Men approached for bus fare

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 32959, 4 July 1972, Page 14

Men approached for bus fare

The police received four calls from different hotels last evening with the same complaint.

A girl, thought to be about 19, was visiting bars in the hotels, soliciting customers with a plaintive, "Have you got 20c? Someone has stolen my purse and I haven’t got the bus fare home to Rangiora.”

In one bar she collected five times—the fare to Rangiora is 55c—and was inducing a middle-aged man to leave with her when she was interrupted by a barman and departed hurriedly. Her mistake had been to approach four lawyers who had informed the hotel manager. When the girl left the bar she was seen to go outside and confer with six youths and another girl who were sitting in a car parked nearby. The two girls went to the next hotel in the street and repeated, individually, the "lost purse” performance. Among those approached this time were a businessman and another lawyer who soon sent the girls on their way. The girls returned to the first hotel and were still there

when the police arrived. The first girl was again in conversation with the middleaged man when the police asked her outside to explain her presence. She does not live in Rangiora; nor could she explain why her six male companions could not have taken her there in the car.

While the girl was speaking to the police the car and the rest of its occupants left the scene.