THE CONSPIRATORS.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 8 December 1924, Page 5

THE CONSPIRATORS.

' HOBBS AT BOW STREET. REMANDED FOR A WEEK, BAIL REFUSED. BY CABLE—PRESS ASSOCIATION—COPXRIGHT. LONDON, Dec. 6. William Hobbs, a solicitor’s clerk and a witness in the Midland Bank case, who was detained at the close of the trial and charged under the Larceny Act with receiving a banker’s cheque for the payment of £150,000, which cheque was stolen from abroad, reappeared today on remand at Bow Street. Extraordinary public interest was manifested in the case, a queue, composed largely of well-dressed women, forming hours before the opening of the court. Sir E. Marshall-Hall to-day defended Hobbs, and Mr. Roland Oliver, who was one of the junior counsel for the bank in'the Robinson case, appeared on behalf of the Director of Public Prosecutions. Mr. Oliver merely called evidence connecting Hobbs with the receipt of the bank notes and the proceeds of the cheque. He said he hoped to make substantial progress by December 13, but nobody knew whether or when' Sir Hari Singh’s aide-de-camp (Captain Charles Arthur) would be extradited from Paris. Hobbs was remanded till December 13, bail being refused. The Daily Herald says that, despite statements in other newspapers, Sir Hari Singh has already reached Europe. It repeats that he is still on board ship, and will arrive in England just before Christmas. He will give evidence against Hobbs and others. The Herald adds that the authorities made every effort to conceal the fact that Sir Hari Singh was en route to England, and the steamship company was instructed to withhold information. The Director of Public Prosecutions and Scotland Yard officers again held a prolonged consultation with reference to the cases. At the hearing of th© charges against Hobbs, hank officials gave evidence that an account was opened at the Kingsway branch of the Midland Bank on January 5, 1920, to the credit of C. Robinson, with a cheque for .£150,000. On the following day £130.000 in £1000: notes was withdrawn, and the balance was subsequently drawn by cheques. An official of the Paris branch of the Anglo-South American Bank said Arthur accompanied Newton on January 8. 1920, and opened an account with 120 £IOOO notes. He could not say which man handed them in. They produced the notes jointly. -Hobbs and Newton took the bank official to lunch and afterwards returned to the. bank, where they interviewed the manager, who suggested .an investment in defence national© and rentes. While at lunch Newton .said' that Hobbs was a retired; solicitor. Hobbs signed a specimen signiture card as an accountant. The official produced a letter signed by Hobbs, authorising an investment as advised. The chief accountant of the AngloSnnth American Bank stated that £40,000 worth of rentes was transferred n-nm Hobbs to Arthur on Febvuarv 6. 1920. Arthur’s stock account showed that, he disposed of the rentes in November. 1921. ' Sir -E. Marshall-Hall said be bad never been in a case before a magistrate when, he bad fewer instructions. The magistrate, in refusing bail, said h« could not forget that Hobbs was caught leaving the country with a large sum of money. '