ALLEGED THEFT OF SAFE

Dominion, Volume 32, Issue 256, 27 July 1939, Page 5

ALLEGED THEFT OF SAFE

Opened In Ngahauranga Gorge ACCUSED ADMITS TAKING VAN Admitting in the Supreme Court, Wellington, yesterday that he unlawfully converted a van to his own use, Thomas Gordon, taxi driver, aged 31, denied that he broke and entered the Dixon Street depot of Barton Ginger and Co., Ltd., on the night of June 21 and robbed it. It is alleged that a safe from the depot was taken to the Ngahauranga Gorge in a van from the same place and blown open. The Crown Prosecutor, Mr. W. H. Cunningham, said that Horace Barton Ginger, who was in charge of the company’s Dixou Street depot, saw the place locked up about 0.10 p.m. and went home. About 1.45 a.m. be received a message to return. He found that the premises had been broken into. A van that had been in the building was missing, a cash box was broken open and a safe was missing. The state of the premises had been discovered by a constable. . At p.m., Mr. Cunningham continued, a man who lived near the Ngahauranga Gorge was walking down the part of the road under reconstruction when be iounu a safe, packed about with cotton waste, and with a fuse protruding. He continued down the gorge, and on the way heard an explosion. He told the police, and returned with them up the gorge. As they approached the place they saw there a van with its lights on, a man digging, and papers being burned. The man fled, but wag caught, and proved to be accused. The safe had been blown open, and, the tran had been burying the floor. The papers being burned referred to Barton Ginger and Co. Acucsed’s Explanation. After arrest accused stated to the police that he was on Thorndon Quay when he found the van, the driver of which he knew. He got in to wait for the driver, and discovered a safe inside. He drove the van to the gorge and blew it open. Mr. Cunningham remarked that the safe proved rather a “dud.” Accused was living in Ghuzn.ee Street, not far from Barton Ginger and Co.'s depot. Accused had been a tractor driver on the gorge works and was fairly familiar with the place. During the night a I’ublic Works Department chest in the gorge was broken open and explosive taken from it. To accept accused’s story the jury would have to believe that someone else did the major part of the job, at Dixon Street. Evidence for the prosecution was heard when the Court adjourned till today.

iMr. M. G. Neale is appearing for accused.