JUVENILE CRIMINAL.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LI, Issue 15664, 18 July 1914, Page 7

JUVENILE CRIMINAL.

ROBS BLIND MAN OF £20. A SERIES OF FORGERIES. Displaying in his character criminal tan dcncics which might be expected only in an old and hardened offender, a fifteen-year-old boy came before- Mr. F. V. Frazer. S.M., in the Juvenile Court yesterday on a charge of obtaining about £20 by false pretences. The boy pleaded guilty. It appeared from the evidence that tho lad came from Christc.luirch, where he had been acting as an attendant upon a blind organ-grinder named Pete. When in Christchurch Pete was robbed of £600 by some men. Subsequently the accused .'.aid Pete came to Auckland, and then theaccused started a systematic leries i>{ frauds upon the blind organ-grinder. He told Pete that he was on ihc track of the man who stole the £,ouo. This man, he said, had died of leprosy en his way to Sydney, but had revealed to two companions before his death tho whereabouts of the stolen money. Tho accused forged a number of letters, parporting to be signed by various detectives. These he read to the blind man and obtained from him various sums of raom-v, jtj the total of about £20. for the purpi-so lof furthering inquiries about the stolen i money. ! Some of the letters the accused had had ! typewritten for him, and, in answer to an I observation from the magistrate, the chief j detective said that inquiries were being made about the typist, who had written lie letters for the boy. The accused, it was said, came from a criminal stock, all his brothers having I been in trouble. With some of the money ihe had obtained he had purchased a I rovolver and ammunition. ■ His Worship committed the accused t« Burflham Industrial School, remarking that such highly developed criminality in i an adult would mean a sentence of five I years in gaol.