FRAUD DISC FACTORY

Greymouth Evening Star, 8 May 1931, Page 9

FRAUD DISC FACTORY

RAID ON SLOT MACHINES. Coiners of discs for operating automatic machines are doing a good business around London. A few weeks ago a man was sentenced for robbing slot machines by means of meta discs, but for one' man caught there are dozens using filed half-pennies, foreign coins, and discs who are not detected. The latest, type of machine is so finely adjusted that it will not respond to any coin other than a shilling 01 a sixpence. To overcome this difficulty counterfeiters have been turning out metal tokens of the right size. There is said to be reason for believing that a factory for manufacturing these counterfeit coins exists somewhere in the East End of London. “We have examples of these discs taken from our machines,” said an official of an automatic machine company,. “They are very cleverly made. They have milled edges, and theii weight is exactly that of a shilling 01 a sixpence. A shopkeeper at Islington recently lost £4 worth of cigarettes in one night through someone working his machine with these dies. Another shopkeeper at Hounslow lost 30/- worth. These milled discs have been found in such quantities that they must be systematically manufactured.”

The wooden automatic machine often installed in hotels and boardinghouses is also “raided.” A 50-centime French coin with a hole in the centre is used. A string is passed through the hole, and the thief thus retains a hold on the coin, which he pushes far enough into the aperture to release the slot.