DARING FRAUD

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXVI, Issue 158, 19 June 1936, Page 9

DARING FRAUD

Former Bank Clerk Admits Forgery MONEY RECOVERED By Telegraph—Press Association. DUNEDIN, June 18. “The police are entitled to congratulations for their promptitude and skill,’’ stated Mr H. W. Bundle, S.M., .this ‘ morning when James Alexander Fleming, aged 26, a former bank employee, pleaded guilty to two charges of forgery. Fleming was committed for sentence. The case was the sequel to a daring bank fraud on June 6, the accused being charged with forging a bill of exchange on the. Bank of New Zealand at Wellington for £834 .16/8 and also with procuring a young woman to cause the bill to bo acted upon. Alexander Chisholm, toller, gave evidence that at 11.20 a.m. on Juno 6 a woman presented a bill purporting to bo signed by the head of the bills department. The document also bore what purported to be the initials of the bank manager with instructions to cash it. Shortly after the woman left witness became suspicious, and after inquiry reported to the police. A public typiste, whose name was suppressed, stated that on June 4 she received a letter through her letter-box which purported to come from one A. G. Spence. The envelope contained a pencilled letter and a pencilled bill of exchange and a blank bill. Witness’s instructions were to type the letter from the pencilled one, type a blank bill from the pencilled one and forward the completed work to Spence at the Post Office.

Another young woman clerk attending a commercial college stated that on June 5 the director of the college said he had given her name to a person applying for a clerk. Witness’s phone number had been supplied to this person, and later a man calling himself Jenkins phoned her, telling her that she was appointed to the position and was to go to the Post Office for a letter. This she did, receiving papers and instructions to cash a bill of exchange, put the money in an attache case and de I 'ver at the office of Gold Band Taxis with the letter. Witness cashed the bill and followed-her instructions.

Joan Griffin, employed by Gold Band Taxis, said that the previous witness handed in an attache case and a letter, which were given to a taxi-driver to deliver, as the instructions said, to Cavendish Chambers. This he did. The remainder of the evidence concurred with the preliminary statements of the first arrest describing how suspicion fell on the accused, resulting in his arrest some hours later, when £774 was recovered in an attache case and £26 in the accused pockets.