MAID TAKEN TO DANCE

Greymouth Evening Star, 13 June 1936, Page 9

MAID TAKEN TO DANCE

£lO,OOO JEWELLERY THEFT

LONDON, May 2. ; The keys to Priscilla Countess Annesicy’s flat in Eccleston-square, S.W. were obtained when a maidservant was invited to a dance and her handbag searched, it was alleged at Sutton, Surrey, yesterday. John Shorter, 32, clerk, of Camdensquare, St. Pancras, and John James, 30, clerk, of Cambridge-terrace, Paddington and Hilda Margaret Colles, 32, St. David’s Hotel, Cartwright-gardens, W.C., were charged on remand with breaking into the flat on March 12, and stealing jewellery valued at £2,500.

James and Shorter were also charged with breaking into a house at Banstead. and a new charge of breaking into a suite at the Hotel Metropole, London, and stealing jewellery valued at £7,500, the property of Mrs. Montague Salmon, was brought against Janies. Israel Farra, 40, a club manager, of Carlton-mansions, Tottenham Court, road, was charged with receiving a bracelet and some cutlery, and Shorter was further charged with possessing housebreaking implements. Det. Insp. White, of Scotland Yard, said he found some of the missing property at premises occupied by Farra, Shorter and James. When told ornaments were found in a suitcase, James put his head in his hands and said:

“That has done it. For God’s sake don’t let my father know. He has no idea of what I have been doing.”

The inspector added that later James made a long statement which referred to the Banstead and Eccles-ton-square robberies. The statement added that Shorter, Colles and himself arranged to take a Miss Ethel Hope, a maid employed by Countess Annesley, to a dance at Streatham. Then they took the keys out of her

handbag while she was dancing. Collies left the dance hall, but returned in i time to put the keys back. | Mr. McClure, who prosecuted, dealling with the £7,500 robbery, said James had made a statement that he I took two rooms at the Hotel Metropole and was given some keys from which he was able to get a set of master keys. He rang up Mrs. Salmon on November 10 and heard she was out. The jewellery was later missed from a cupboard in the bathroom. Shorter, James and Colles were remanded in custory. Farra’s bail of £5O was continued.