Theft shatters family’s dream

Press, 22 August 1989, Page 9

Theft shatters family’s dream

By BARRY CLARKE A financially-strug-gling family’s return to Christchurch yesterday from the North Island to start a new life was shattered by thieves.

What should have been a day of celebration for Mrs Sherrill Flanagan and her four children turned into a nightmare when the truck carrying family possessions from Marton arrived with almost an empty load. The goods, which included a television set, video, electrical kitchen items and children’s toys, were stolen from a friend’s garage in Marton. They had been stored there for three months while she arranged the $l2OO cartage fee.

“It was going to be Christmas Day for us. We were looking forward to having our own things and being able to sleep in our own beds,” a tearful Mrs Flanagan, a beneficiary, said yesterday.

“It’s turned out to be a nightmare. I can’t believe it.”

The goods were insured at her former address in Marton. Because

they were stolen from an unlocked garage at another property the insurance company is unlikely to pay out. Mrs Flanagan is upset her friend did not bother to tell her of the theft, and has asked the police in Marton to investigate. Mrs Flanagan, aged 32, and her children, aged three, five, 13 and 15, have been living in a Housing Corporation house in Hornby with borrowed furniture. She had lived in the North Island for four years and decided to return to Christchurch to start a new life after a recent divorce.

“I just don’t know what I’m going to do. I worked so hard for years to buy the television, video, stereo, toaster, al! my pots for the family. I bought $4OO worth of sheets and continental blankets for my family. They’re all gone. “I just haven’t got money to buy anything now. Most of the stuff is new. I bought most of it at the beginning of the year.

“It’ll be a 10-year struggle to get back where I was.”