THIEVES RIFLE MAILS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume L, Issue 15482, 13 December 1913, Page 8

THIEVES RIFLE MAILS.

TAUMARUNUI SENSATION. FIVE BAGS TAKEN AWAY. REGISTERED LETTERS OPENED. NO ESTIMATE OF LOSSES. Five bags of mail matter were removed from tho Taumarunui Post Office during the early hours of yesterday morning and their contents searched for valuables. Registered letters were opened, and presumably negotiable matter was appropriated, though cheques and other identifiable contents were discarded. Tho stolei mail matter was addressed to Wellington and was to have been despatched south at 4 a.m. Tho robbery must havo occurred between that hour and midnight, tho only period in which tho post office at Taumarunui has a respite from the work in connection with the mail trains which pass through tho town at night. Though the postmaster (Mr. James Thome) resides in tho post office, ho did not hear anyone moving in the mailroom after the departure of the night assists at midnight until ho was awakened shortly bofor four o'clock and informed that the bags were missing. Tho police were immediately summoned, and after a search found til© bags in different parte of the town. Some of mem had apparently been opened in tho post oniee, as envelopes of registered lettors were scattered about tho mailroom, Some of the bags were actually taken to a spot behind the police station and their contents examined Many letters which were not registered were opened. The value of the registered articles stolen cannot be estimated, as the postal officials have no information re£e,d A Collleuls of the o trusted to them.