THREE TONS OF GOODS

Evening Star, Issue 22956, 13 May 1938, Page 14

THREE TONS OF GOODS

THEFTS OVER THREE YEARS . NINE MEN AND A WOMAN INVOLVED [Peh United Press Association.] CHRISTCHURCH, May 12. “These cases disclose a system of wholesale thieving and receiving in the city over a period of three'years,” said Detective Sergeant T. E. Holmes in the Magistrate’s Court, when nine men and one woman appeared on theft and receiving charges. A search of premises in the city had revealed stolen property valued at £1164 6s 6d, he said, and this had been identified by six large city firms by which most of the men charged were employed. < “ The assortment of property, including half a ton of drapery and some bulky hardware and ironmongery, is undoubtedly the largest this court has seen for some time,” he continued. “Altogether there is more than three , tons of goods, and it is clear that the courtroom could not hold it all. At one time the men all worked in one centre and the goods went to a common receiver. The employees had had up. to 24 years’ service with their firms.”

Six of the men charged with theft, one of whom faced a receiving charge in addition, entered pleas of guilty and were committed to the Supreme Court for sentence. The man against whom eight charges of receiving were preferred also pleaded guilty and was committed for sentence. One man was remanded until Monday, and the case against the woman was adjourned until next Thursday. The men accused of theft —John Searle, Herbert Arthur Currie, Tom Hazard, Harold Thomas Stringer, Rawei Arthur Wilkinson, Harold Herbert Stackhouse, and Herbert Francis Hempenstall—gave evidence of the handling of the goods when the receiving charges against Hugh Lowther were heard. Detective Cunningham, who arrested Lowther, and Detectives Watt and Burns read statements relating to the charges in which Lowther said he had bought the goods from the other men, knowing most of them to, have been stolen. Lowther also accepted full responsibility for the goods recovered from premises other than his own, saying that they had been ■ put there at his instructions. Lowther was granted bail in his own recognisance of £IOOO and two sureties of £IOOO each. For Searle, bail was fixed at self £2OO and one surety of £2OO. In each of the other cases the accused were granted renewal of bail in self £IOO and one surety of £IOO. All were ordered to report daily to the police.