Pair went on 'crime spree'

Press, Volume CXVI, Issue 34105, 18 March 1976, Page 13

Pair went on 'crime spree'

(From Our Own Reporter) NELSON. A young man and his female accomplice had gone on a South Island crime spree, Mr K. H. J. Headifen, S.M., was told in the Nelson Magistrate’s Court.

Before the court was Michael de Graaff, aged 21, of no fixed abode, who pleaded guilty to 14 charges. These included theft, breaking and entering, and false pretences. The total value of the goods and money involved in the offences was $2812.

He admitted stealing from Kaikoura a utility vehicle valued at $2300, and the other theft charges related to a television set, a hydraulic jack, a car battery, an electric grinder, and a spotlight. The false pretences charges arose from the cashing of cheques taken from a book stolen in Cromwell. There were seven such charges. Sergeant R. Edie said that the offences came to light when, on March 7, the defendant had called at a house in Nelson to pay an outstanding debt of $142. He produced a cheque for $195 which, he said, was paid to him as wages. He received a cheque for $53 as change, but the man who was owed the $142 was suspicious and telephoned the Cromwell bank the next morning.

As a result of the information received, he stopped the cheque given to the defendant, and when the defendant called at the bank that day to cash it he was detained by the accountant and taken into custody, said Sergeant Edie. He admitted stealing the utility from Kaikoura after selling his own car there for $6O and he painted the roof of the cab so that it would be less easily identified. He stole some of the goods from Kaikoura before returning south with his accomplice and embarking on

a crime spree, said Sergeant Edie. False cheques were cashed at Kakarora, at Haast (four charges) and Bruce Bay, ana’ in Nelson one cheque was given as a deposit on a stereo cassette car radio. With de Graaff was Theresa May Robinson, aged 19, of no fixed abode, who admitted the theft of the utility, a breaking and entering charge, one charge of false pretences, one of attempted false pretences, and one charge of breaching the terms of her probation. Both were remanded for a week in custody for probation officer reports.