hall: on April 25, at Palmerston, a car valued at £5OO, owned by the Otago Electric Power Board; on or about March 16, at Mount Maunganpi, a car valued at £315, owned by Leslie George Wake. Details of the breaking and entering charges are: on or about April 19, at Otorohanga, Arthur John Prestcott’s shop, stealing £4O and cheques valued at £37 6s 3d: on or about March 21, Donald Campbell Morice’s house, stealing goods and money of a total value of £l7; on or about April 19, at Pio Pio, premises of Pio Pio Motors, Ltd., stealing ss, a screwdriver and about one gallon and a half of petrol. Details of the theft charges are: on or about April 17, at Frankton, stealing a pair of trousers valued at £4, owned by David Giffith Jones; on April 25, at Dunedin, stealing four bottles of liquor, valued at £4, owned by Reginald Mervyn Hall.