Girl Vanishes

Manawatu Times, Volume 64, Issue 95, 24 April 1939, Page 12

Girl Vanishes

CHEQUES SENT TO POLICE SYDNEY, April 14. Mysterious telephone calls and an anonymous letter accompanying returned cheques have added to the puzzle surrounding the disappearance on April S of a Sydney girl, Miss Kathleen Claughessy, daughter of a Balmain (Sydney) hotelkeeper. She had more than £IOO when sho left home, and her parents fear for her safety. The police, however, consider that sho is unharmed. Miss Claughessy was sent by her father last Saturday with the money to a city bank, the fact that the banks were closed over the Easter holidays having been overlooked. She alighted from a taxi outside the bank and has not been seen since. Four days later tlie Balmain police received a paekago containing cheques to the value of £35, which were included in the money taken to tho bank by Miss Claughessy. Accompanying the cheques was au unsigned note, printed in block letters, stating that the girl was alivo and well and concluding: “CalL off tho police.” Tlie block letters defied identification. Tho package was posted in a city pillar-box. On the same day a telephone message was received at a Sydney newspaper office from a yuan who refused to give his name and address. “I want you to tell Miss Claughessy’s parents not to worry, as everything is 0.K.,” he said, aiding that he had been a friend of Miss Claughessy for two years. Asked where the girl was, the man said: “She might be in Australia and she might not be. I will bet £SOOO the police will not find her, because I am the only person who knows where sho is,” he said. “She has some money with her. ’ ’

The man said ho aid not intend to inform tho police of the girl’s whereabouts, and added that ho was only a go-between and could not tell more because ho had to keep a promise. The police think the call, which they failed to trace, was made by a practical joker. They havo received other calls which have been proved hoaxes. The parents fear the message suggests that the girl is being detained against her will.