CHASE IN TUBE

Evening Star, Issue 25678, 29 December 1945, Page 4

CHASE IN TUBE

SYDNEY LAD WITH MACHINE GUN ESCAPEE FROM DETENTION HOME SYDNEY, Dec. 28. Found with an Austen sub-machine gun in his possession, a 13-year-old boy risked his life by leaping on to the underground railway line at the Town Hall Station in the city and hiding from the police in the tunnel. Fortunately, trains were running at long intervals at the time, and the police who entered the tunnel captured the boy before a train came along. , His arrest unfolded an amazing escapade by the lad and a 13-year-old companion since their escape from a detention home about 100 miles from Sydney last Monday. They hitch-hiked to the city, broke into a suburban public school, and took two Austen sub-machine guns. Thus armed, they went to another suburb at the extreme other end of the city, and broke into a public school, a jeweller's shop, and a small goods shop, stealing jewellery and a large quantity of soft drinks and biscuits on which they lived. They spent the nights in railway carnages. The guns were carried in sacks. • Yesterday the boys separated, and one gave himself up at the City Children's Shelter. He told the police that •he had hidden his gun in the bush. The second boy came to the. city and wandered about with the gun in a sack. Early this morning a Royal Navy officer sat beside the boy on the Town Hall Station. The officer thought the bov had a sub-machine gun m the sack, and he and another man grabbed the boy and began to take him to a police station. The boy broke free, raced down the station steps and jumped on to the railway line. He was found 'crouching in the dark about 400 yards from the Town Hall Station.