SEQUEL TO ROBBERY

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 73, 19 December 1935, Page 17

SEQUEL TO ROBBERY

Charges Against Man and Woman HANDBAG FOUND IN SHOP A man and a woman appeared in the Wellington Magistrate’s Court yesterday on charges arising from the breaking and entering® of a shop at 64 Abel Smith Street, on December 7, and the theft from it of a quantity of women’s and infants’ clothing and dress materials. Mr. E. D. Mosley, S.M-, heard the charges and Detective-Ser-geant L. B. Revell prosecuted. Minnie O’Connor, aged 35, pleaded guilty to receiving a quantity of clothing and materials valued at £2l/1/-, belonging to Alga Catherine Pool, knowing them to have been dishonestly obtained.

Eric John Jones, a labourer and hawker, aged 26, was charged with breaking and entering the shop of Alga Catherine Pool on December 7, and stealing women’s and infants’ clothing and women’s dress materials, valued at £34/4/9. Mr. R. Hardie Boys appeared for Jones. * Speaking of O’Connor, Detective-Ser-geant Revell said accused had a quantity of clothing in her possession when arrested; she was drunk. Accused stated she had received the clothing from Jones. She had a long list of convictions. O’Connor was convicted and ordered to come up for sentence if called upon within 12 mouths, the magistrate saying he would treat her leniently. Mrs. Pool was the first witness against Jones. She said she conducted a dressmaking shop at 64 Abel Smith Street. She left the shop at about 9.30 p.m. on December 7, after locking doors and windows. When she returned the following morning she found the shop in disorder and a quantity of clothing and material was missing. One window was broken.

Minnie O’Connor said she saw accused on the night of December 6. She was in an alley-way off Abel Smith Street with him and another man. They were all “very drunk,” She saw the clothing in the alley-way. She could not say where accused got the clothing which he gave her. .

She said a handbag which was produced was hers and that an unemployment card inside it was accused’s, but she could not say how the bag came to be discovered in Mrs. Pool’s shop. She did not go into the shop. She supposed accused had her bag that night. - Detective S. C. Browne said he found the handbag on a counter in MrsPool’s ‘shop; the card was inside it. On December 10 he arrested accused; who made a statement admitting that he had been in a shop in Abel Smith Street with- O’Connor and a man named “Pat.” He remembered taking a quantity of clothing; they took it to a bach. He was drunk.-.,

Accused pleaded not guilty aud was committed to the Supreme Court for trial. Bail was renewed on accused’s own recognisance at £2O.