CHARGE OF THEFT

Greymouth Evening Star, 11 February 1947, Page 4

CHARGE OF THEFT

WATERSIDE WORKER AND TYRES COMMITTED FOR TRIAL CHRISTCHURCH, This Day. In the Magistrate’s Court yesterday before Mr. F. F. Reid, S.M., Norman William Waghorn, a waterside worker, aged 37, was charged with receiving on January 10 from a person unknown four motor-car tyres valued at £32, the property of the Railways Department, knowing them to have been dishonestly obtained, and with stealing Hour motor-car tyres valued at £32, the property ol the Railways Department. ' William Cecil Aitken, trains clerk at the goods sheds, Christchurch, produced a rail consignment note for a shipment of six tyres from Dunedin to be forwarded to the Housing Construction Department, Wellington, and railed to Lyttelton on January 7. He had later made an inspection of waggon Zl4, in which the tyres had been placed, and he found that the seals which had been placed on each of the four doors at Christchurch had been broken off. An inspection showed that a number of articles sent in waggon Zl4 were missing, and these included a consignment of tyres. Thomas Finnerty, a barman in a city hotel, said he knew accused, who was a regular customer. Waghorn owed him money, and recently he asked witness to accept four motor tyres in payment of part of the debt. Accused said the tyres were worth £4O. He had agreed to take the tyres, thinking they were the property of the accused. Detective Ronald Stuart Smith said the accused denied giving any tyres to Finnerty, and said he knew nothing about the tyres. He was next confronted with Finnerty. In the course of a conversation concerning money owed to him, Thomas Finnerty said: “You know very well I received the tyres from you,” to which accusd replied: “As a matter of fact, I did give them to him.” Asked where he got the tyres from accused said: “As a matter of fact, I got them from a seaman from an overseas boat. He asked me to put them off for him. I was not going to get much out of it, anyway.” He did not know the seaman.

Waghorn pleaded not guilty to both charges, and was committed to the Supreme Court for trial.