Committed For Trial On Burglary Charges

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31366, 11 May 1967, Page 9

Committed For Trial On Burglary Charges

A man who was arrested in a Railways hut near Stewart's Gully on April 13 appeared in the Magistrate's Court yesterday before Messrs K. B. Phillips and W. E. Olds, Justices of the Peace, charged with committing a series of burglaries in the Spencerville area.

Patrick William Hammond, aged 45, unemployed (Mr L. M. O’Reilly) was committed for trial at the next sessions of the Supreme Court on charges that on March 25 at Spencer Park he broke and entered a caravan belonging to Owen Byfield; that on April 1 he broke and entered a bach at 57 Heyders road belonging to Annie Kathleen Wallis; that on April 4 he broke and entered a house at 14 Heyders road belonging to Gwendoline May Dempster; and that on April 5 he broke and entered a house at Spencerville belonging to Elsie Joyce Reader. He was also committed for trial on charges that on March 31 he stole from a house at 22 Heyders road, belonging to Mrs Reader, a transistor radio valued at £l5; and that on April 1 he stole from a house at 67 Heyders road, belonging to Rosa Eileen Tanner, a watch and a pair of sunglasses, of a total value of £l4 10s.

Detective Trevor Owen Tozer said that on April 13, about 2 a. nt, he went with a police party to a railway hut about half a mile from the Stewart’s Gully railway crossing. They heard noises inside, surrounded the hut, and he then tried the door but found it locked.

After getting inside they located the defendant who was in an unkempt condition and had not shaved for several days. Constable Leslie John Bruce said that on April 6, while working with his police dog in the Spencerville area, he found a suitcase and sleeping bag in an area of dense gorse and flax in the plantation area south of Heyders road. Detective D. N. Stewart said he received from Constable Bruce on April 6 a suitcase and sleeping bag. In them was clothing which previous witnesses, Mrs Reader and Mrs Dempster, had identified as theirs, and an eiderdown which a previous witness, Mrs Wallis, had identified as hers. There were also two transistor radios which Mrs Reader and a previous witness, Mr Byfield, had identified as belonging to them, a pair of sunglasses, which Mrs Tanner had identified as hers, and a pair of trousers and a pair of socks.

The suitcase and a travelling clock were identified by Mrs Reader as her own. Hammond later in the day appeared before Mr E. S. J. Crutchley, S.M., charged that on March 6, at Christchurch, he stole a purse and contents valued at £3 10s, the property of Marie Duffell, and that on April 13 he was deemed to be an idle and disorderly person in that he had insufficient means of support. He pleaded not guilty to the theft charge, and both [that charge and the charge of being idle and disorderly • were adjourned till May 30.