ALLEGED SHEEP-STEALING CASE.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CIII, Issue 12243, 2 July 1900, Page 6

ALLEGED SHEEP-STEALING CASE.

At Timaru on Saturday, E. Mills and T. Millington were charged with having stolen ninety-seven sheep, the property ■of W. Pringle. Evidence was given that Mills and. another man were seen driving towards Mr Fitzgerald’s • farm, on, the Levels, at about 9.30 o’clock on the night that the sheep are supposed,to have 'been stolen. At about midnight, according to one. witness, two men drove about ninety-seven, sheep to- ■ wards’- Mills’s Bouse. -The witness who made 1 this statement did : not recognise the men, but stated that the'horse in the cart was similar to the description of Mills’s horse. Early next morning, according to the evidence, Mills trucked the two lots of the sheep at Washdyke, and was assisted by someone who was not identified. Millington, however, drove away with Mills after the sheep had been loaded and consigned. Mills wired and wrote to Messrs Matson and Co. about the sheep, and a few days later, as the sheep had mot all been sold, Millington went to Christchurch and saw Messrs Matson and Co.’s auctioneer, and told him that he was as much interested in the sheep as' was Mills, and urged that the balance should he sold at once privately, instead of being held over until the nest sale, but this was not done. Millington received a letter from Mills, who authorised, the former to act for him.. This letter Millington forgot to take with him, and it was posted to him at Christchurch by his wife.; It arrived too late-, however, and fell into .the bauds of the police. A .cheque had been sen*, to Mills for those.sheep that had been sold, but pavment was -stopped. ..The accused reserved their defence, and they were c/ommitted for trial at the Supreme Court. Bail was allowed. -