Therapist found guilty on three fraud charges

Press, 24 February 1979, Page 4

Therapist found guilty on three fraud charges

Nelson reporter A colour therapist charged with making, false claims to the State Insurance Office for sums of money totalling $32,736, has been found guilty on three of the four charges he faced in the Supreme Court at Nelson. Howard William Ireton | Le Page, aged 40, had deI nied four charges of false ; pretences. [ After a six-hour retirment, the jury found him guilty on a charge of attempting to obtain $379 in a fraudulent claim for the Joss by theft of cash and articles on April 4, 1977; not guilty on a charge of fraudulently claiming $320 for the loss of two radionic machines and a transformer damaged in a fire; guilty on a charge of fraudulently claiming $1639 for medicinal tablets Sent from Britain, which he claimed he had not received; and guilty on a charge of fraudulently claiming $30,398 for the loss of goods in a house fire at Neudorf (involving $20,000 for a stamp collection. $5OOO for a Chippen-

dale dining suite, and $3OB for each of six radionic machines and other articles).

Mr Justice Quilliam remanded Le Page to March 2 for sentence in Wellington.

The jury added a rider that Le Page should have some assistance in going over his claim for the loss of goods in the fire. The jury felt it would be “unjust” if he was not able to make a further claim for the contents destroyed in the fire.

Mr P. W. Graham, with him Mr W’. R. Flaus, appears for the Crown, and Mr H. W. Riddoch for Le Page.

Asked in cross-exam-ination how he had assessed the value of the stamp collection, Le Page said that $20,000 was the price offered him by a German man staying with an aunt in Auckland about five years before the fire. He was a visitor to New Zealand. Le Page said he did not know where he was now. He was not a dealer. The valuation of $5OOO

for the Chippendale-style dining suite was assessed by checking present-day prices and- from the fact that a man in Invtercargilhad offered him $4300 fo:

Mr Graham questioned him about the letterheac. on his business corres pondence. The letterhead described him as “Professor Le Page” and listed what appeared to be degrees or qualifications. Le Page said he had attended the Sussex College of Technlogy, England, for about a year when he was 19, and had been given the title with an honorary degree in psychology. Then followed eight other degrees or qualifications ending with D.Sc snd 8.A., both of which Le Page said he obtained from Sussex College and stood for diploma of science and batchelor of arts.

His Honour: Do I gather the stamps for which you claimed $20,000 were substantially destroyed in the fire? — They were. We have a few of the ones that were left. His, Honour: Having regard to the value placed on the albums that have been produced, may we assume that what was destroyed was infinitely superior to these stamps? — Certainly. His Honour: As a collector who had acquired that [collection. I would imagine you would be able to describe individually the really valuable ones in it — I had books to study these prices but I had not got into that detail.

His Honour: Are you not able to bring to mind instantly the really valuable stamps within that collection? I would have though a collector could have done that without pausing? — I was not a collector in the sense of knowing each individual stamp in my collection. . In his address to the jury, Mr Graham for the Crown, summarised the evidence on each count. On the charge of theft, Mr jGraiham said Le Page had said he had returned to Gore to report the theft of the cash and .articles from his truck when Balclutha was much closer and in the direction he was travelling. The police at Gore said they did not know of any theft reported.

There was a ! conflict of evidence on the damaged fadionic machines, said Mr Graham. The crown witness (Ms McCall said two transformers and no machines were affected in a fire. The accused had said they had been sent to Invercargill for repair, but his claim had said they were unrepairable. Later he had said he had got them back when, ,in fact, they had not been sent. .

A shipment of tablets from Britain, for \Vhich the. accused had claimed, had been signed for by his Wife. There had been a housefire and the Le Page fam-

ily had lost heavily. But. it was the Crown’s case that the accused ahd lodged a claim for items on which he had placed an excessive value, or for items which had not been lestroyed in the fire, said Ir Graham.

The jury had to deternine if the accused had embarked on a course of conduct with the firm intention of defrauding the State Insurance Office, said Mr Riddoch for Le /age,. Only one of the three police witnesses, a Constable from Gore, had given evidence on the theft charge. The Constable said he had no recollection of a report alleged to have been mde to him in the early hours of the morning, said Mr Riddoch. The accused, his wife, his mother, and an employee, Miss McCall, had given evidence of having seen two radionic machines and a transformer burned. If what they said was untrue, it could only be said that they were all party to an attempt to defraud the insurance office, said Mr Riddoch. . As- to the non-arrival of the medicinal tablets for which Le Page had also lodged a claim, he himself was most confused about this charge,, said Mr Riddoch. The whole claim appeared to be totally confusing. The accused had suffered badly in a disastrous fire. He had an insurance cover with the . State Insurance Office which a month later declined to meet his claim or any part of it. The office had appointed a claim’s adjustor, (Mr Paterson) to look into the loss. He advised the family to draw up a list and a schedule, which was Shown to Mr Paterson, and he asked them to, estimate the value of each item. He would then meet them again and check their estiinated valuations.

. The second meeting never took place, said Mr Riddoch. The office in the meantime declined the claim on the ground of a

“‘gross over-statement of value.” “You might think the State Insurance Office had declined the claim with indecent haste before another meeting with the assessor,” said Mr Riddoch. The valuations drawn up by . the family were only estimates which the professional, Mr Paterson, was. to assess' and adjust. But he was never given the opportunity. in his -summing-up, his Honour. when dealing with the items lost in the house fire, advised the jury to consider these With a great deal of caution. It could, be that conscientious though the accused was, he had made some mistakes: The picture, as presented in the evidence, showed a household in some confusion.