MONEYLENDER ROBBED

Greymouth Evening Star, 8 November 1923, Page 2

MONEYLENDER ROBBED

A CLERGYMAN CHEAT. In London James Corr Dumphy, a retired Chaplin (52), of no fixed abode, was charged on remand with attempting to obtain £5O by false pretences from Francis Byron Fearns financier, Jermyn Street. He was further charged with attempting to obtain that amount without disclosing that he was an undischarged bankrupt, also with obtaining £3O credit, without disclosing that fact from Lionel Beaumont at Regent Street and £3O from Charles Debenham, Ltd., at Duke Street. He pleaded guilty. The prisoner has been defrauding moneylenders in the West End of London for 12 months past, said prosecuting counsel. Applying .for a loan to Mr. Fearns, continued counsel, Dumphy stated that he was* an army chaplain and had a pension of £5OO a year, was a householder, and owed only £3. Dumphy also said that he had never been a bankrupt, that he was going to take up a living under the Bishop of Southwark at Dorking, and was living at the Imperial Hotel, Russel Square. These statements were entirely untrue. Dumphy was an army chaplain for 20 years, and was pensioned in 1921 receiving £350 a year. “Since then he has been living on his pension and his wits,” said counsel. Accused was made a bankrupt in 1912, and had not been discharged. Admitting his guilt, accused urged that he wanted money for his sister and two children, for educational purposes in the case of the latter. “I did not know,” he said, “I was doing anything wrong when I made these statements to the moneylenders. I was not conscious of making statements that were untrue.” A War, Office representative said that Dumphy was chaplain of Netley Hospital. Just previous to his retirement he had to be admitted as a patient suffering from concussion. ® Remarking that he would like to know more about prisoner and to have a doctor’s report, the magistrate remanded the accused.