Robbery suspect in Sydney jail

Press, 12 May 1984, Page 8

Robbery suspect in Sydney jail

Kevin Lofthouse, the young Scotsman who escaped from Addington Prison a year ago this week-end, is in Long Bay Jail, Sydney, awaiting a possible sentence of life imprisonment for two armed hold-ups and the shooting of a bank manager. Lofthouse, an intelligent young man who “thinks life is a party,” according to a Christchurch detective who has had dealings with him, was awaiting trial for the $14,000 robbery of the Shirley T.A.B. when he escaped from Addington. A detective in the Sydney police consorting squad observed yesterday, “I doubt if he will think life is so much of a party after six months in Long Bay.” It is not known how Lofthouse managed to flee New Zealand, but the police think that he probably did so within a few days of his escape from prison. Nor have they been able to find out how or when he entered New Zealand. “He is a bit of a mystery man,” said one Christchurch detective. Lofthouse has been in Long Bay since December 3, last year, when the Sydney police arrested him during a bank hold-up in which a bank manager was shot.

Apparently Lofthouse had ordered the manager to open a safe: There was a struggle during which a gun discharged, seriously wounding the bank manager. Lofthouse was convicted of the aggravated robbery of the bank and a Sydney jeweller’s shop, and of wounding the bank manager with intent to rob him. Under New South Wales law, aggravated robbery carries a maximum sentence of 20 years imprisonment. Lofthouse could be sentenced to life imprisonment on the wounding charge. Approval has been given for an order to extradite him from Australia to stand trial for the T.A.B. hold-up, but the New Zealand police are waiting to see what sentence he gets for the Australian offences. If Lofthouse was given a “substantial” jail term in Sydney, it was unlikely that he would be extradited, said a spokesman for police national headquarters in Wellington. Being a British citizen, Lofthouse would be deported from Australia to Britain on the expiry of his jail term. A New Zealand court would also be unlikely to impose a heavy sentence if

Lofthouse had already served a long sentence in Australia, said the spokesman. Mark Cyril Woodall, who escaped from Addington with Lofthouse but gave himself up the next day, having “sorted out a domestic problem,” is serving four years for his part in the Shirley T.A.B. robbery. The police say that the pair went on a high-living spending binge through the North Island, “blowing” several thousands of dollars. Lofthouse, although he had trained as a mechanic in Scotland, was an articulate, intelligent person with the ability to pass himself off as a member of a profession. They stayed in the best hotels. On one occasion they paid $l5OO to charter a Racht in the Bay of Islands, [either of them knew how to sail the vessel: when they got tired of it, they left it to drift. Had Lofthouse stayed in New Zealand instead of fleeing to Australia, the Eolice believe that his very road Scots accent would eventually have given him away. As it is, Long Bay is likely to be his home for a long time.