NOTORIOUS THIEF

Evening Star, Issue 23725, 5 November 1940, Page 3

NOTORIOUS THIEF

WOMAN SMUGGLED TO ENGLAND Alleged to be one of the cleverest women pickpockets in Europe and an associate of a notorious gang of Continental thieves, petite Bennie Fenigstein, aged 35, was sentenced by the deputy chairman of the London Sessions, Mr A. W. Cockburn, E.C., to 12 months’ imprisonment on a charge _ of being an incorrigible rogue loitering with intent. It was revealed by Detective-ser-geant A. Hearn that Fenigstein was born in Warsaw and, according to her own story, she was smuggled' to England just before the outbreak of war. She declined, however, to say at which

port she landed, or to give the name of the ship which was supposed to have brought her. It was stated that she was well known to the police in Warsaw, Pans, and Brussels and she has twice been convicted in England.

Fenigstein was shadowed in Stepney by two police officers who saw her make several attempts, to steal from the baskets and handbags of shoppers. When arrested, two rings, a watch, a necklet, and a bracelet, which the police believe to be the proceeds of a burglary at Dorking last September, were found in her possession. Fenigstein’s explanation was that she bought the rings in Poland years ago. The bracelet, from which hung five golden sovereigns, and the watch she said were given to her in Poland, and she had worn the necklet since she was 13.

'The judge refused the request of he* counsel for permission to retain th« jewellery. - •' When asked how a woman of this character had been able to land .in Britain and what was her mode of Jiving, Detective-sergeant -Hearn -stated that the police had only her word for' it that she had been smuggled fron* Belgium as a stowaway* ■ She told the police she had an income of £5 a week from a brother and a sister, who were living in Paris up to the time of the German occupation,,; but there was no confirmation of thifc*