CHARGES OF PILLAGE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LI, Issue 1509, 16 January 1914, Page 8

CHARGES OF PILLAGE.

THEFT OF CARGO.

WATERSIDERS ARRESTED.

INGENIOUS HIDING PLACES.

Five waterside workers were arrested by Detective Gourlay yesterday on charges of cargo broaching. During the unloading operations of the Tyser liner Star of Ireland, which arrived in Auckland from New York via Capetown and Brisbane on the night of January 2, complaints were received by the police that a case containing hair-clipping machines had been tampered with, and 52 pairs of the clippers stolen. Six men were engaged in the hold in which this case was stored, and they accordingly fell under suspicion. The case was taken up by Detective Gourlay, with the result that after interviewing the men who had been working in that particular hold he arrested five of them yesterday. One of the six men, it was ascertained, was innocent of the theft. One was a member of the old waterside workers' union, and the other four men belong to the new union. All are young men, with the exception of one, who is a married man with a fairly large family. The men who were arrested were all found to have some of the missing cargo in their possession, and they had evidently taken pains to hide the fact. A search of the premises occupied by one man revealed two pairs of clippers hidden under the wash-house, while another pair was found in a hedge between the garden and the lawn in another man's residence. Another pair was found in a pipe under the house occupied by a third man, while the other two men each had a pair in their respective dwellings. It is thought that the case, which was burst open when it arrived at Auckland, was tampered with, and some of its contents abstracted before it reached here. The officials for the new Watersider Workers' Union were extremely sorry to find that some of their members had fallen under suspicion, but nevertheless rendered all the aid in their power to the police. All the accused were arrested by Detective Gourlay in one day, notwithstanding the fact that they lived in various parts of the suburbs at Onehunga, one at Dovonport, another at Stanley Bay, and the other two out of the city." Detective Gourlay added another arrest to his total when searching for the alleged pillagers. In October last a private information of alleged assault was laid against a man, who immediately disappeared. When making inquiries about the wharf yesterday relative to the Star of Ireland case. Detective Gourlay saw a man answering the description of the individual who was wanted, and a short interview proved him to be the man. He was accordingly arrested. All the six men arrested by Detective Gourlay will appear at the Police Court this morning.