THEFT OF £1806

Press, Volume LXXXIX, Issue 27201, 19 November 1953, Page 12

THEFT OF £1806

FORMER ACCOUNTANT PLEADS GUILTY

(New Zealand Press Association) WELLINGTON, November 18.

~ Frederick Joseph Huddleston, aged 46, a clerk, admitted in the Magis-. trate’s Court today four charges of theft of a total of £lBO6 15s lOd while he was employed as accountant to- a Wellington firm of builders’ suppliers. He was remanded by Mr W. H. Carson, S.M., until Monday for sentence. Senior-Detective Craigie .said the accused was employed as an accountant from August, 1950, to July 16 this year, first in a part-time capacity and latterly full-time. In April, 1951, the firm’s staff started a savings scheme and gave part of their weekly wages to the accused to bank. Between July 13, 1952, and May 30 last he converted £648 of this money to his own use. Between November 22, 1951, and April 24 last the accused stole £ll2O 10s from the firm by paying amounts from sales into a second account, destroying the records of the sales, and withdrawing the money for his own use. The third charge involved £37 10s, a tenant’s money which he failed to bank and used for his own personal expense, and the fourth charge was a similar offence with a £1 5s postal note.

Senior-Detective Craigie . said the accused, yvho was married, had a criminal list extending back to 1928. In, 1947 he was sentenced to three years’ reformative detention on 20 charges of false pretences.