"EGREGIOUS FOLLY."

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 11950, 26 April 1902, Page 2 (Supplement)

"EGREGIOUS FOLLY."

HOW A BLACKMAILER'S THREATS ' SUCCEEDED. A PEW days ago a well-deserved sentence of ten years' penal servitude was passed upon a blackmailer at Lewes Assizes. The prosecutor was Thomas Augustus Goodman, a well-known Brighton solicitor, who for the past twenty-seven" years has been clerk to the Hove magistrates. He occupies a drawing-room tint at 8. Queen Square, and it was stated that the accused—a commission agent named Timothy Horgau, sixty-two years of age—had for three years lived in the same building. By some means he became possessed of some letters belonging to the prosecutor, and on December 18, while Mr. Goodman and a friend were dining together, Horgau rushed into the room and made certain grave accusations against the prosecutor, professing to base them on extracts from the letters. Goodman staled that he was so unnerved by the accusations and the dread of being involved in a terrible public scandal, that he agreed to Horgan's terms, which were a cheque for £500, and. agreements to pay £250 in six months and £200 a year for four years. These demands were enforced at the point of a ruler, with which Horgan threatened to knock out Goodman's brains. Next day. however, Goodman communicated with Scotland Yard. He gave a most emphatic denial to the charges made by the accused. Corroborative evidence was given. The prisoner declared that the money was given him voluntarily, though he admitted stealing the letters. In passing sentence Mr. Justice Grantham said that, putting aside Goodman's egregious folly, there was nothing against him but the word of a diabolical thief. There was not a syllable in the letters of which anyone need lip ashamed.