RESIDENT MAGISTRATE'S COURT.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3561, 7 December 1882, Page 3

RESIDENT MAGISTRATE'S COURT.

This Day. (Before Captain Preece, R.M.) LARCENY. George Cameron was charged on the information of Constable Schultz with having, on the 26th December last, stolen one silver watch, valued at £4, the property of John Hard Anderson, of Napier. The accused pleaded not guilty, adding that be bougbt the watch from another man, and had had it repaired by a watchmaker in town. The evidence of J. H. Anderson went to show that on Boxing Day last year he was working in Dickens-street. He had ' hie waistcoat off ; it was hanging on the fence. In the pocket of tbe vest was his watch (produced), attached to a chain. When be came out after having dinner he found tbe watch and chain were gone. He next saw the watch in the possession of tbe police. Witness did not know the prisoner. David Smith, hotelkeeper, of Makatoku, was examined, and identified the watch produced as the one he had seen on April 13th in the possession of tbe prisoner. Prisoner represented himself to witness as a New York detective, and remained for a few days at ths botel. One morning shortly after the prisoner arrived he offered to sell tbe watch, prodaced in Court, to witness, alleging that he was hard up. He a°ked £3 for it, which witness refused to give. Subsequently, after hard pressing, he gave prisoner £1 for it to start him on the road. The prisoner some months later on returned to witness' hotel, when witness asked him was not be the person who had sold the watch, and prisoner replied that he was. Witness told the prisoner the watch was a stolen one, and asked to get his £1 back. The prisoner paid be had bought it of a man named Swan, who worked at Mr Young's hotel at the Spit. Constable Schultz then came in, and prisoner repeated the same words to the constable. Witness had given the watch up to tbe police on May 27th, when he knew it to be stolen property. Constable Schultz deposed to receiving the watch produced from tbe last witness on 27th May last. On the 4th of the present month Mr Smith came to witness and told him that the man who had sold the watch was at the hotel. Witness went there with Smith, and saw the prisoner. In answer to witness prisoner said he had bought the watch for £3 from a drunken man at Mr Young's hotel about twenty months ago. The prisoner also said he would not know the man again if he saw him. Witness then arrested the prisoner on the charge of stealing the watch. On the road to the police station the prisoner contradicted himself by saying he only gave 25s for the watch. The prisoner meutioned in the presence of witness, when he was talking to Mr Smith, that the name of the man from whom he bought the watcb was SwaD. Tbe prisoner made a statement in which he admitted that what the witnesses had said was quite right. He could only repeat that be had bought the watch, as was told to both Mr Smith and the constable. Mr Moffitt, who knew him, would certify as to bis character. E. Moffitt, ex-sergeant of police, said he had known the prisoner since 1865. He was a quiet, and, so far as witness knew, a perfectly trustworthy man. Never knew or heard of prisoner having committed any act of dishonesty all that time. He was a carpenter, and had been accustomed to working on stations in tho Waipawa district. Witness had known nothing of prisoner, however, for the last two years. His Worship said that, as tbe prisoner had been found in the possession of the stolen watch, and could give no reasonable explanation of how he came by it, his story also being contradictory, the Court had no alternative but to find him guilty. In passing sentence the prisoner's former good character would be taken into account, and tbe term of imprisonment made as light as was compatible with the offence. Tbe prisoner was then ordered to be imprisoned for two calendar months in the Napier gaol with hard labor.