POLICE VICE CASE

Press, Volume XCVI, Issue 28451, 4 December 1957, Page 7

POLICE VICE CASE

34th Witness At Brighton

(N.Z. Press Association—Copyright) BRIGHTON, December 2. Nine police officials escorted a woman from the Courthouse today after she testified in Brighton’s police inquiry case. She was the thirty-fourth witness in the case—Mrs Joan Watson, a pretty brunette.

She testified that one of the accused. Detective Inspector John Hammersley, aged 39, had accepted money to prevent police action over a “tapped” telephone conversation she had had with a jewel thief.

She alleged that the detective had told her a tape recording had been taken of the talk she had with one of two men who had robbed a jeweller’s shop. But a previous witness, Ernest Waite, with whom she lived had given Hammersley money “so that no action would be taken about it.”

Waite, a self-confessed black marketeer, has alleged that Hammersley had a friend who was in contact with an organisation of thieves in London. The accused are Charles Ridge, aged 57, who held the title of Chief Constable, Hammersley, Detective-Sergeant Trevor Heath, aged 35, a bar owner, Anthony John Lyons, aged 59, and a bookmaker, Samuel Bellson, aged 42. Mrs Watson was questioned about a British Railways police investigation into the theft of cigarettes and tobacco, some of which Waite received. She alleged that Heath suggested that she should confess to receiving them because she might be dealt with lightly as •he had no previous convictions. Hammersley agreed with the scheme, she claimed. But before she could give herself up, Heath told her that Waite was “all right so far.”

Roy Mitchell, a convict who was brought from his prison cell to give evidence, said that he had seen Hammersley at Waite’s house. Mitchell admitted robbing • jeweller’s shop and selling some cigarettes he had stolen to Waite. Another witness, William Wat•on, a van driver employed by Waite, said both Hammersley and Heath were on “very good terms” with Waite. The Court adjourned until tomorrow. Twenty-eight more witnesses are still to be called.