Crimes Connected

Manawatu Times, Volume 61, Issue 134, 9 June 1936, Page 8

Crimes Connected

CLAIM BY NEW SOUTH WALES POLICE. ASSAULT AND THEFT CASES. United Press Association —By Electric Telegraph.—Copyright. SYDNEY, June 8. There was a startling turn at the week-end to the shooting of Superintendent Brophy, when, as a result of inquiries, t'he police claim to have established that a man involved in the shooting was also one of the bandits who stole a pay-roll at North Fitzroy.

On May 21 a message from Melbourne reported that Superintendent John O’Connell Brophy, who began duty as chief of tho Victorian Criminal Investigation branch a week previously, was shot in tho face and the right arm. An official police statement declared that Mr Brophy went to Royal Park to try to catch some car bandits who have been operating in that locality, and was himself held up by two armed men who apparently recognised him and fired the shots before Mr Brophy could manipulate his own revolver, which jammed. One bullet passed through Mr Brophy ’a lower jaw, just missing a vital artery, and emerged at the back of the neck. Another broke his right wrist, and a third was deflected from his heart by the buckle of nis braces.

On Juno 4 three armed men held up employees of Goold and Porter, Ltd.) boot manufacturers, at North Fitzroy, and robbed them of a pay-roll of £I4OO. The money was being brought from the bank in a delivery van when, within 200 yards of tho factory, three masked men in another car forced the van in to tho kerb, where they compelled the employees to hand over the money. The bandits then disappeared in heavy traffic. The alfair w-as witnessed bv a pedestrian, who described it as one of the neatest and quietest of “jobs.” The factory employees were armed.