BREAKING AND ENTERING CHARGE

Evening Star, Issue 21316, 21 January 1933, Page 16

BREAKING AND ENTERING CHARGE

ACCUSED COMMITTED FOR TRIAL At the Police Court yesterday afternoon Reginal Merton Semb, for whom Mr C. J. L. White appeared, was charged with having by day entered the warehouse of the Godwin Hosiery Company and stolen hosiery valued at £7O. Charles Godwin, manager of the complainant firm, said that about 12.15 p.m. on Saturday, November 26, he left his premises securely locked. On returning on the following Monday morning he found that a hole had been broken in a partition between his premises and an adjoining building, and an examination of the warehouse revealed that a quantity of stockings in an unfinished condition was missing. The articles produced in court were similar to those that were missing. August Ullrich, a railway guard, stated that on November 29 he was in charge of the Invercargill-Lyttelton express from Waianakarua onward. He recollected that after the train left Timaru he had had a conversation with the accused, who said that there were two suit cases bearing the name of H. through to Lyttelton. These belonged Compton in the van which were booked to hmi, and he wished them removed at Christchurch. John Simpson, licensee of the Rugby Hotel, Dunedin, gave evidence that the accused had stayed at his hotel from November 19 to November 29 of last year. Detective M'Clung, of Christchurch, related details of a search of a house in Christchurch occupied by the accused and of the finding of several pairs of socks and stockings. The accused denied, when questioned, that he knew anything of the robbery at the Godwin Company’s premises. On December 12 witness found in a section the two suit cases produced, one of which contained five pairs o fladies’ stockings. Detective Turgis gave evidence of a conversation with the accused regarding two suit cases. The accused pleaded not guilty, and was comniitted to the Supreme Court for triglj[„.,