FRAUD CASE RECALLED.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLVII, Issue 220, 15 August 1927, Page 11

FRAUD CASE RECALLED.

APPEAL BY BANK OFFICER

PROTEST AGAINST FINE

SUPREME COURT PROCEEDINGS

Praying that a mandamus shall be issued to the Post and Telegraph Appeal Board, directing it to consider liis appeal, on© of the postal officers disciplined after the Baume case, has instituted proceedings in ■ the Supreme Court in AVellington. In his affidavit, the officer sets forth the facts of the case in which Sidney Erne Baume and William Smith were found guilty of fraudulently obtaining £lllO from the Post Office Savings Bank, for which they were sentenced to imprisonment. On October 31, 1925, Smith lodged a cheque drawn on Ins account with the Bank of New Zealand, Invercargill, fox - £SO. With this cheque the plaintiff states he dealt in the manner prescribed in tile regulations, entering it in the deposit book and enlacing the deposit 6lip “Invercargill cheque.” The same practice was adopted by another officer in dealing with a cheque for £4OO which Smith lodged on October 31. On November 2 Smith withdrew £lO, the ledger clerk, it is alleged, failing to notice that the cheque had not been cleared. Later tho same day. Smith withdrew £350, the. ledger clerk passing the withdrawal slip. About November 2, also, Smith paid in an undated Invercargill cheque for £2OOO, which was received by another officer, who lrad not noticed that it was undated, and it was posted in the ledger by the latter clerk. Smith then withdrew £750, and on November 6 all the cheques were returned from Invercai--gill marked “No account.” The plaintiff had been fined £lO by the secretary of the Post Office for accepting a post-dated cheque on October 31. Of the £lllO obtained by Baume and Smith, £1026 had been recovered and various other officers of the department had been fined amounts which, with the £lO mentioned, made up the difference of £B4. Plaintiff states that he lodged an appeal with the secretary of the Post and Telegraph Appeal Board against the fine, but that he was informed that he was not able to appeal.