Supreme Court MAN NOT GUILTY OF FALSE PRETENCES

Press, Volume C, Issue 29517, 19 May 1961, Page 16

Supreme Court MAN NOT GUILTY OF FALSE PRETENCES

Eric Neville Hill, aged 50, a salesman, was found not guilty by a jury in the Supreme Court yesterday on two charges of false pretences. Mr Justice Macarthur discharged Hill The Jury took 130 minutes to reach its verdict. Hill pleaded not guilty to a charge of obtaining at Christchurch on December 12. 1960. an air ticket for travel from Christchurch to Wellington, valued at £4 10s, from the National Airways Corporation by falsely representing that a cheque for that amount was a good and valid order. Hill also pleaded not guilty to a second charge of obtaining, at Blenheim on December 14. 1960. £lO from Arthur Brant Barratt by falsely representing that a cheque for that amount made payable to the Criterion Hotel, was a good and valid order. The Crown Prosecutor (Mi P. T. Mahon) represented the Crown and Mr D. H. Godfrey appeared for Hill. Early in December last the accused opened an account with the Riccarton branch of the National Bank of New Zealand, said Mr Mahon. He previously had two accounts with another branch of the bank but transferred both these accounts, his personal one and a joint account with the woman with whom he was then living, to the Riccarton branch. The transferred accounts were opened at the Riccarton branch on December 6. Early on December 12 the accused sent a telegram to tl e Riccarton branch of the bank requesting that the bank stop payment of cheques on both accounts until he got in touch with the branch officials personally. “The bank has had no authority to pay any cheques on the two accounts which might be drawn on them in the meantime,” said Mr Mahon. Issue of Cheques On December 12, the accused went to the National Airways Corporation in Christchurch and obtained an air ticket for Wellington by issuing a cheque for £4 10s on the Riccarton branch of the National Bank, signed E. Hill. Two days later, on December 14. the accused booked into the Criterion Hotel at Blenheim, said Mr Mahon. The accused booked in under a different name. That same night he booked out again.

asked for his account, and issued a cheque for £ 10, payable to the hotel and signed E. • Hill. He was given £7 9s 9d. Mis board having been £2 10s 3d. “Both these cheques were dishonoured because the accused had instivcted the bank to stop payment on both his accounts. The Crown’s case is that the accused well knew that the cheques would not be met because he had stopped payment and that he committed a false pretence on each occasion by issuing a cheque knowing it was not a good order,” said Mr Mahon. On December 16, the accused was arrested in Blenheim. That day he sent a telegram to the bank at Riccarton requesting that cheques on his accounts be paid-until he saw the bank officials on the Monday. The bank did not pay the cheques because the accused had in his previous instruction told the bank to stop payment until he saw the bank officials personally. On December 22. the accused instructed the bank to close both the accounts. Mr Mahon said it later transpired that the two cheques which were the subject of the present charges were not the only ones dishonoured because of his. instructions to stop payment Seventeen cheques in all. for various amounts, totalling more than the credit balance in the accused’s accounts, had been dishonoured. “The Crown does not suggest that there is any criminal offence in the dishonouring of these other cheques. It might be contended on behalf of the accused that he may have intended to honour the two cheques forming the basis of the charges against him by instructing the bank to pay out at a later date. "The other cheques are mentioned in anticipation of this defence, so you may well think that he had no intention of honouring the two cheques. The Crown’s case is that the accused issued the two cheques with intent to defraud and asks you to weigh the facts of the other dishonoured cheques against any intention that he did not intend to defraud,” Mr Mahon said. Banker’s Evidence

James Patrick Taylor, manager of the Riccarton branch of the National Bank of New Zealand, said the accused had two accounts, E. N. Hill and E. N. and M. M. Hill, at the bank on December 6. 1960. The telegram stopping

payments on both accounts was sent at 1-5 ajn. on December 12. On December 18, the bank received a telegram: “Honour cheques until I see you Monday. HilL” the witness said. He did not act on the telegram as anyone could have sent it and because of the previous instructions to stop payment until Hill called personally. The witness said that because of the stop-payments instructions 13 cheques signed by the accused were dishonoured and four dishonoured after both accounts had been closed by Hill. Cross-examined by Mr Godfrey. the witness said his branch was the nearest of has bank to the address Hill gave when opening the accounts. From December 9 to the closing of the accounts there was a total credit balance of £l7 16s 6d. He understood there had been a telephone call from Hill at Blenheim to the bank on December 16. It was while he was away at lunch. It could have been to honour all cheques. The witness said it was the practice that all countermanding of payments must be done in writing. He had refused to act on the telegram signed Hill on December 16 To his Honour the witness said that none of the dishonoured cheques had been drawn by M. M. Hill. All were drawn by the accused. Detective A. G. I. Rodgers read two statements made by the accused, who was quoted as saying he did not know why he had issued the cheques after instructing payment to be stopped. To Mr Godfrey, the witness said the accused had offered to pay the N.A.C. £4 10s in cash after his arrest The N.A.C. had referred the offer to the police. Defence Case Mr Godfrey called no evidence for the defence. Several, factors indicated that the accused had reasonable cause for belief that the two cheques he had issued would be met in due course, counsel submitted in his address for the defence. The evidence plainly showed that there was more than £l7 in both accounts. The two cheques totalled only £l4 10s, and the accused could have met them, as he had authority to draw on both the accounts. “The accused's telegram to the bank on December 12 was a conditional and temporary request, not a blanket instruction to stop payments on cheques, it was only to stop payment until he saw the bank personally,” Mr Godfrey said. “The accused later sent a telegram. on December 16. telling the bank to honour the cheques, and there was also the evidence of a police officer that the accused had offered to pay the N.A.C. £4 10s in cash. “In my submissions these

are all factors which show that the accused intended to pay. had reasonable cause to believe he could pay, and did not have any wilful intent to defraud when he issued the two cheques,” Mr Godfrey said. These factors must raise reasonable doubts in fairminded men, counsel submitted. The accused was not charged in connexion with the other cheques listed as dishonoured, and there had been no evidence that the cheques dishonoured after he closed the accounts had not been written before the accounts were closed.