OLD WOMAN DEFRAUDED

Press, Volume XCIX, Issue 29268, 28 July 1960, Page 20

OLD WOMAN DEFRAUDED

Five Brothers Sent To Gaol (NX. Press Association-Copyright) MELBOURNE, July 26. A rise in the “basic wage for crime” was overdue, Judge Bul-ler-Murphy told five brothers and their brother4n-law in General Sessions today. And there should be liberal margins for greater rises to incorrigible rogues, he said. In this case, he said, the men had hunted in a pack to obtain money by false pretence and by false promise. They had selected as targets those whom by reason of sex, age and infirmity, appeared to have been peculiarly susceptible to their wiles and were illequipped to protect themselves against imposition. Judge Buller-Murphy imposed these sentences: Harold Ernest Roberts, aged 41, five years; Desmond Bannon Roberts, aged < 33, five years; Rex Roberts, aged 28, five years; Gordon Mannix Roberts, aged 40, three years; Donald Dundee Roberts, twelve months; Walter Frederick Hammond, aged 35, twelve months. In their-trial, Harold, Desmond, Gordon and Rex Roberts were found guilty of having defrauded Miss Frances Louise Charles, aged 84, Mount Albert, between July 21 and 23 last year of £949 15s by falsely promising to carry out repairs to her house. The other brothers and the brother-in-law were found guilty of similar offences. All pleaded not guilty. Evidence was given that the men, in a body, called on elderly people, examined their houses and told them that the houses needed extensive repairs. The men “high-pressured” their victims, mostly elderly women, into paying them money for the repairs, which Were unnecessary, the prosecution alleged. Their defence was that the repairs were necessary and were in fact carried out, or would have been completed if they had not been ordered off the premises.