SEIZURE OF GOLD

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2557, 3 September 1915, Page 6

SEIZURE OF GOLD

CHINESE RELIEVED OF £260

INCIDENT ON S.S. MOERAKI

'A rather sensational arrest, not of an individual, but of £260 in gold, was made just an hour before the Moeraki left for Sydnoy. An elderly Chinese was calmly walking along the deck of tho vessel when a polico officer tapped him on tho shoiildor with tho intimation that ho "wanted him." "AVha' for?" inquired tho Colestial. "Yon know, all,right," was the reply, and it ivas a, considerably alarmed Chinaman, that was escorted to whero an innocentlooking tin trunk and a wooden box lay in another part of tho vessel. Tho polico ofTicor, Chinaman, and' property wero shortly in tho tolls office, where, on being searched, a cash box 1 was unearthed from tho bottom of the tin trunk. Tho cash box contained £260 in gold, and apparently tho Chinaman, unheeding tho many warnings, was nbout to smugclo this ' away to tho* Flowery .Land. The gold was taken to flic polico station, while tho Chinese departed ill tho company of a sympathetic countryman. Ther seizure was made under tho Banking Act Amendment oF 1914, which prohibits tho export of gold to foreign countries. The Chinese whose departure for Sydney was indefinitely postponed, has been a resident of tho Dominion for tho past 48 years.