A Sham Heiress.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 5191, 11 April 1888, Page 3

A Sham Heiress.

EXTRAORDINARY FRAUDS BY A YOUNG WOMAN.

At Bolton Police Court on Jan 2t», a most extraordinary case of fraud was beard, a vounir married woman named Margaret Annie Prince being charged with obtaining over .-2000 from various people in Boltou and district on the statement that sue was about to inherit the enormous sunt of £" 000,000, and required the temporary loan of small sums for Government duty. There were a large number of cases, but only eight were particularised in the charge, 0 f which three were gono into. Iho proceedings occupied the attention of the Court for over four hours. Ihe representative of the Public Prosecutor H„d that the prisoners system was to Persuade her dupes that sho only wanted the money for a low days until her fortune came, and promised as much as £O0 000 for tho loan of £S. In one case a were promised for the Man of £600. -the prisoner, who drove about, iv a hired camSTito represented that she had dined with the Duke of Builm-l, Mr Gladstone, and other eminent p. v- , ,s- f s. Her stones were actually belicv- d. a;, \ money was lent Z her freely. Wh-n ■".•.■>.:.»* were raised, lUte i a r-ligious strain, and told her fupcTto cast tbeii- doubte on Jesus. The P „t -mnea-ed to have been spent in extraXS Eg on* driving about. Sophia Knowles, a washerwoman, said the prisoner bTdohtainedullhcr savings, and induced her to horrow money. Witness was now £ f £ " * Set STfe SSSSn,_ ___£%*»*» Sedb„r,h, from wiiom tho letters put in pur- \ nortod to come, was his sister, but tho writing was not hers. The accused might _f iSght not be bis niece. A woman named Fish paid the prisoner had spent aboutiLlOO in her company on enjoyment. She Mompauied her to Sedbergh, where the Xp««<l aunt refused to see her. WitnU then found out that the prisoner was untruthful, us *h« had __prc*ciited *i Tnl.rp'is'i "Timd mansiou at. which theVuko n of' Rutland, tho Bishops of Xford and Lichfield, and other nomblc _ „ rioted whereas it was only an personages t ordinary J? n^ SOl)er hild paid him Davenport saiu pus""*-* i nearly £205 iv a tow months, hut she lad borrowed £70 from hnu since. Another witness stated that the prisoner told her she bad visited Mr Gladstone at Hawaraen, and that her family had stayed with tho Duke of Rutland. Tbe prisoner was committed for trial at the assizes.