HOW WOMEN LOSE THEIR JEWELS

Evening Star, Issue 18852, 29 January 1925, Page 6

HOW WOMEN LOSE THEIR JEWELS

UNINGENIOUS HIDING PLACES. Recent activities of British thieves who penalise- in raiding bedrooms while the occupants of the house are at dinner call attention to the general carelessness of which tiie owners of valuables me guilty. v i, average woman thinks she lias ex* versed the maximum of care if she relocks her jewel iTi.se after taking out tlio articles iequircd for immediate adorn* ii,cut. Others, a little more cautions, taka the precaution of hiding the jewel rasa or tnc valuables therefrom in some, receptacle in the bedroom. But the trouble i* they have no originality. Amazing though it may seem, it has been com* puTcd tli.it seventy-five out of every 100 women have the same idea of what con* stitutes a safe place--a little matter of psychology with which thieves are thoroughly familiar. Detectives declare that most women invariably place their jewellery in the top right..hand drawer of their dressing table or chest. If not there, then they conceal it, in t.he lingerie or linen in one of Ilia oilier drawers or m one of half a dozen places where an experienced thief immediately l<.oks, such as the linen basket, under* rugs, behind pictures or pillows, under the mattress of the bed. or undcl the paper which usually lines the drawers of the dressing chest. )lt will generally be found that if • thief lias not discovered the booty ready to his hand all these places have been searched.

The criminal is cunning as well M daring. If he finds a locked jewel case the expert does not crudely force it open, but uses skeleton keys, and then carefully relocks the case so that suspicion shad not be immediately aroused; maybe tba theft will not be detected for days, by which time all clues will be cold. There is a case on record where 4 woman’s house was robbed, but the owner was confident that her jewels were safe because the drawer in which they were kept and of which she had lost the key some days before, had not been forced. A wis# detective, however, thought otherwise., end insisted on the drawer being broken open. His suspicions were correct; the jewels were gone, the thief having relocked the drawer with his skeleton key after appropriating all he required. These lightning raiders would have little chance of making rich hauls if women, as their husbands in business, would use safes in which to store theif valuables. Even a little wall safe Ls better than nothing for it, like its biggef fellow, requires time to *’ crack.” ana time is the one thing this kind of burglar cannot spare when all his work has to be done between the soup and the sa3ciy. —” F.C.,” in the 4 Daily Mail