Stolen tapes recovered

Press, 17 August 1984, Page 20

Stolen tapes recovered

PA Auckland Vital tape recordings stolen from a historian and author, Professor Judith Binney, have been recovered from a dustbin. The recordings and some articles of jewellery taken when her home was burgled were recovered by “Auckland Star” staff after an anonymous tip-off to the Binney, an associate professor of history at Auckland University, was

elated by the find, which will save her two more years work on her latest book. Included in the burglary haul were 11 tape-recorded interviews with elderly Maori women, surviving descendants of the Maori leader Te Kooti and the prophet Rua, made in the Bay of Plenty. The tapes and three pieces of greenstone (including one which does not belong to Professor Binney)

were found on Tuesday in a paper bag inside a council rubbish tin not far from her home, three weeks after they had been stolen. Her husband, Mr Sebastian Black, a senior lecturer in English at the university, said other property including a valuable nine-metre-high canvas painting by the Maori artist, Ralph Hotere, jewellery, clothes, money, Peruvian artefacts and two tins of cat food were still missing.