ALLEGED BREAKING AND ENTERING

Evening Star, Issue 21706, 28 April 1934, Page 14

ALLEGED BREAKING AND ENTERING

EVIDENCE OF FINGER PRINT IDENTIFICATION ! In the Police Court yesterday afternoon Courtney Clarke Pledger was charged with, on Junp 17 last, breaking and entering the dwelling house of John Gebbie with intent 1 to commit a,crime therein, and with, on' July IS V last* breaking and entering the shop of Maxwell M'Kenzie and stealing goods valued at £l2. Maxwell M'Kenzie, a grocer, of Mornington, said that on July 16 he found, that the front door of his shop had been tampered with and back door had •been smashed open. A quantity of goods had been taken,, and 2s 6d in coppers was missing from the till. .Witness identified articles produced in court as having been in his shop. . David Dorie O’Callaghan said that on the night of July 15 his motor cycle was stolen from the shed where he kept it.; As a result he was out that night ,_in ! company with Constable Excell. While he -and the constable were standing near Thomson’s shop at the corner of the Taieri and Kaikorai Valley roads two men approached with sacks on their backs. They hesitated, and then turned’ down Taieri road. When'witness and the constable moved out from - a shadow, the two men ran. Witness followed one and Constable Excell the other. The one whom witness followed dropped his bag, and witness gave it to the constable. Constable Excell said .that the two men were the accused and his cousin, Ernest Pledger. Witness pursued , the accused, who ran up; a right-of-way, dropped his bag, jumped down a bank,, and escaped across a paddock. Witness identified as the contents of the > bag goods • which M'Kenzie had previously, stated were from his shop. A mortice chisel was later found in the right-of-way. • Detective Jenvey said that at 4.30 on . the morning of July 16 he , went to the accused's house! There was no sign of ] the accused, and his. bed had not been slept in. The following day and on July, 20 witness again went to the house, but * could not find the accused.

John Gebbie, a retired hotelkeeper, of Roslyn, raid that. on. June, 18 last he found that a storeroonrattached'to his house had been entered, one of the perforated zinc windows, haying been cut open. The . safe outside, had. been opened and its contents stolen. Attempts bad been made to open other windows arid doors;' Two dozen bottles of ale had been stolen front the storeroom. V

William Kelso Ellis ’ said that the accused called at his .house early: on the evening of June 17, and->was still there when # witness retired between 11 o’clock and 11.30. The accused called next morning, and brought some bottles of “homo brew” ale/ Later Detective Gibson took away the bottles. Constable R. H. Todd, assistant gaoler, Dunedin, gave evidence of having taken the accused’s finger prints and' forwarded them to the Criminal Registration Branch, Wellington. Edmund Walter Dinnie, finger print expert in charge of the Criminal Registration Branch, Wellington, said in June' last he received a parcel of glass from Detective Gibson. On this glass he found useful finger prints. On April 18 he, received impressions of ' finger pfirits : 'produced twenty’-points of sittfilarity. Witness was perfectly satisfied that the pfirits tverfe idelttical and that the same person left the two sets of prints. ' ' ' „ , The hearing of-evidence was_then adjourned until Friday; n®xt. Bail was re* fused. ■ ■ . , .