SUPREME COURT Trial On Charge Of Stealing Car

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30666, 4 February 1965, Page 15

SUPREME COURT Trial On Charge Of Stealing Car

Pita Tauwhare, a school teacher, aged 36, in the Supreme Court yesterday denied alternative charges that on August 1, 1964, at Christchurch he stole a car valued at £6OO, the property of John Woodward, and, that on the same date he received the car, knowing it to have been dishonestly obtained. Mr Justice Macarthur was on the Bench. Mr N. W. Williamson appeared for the Crown and Mr H. J. B. Quigley appeared for Tauwhare. John Woodward, a farmer of Westport, said that on August 1 he parked his car In Racecourse road while he attended a race meeting. When he returned to where he had left his car after the running of the Winter Cup, the car was missing. He next saw the car at a Kaiapoi garage on October 27 when he had identified it as his. The car licence plates were not those on the car when he left it at Racecourse road. Offer Received At Kaiapoi the plate number of the car was AQ7040. On October 5, before he had gone to Kaiapoi, he had received a telegram signed Pita Tauwhare which offered £6OO for the car “as it, where is.” Patrick Robert Brosnahan said he had been employed as a car salesman with the New Zealand Farmers’ Co-operative Association of Canterbury, Ltd. He had been issued with the plates AQ7040 for use on a company car, but the plates had been stolen or lost and that had been reported to the police. John Reginald Gardiner, assistant manager of the Farmers’ motor division, said on September 23 near Culverden he saw a car with the plate number AQ7040. He asked the driver whose car it was and was told Artie Williams. The accused was the driver at the time, and said Williams lived in Glade avenue. Witness identified the plate number as one of a batch of about 50 in a series which had been issued to the Farmers. He had reported the matter to the police. Detective J. A. Howat said when he had called at Tauwhare’s Woodend home he saw a car outside which had plate No. AQ7040. Tauwhare came up to him and said the car had been given to him in payment for a gambling debt by Artie Williams, whom he had known at Ocean Beach freezing works about five years ago. He said the car had been in his possession for about six weeks. Meeting In Hotel Later, at the Kaiapoi police station, Tauwhare said that on a Saturday early in August he had gone to the Bush Inn where he had met Williams

and another Maori named Sam.

Tauwhare told him Williams had said he needed £l5O quickly to settle a gambling debt, and when the change in his story was pointed out to him Tauwhare said tris original answer was not correct

He had given Williams three blank cheques from his teachers’ salary account and Williams had said to retain the car until he paid the debt. Detective Howat said they had then gone to No. 22 Glade avenue, a number Tauwhare had given him, in search of Williams. There was no No. 22 in the street, and though they visited about four houses in the street they were unable to locate Williams or any person who knew him. They had then gone to the Central Police Station where he and Detective Sergeant E. Stackhouse had again interviewed Tauwhare. When Sergeant Stackhouse asked Tauwhare what the position was with the cheques he said he had money owing to him. Accused said the cheques he had given Williams at the hotel were made out for amounts of £65, £45, and £4O. When it was pointed out to Tauwhare that he had earlier said the cheques he had given Williams were blank he said that had not been correct. Tauwhare had then asked whether it would be better for him to plead guilty to receiving or stealing the vehicle and was told it was the truth that mattered and not what he should plead. Tauwhare had then said that he had not given Williams cheques but had given him £3B of £4O he had had in his possession. Detective Howat said that before going to the Central Police Station he had asked Tauwhare what steps he had taken to locate Williams, and Tauwhare had said he had seen Sam and Williams at the New Railway Hotel about a week after having seen them at the Bush Inn. While there Sam had said to Williams that it was not his car but that Williams had “flogged” it. Tauwhare said he thought Williams and Sam were joking and he had not believed the car was stolen. Statement Read

Detective Howat then read Tauwhare’s statement made after his arrest which said that before he had taken the car Artie had told him it was “hot and it had been knocked off somewhere.” Detective Constable W. R. Woolman said that on October 21 he interviewed Tauwhare and he admitted sending the telegram containing an offer for the car to Mr Woodward. James Williams, assistant manager of the Para Rubber

Company, Ltd, Timaru, said that a man whom he identified as the accused, had asked for a cash refund of £5 19s 9d on a boy’s coat and that had been granted. The refund voucher had been signed in his presence by the accused with the name “A. Williams.” The accused had then been directed to the firm’s tyre depot and there signed another refund voucher with the name “A. Williams,” but that had not been done in his presence.

Peter Halkett McKeating, employment officer at Ocean Beach freezing works, said he had searched the records of his company and could find no record of an Artie or an A. R. Williams having been employed there in the last 10 years. Accused’s Evidence

In evidence Tauwhare said he had gone to the Bush Inn one day in August and had there met Williams whom he had previously known while working at the Ocean Beach freezing works on three separate occasions. In general conversation Sam. another Maori with Williams, had said something about the ear not belonging to Artie Williams. The words “hot” and "knocked off” in his statement had not meant to him that the car was stolen but rather borrowed. He had not questioned the words in his statement. Artie had said he would send him the ownership papers and he had expected payment in November. During his interviews by the detectives he had on several occasions asked for a solicitor. In Kaiapoi he had been told it was not necessary and later at the Central Police station he had been refused. He had signed the cash refund vouchers in Timaru in the name Williams as he at that time had been driving Williams’s car. He had sent the telegram to Woodward because he had wanted to repay him for the inconvenience and time spent on inquiries for his lost car and because he and his wife had thought it was the proper thing to do. He said that he had made the statement about which charge he should plead guilty to after Sergeant Stackhouse had made a remark to him. The detective sergeant, when recalled, denied making the remark. The case will continue today. Appeal Fails An appeal against a sentence imposed in the Magistrate’s Court earlier this year on charges of indecently assaulting two girls was heard in the Supreme Court yesterday before Mr Justice Wilson and was dismissed. Mr I. C. J. Polson appeared for the Crown. Robert James Watson, aged 17i, a farmworker, appealed against a sentence of Borstal training imposed in the Magistrate’s Court on January 29 in respect of charges of indecently assaulting a girl over the age of 12 and under the age of 16 years on November 29, and, indecently assaulting a girl under the age of 12 years on December 14.