VALUELESS CHEQUES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume L, Issue 15482, 13 December 1913, Page 2 (Supplement)

VALUELESS CHEQUES.

"FOR THE SAKE OF MY CHILDREN." " What I have done I have done for the sake of my children. I have tried hard to make money, but failed. It is other people's fault that this has occurred, and they ought to suffer." These were the words, followed by a plea of not guilty, of Jean Hart, a married woman living apart from her husband at a furnished flat in Hyde Park Mansions, who was charged at Marylebone recently with obtaining goods and money to the total of £81 6s 6d by means of worthless cheques. Mr. G. 11. Brookes, prosecuting, stated that last June accused took a flat at the Lauderdale Residential Club at four guineas a week, representing herself as Mrs. Darling, wife of Captain Darling, of the Dragoons. The following month she went to Brighton, leaving her maid and her children behind, and by the time she returned she owed an account of £42 3s 9d. She then gave notice to leave, and left on August 9, after giving the manageress of the club a cheque for £50 in payment of the account, which cheque was subsequently dishonoured. In July, proceeded counsel, someone engaged a room at a boardinghouse in Mortimer Street for one night, and on that night a woman, who represented herself as the prisoner's maid, called there and took away two parcels of goods to the value of about £37. which the prisoner had ordered at two West End shops. The prisoner gave the maid two cheques to pay for the goods, and in each instance the cheque was returned. Then in August, it was alleged, the prisoner called at an establishment in Bond Street. giving the name of Mrs. Duckworth and an address in St. John's Wood, and ordered goods to the value of £41. Again she gave a cheque in payment, and again the cheque was dishonoured. A remand was ordered.