Detention for kidnap fraud

Press, 9 August 1980, Page 5

Detention for kidnap fraud

PA Auckland A young woman who falsely told the police she had been kidnapped has been sentenced to eight months periodic detention. She is Lynley Robyn Brown, aged 18, an unemployed masseuse, of Otara, who appeared before Judge Duncan in the District Court at Otahuhu.

She had previously pleaded guilty to charges of alleging, without genuine belief and truth in her statement, that a crime of kidnapping had been committed; wilfully making a fictitious telephone message, namely that she had been kidnapped; forging a Post Office Savings Bank book; using a Post Office Savings Bank book withdrawal slip to defraud and obtain a financial pecuniary advantage. The Judge sentenced her to periodic detention at the Epsom centre for eight months on the false complaint charge, four months for the fictitious message, and six months each on the bank book charges. The terms are to be served concurrently. He told Brown that the

charges were of a very serious nature and that she had certainly made up for her lack of previous convictions.

“Your actions show an inclination towards a disregard for the law and to break it when it serves you,” he said. “You carried off your deception to the point where it had the police hoodwinked.”