Youth alleges robbery kidnap with knife

Press, 7 September 1989, Page 16

Youth alleges robbery kidnap with knife

A knife-carrying assailant robbed a student of personal items in a toilet in the Botanic Gardens, then made him walk into the central city to try to obtain money, the District Court was told yesterday.

Evidence of this was given at the preliminary hearing of charges against Kenneth Hunter Georgeson, aged 29, a sickness beneficiary, of aggravated robbery, and kidnapping the youth,

Messrs J. B. Andersen and A. L. Mclvor, Justices of the Peace, committed Georgeson for trial by jury in the High Court. They remanded him in custody pending a date for his trial.

The charges against Georgeson were that, being armed with a knife, he robbed the youth of his watch and a pair of gloves, together worth $216, and that he unlawfully detained the youth without his consent.

Mr Stan Barker, who appeared for Georgeson, reserved the defence.

Sergeant Pat Creasey prosecuted. Prosecution evidence

was that on August 1 the complainant, then aged 17, went to the toilets in the Botanic Gardens.

He was confronted by Georgeson, who held a knife. Georgeson demanded money and when the complainant said he had none Georgeson took his watch and gloves. He told the complainant he required him to get $2OO and warned that he would use the knife if the complainant tried to run away.

The complainant decided he had to “go along” with him, and said his mother worked in a city bank, and he could get her bankcard.

He was reminded not to run away or he would be done in.

They walked to a city bank, with Georgeson close beside the complainant. They could not gain entry and the complainant said he knew a person at an inner-city hotel who might lend him the money. The complainant thought Georgeson would be refused entry because

of his scruffy appearance and that he would be able to escape from him.

Both men were admitted into the hotel and the complainant then told Georgeson his friend did not appear to be there. Georgeson said it was about time they went to the complainant’s house. They went to a taxi stand in Cathedral Square but after Georgeson got into a taxi the complainant slammed the door and ran off. A doorman at a hotel said two men entered. One, a teenager, appeared “hyper-active.” The elder man stood very close to him.

After speaking to the youth he allowed them upstairs but was apprehensive about them and told a porter to allow them only two minutes in the building. They left the hotel before this period.

In a written statement made to Detective John Thomson, Georgeson denied threatening the complainant. He said he did not have to. “He was offering me things on a

He said that when he entered the toilet the complainant was doing an indecency and beckoned him over. He decided to ask the complainant for money. He said he did not have any, and that he sympathised with people like Georgeson who were unemployed. He told Georgeson he could get some money as his mother had a bankcard. He gave Georgeson his gloves and watch.

Georgeson said the complainant said they could go to his house and get the bankcard. Georgeson said the way the complainant was acting, he believed the complainant wanted him to go to his house to commit an indecency, and he would give him the bankcard and account PIN number.

Georgeson’s statement said he did not carry a knife and did not force the complainant to do anything. The complainant had offered to take him to get a bankcard.