JEKYLL AND HYDE PARSON.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIX, Issue 18173, 19 August 1922, Page 2 (Supplement)

JEKYLL AND HYDE PARSON.

■ , _ <»- , ' LIVING BY HIS WITS. MONEY FROM WOMEN VICTIMS. A clergyman of 60, who appeared in the dock in clerical attire and wearing goldrimmed eyeglasses, was sentenced at the Old Bailey, London, recently, to nine month's imprisonment hv the second division. Accused was described as a "clerk in Holy orders/' and his name was given *is Evelyn Lopresti, alias Talbot and Arpad. It was stated that under pressure of his bishop he resigned a living in 1913 and since then had " lived by his wits." The charge against him, to which he pleaded guilty, was that of obtaining three sams, amounting to £662, without disclosing that he was an undischarged bankrupt. Mr. Eustace Fulton, who prosecuted, said Lopresti was made bankrupt in 1913. In February, 1918, he went to stay at a laotel in Lancaster Gate, giving the name of the Rev. Erie Talbot, and,that of a woman who went with him —woo was not his wife—as Mrs. Talbot. He left the hotel owing £299 6s. 6d. Next he went to lodge with a Misis Miller, giving the names of the Rev. Evelyn and Sirs. Talbot. He left owing over £74. He also borrowed £289 from Mr. Hodgson, a fellow clergyman. '. Counsel read a letter Lopresti,wrote to Mr. Hodgson, in which he said the settlement of his affairs had been delayed, and asketf for a loan. He wrote :—" lam to be inducted into a benefice. ~ . ._ .'■-. I am taking the name, of Talbot, as I inherit some property later on, and that is

one of the conditions. . . . I am in my 60th year, so please help me. The benefice is a rectory, worth about £480 a year." * These statements were entirely untrue, said Mr. Fulton., Counsel added that Lopresti had to resign a living owing to his relations with a nurse. At Dorking, where he registered an illegitimate child, he took the name of the Row. Evelyn Arpad, Baying that the nurse was his wife. After about two months he deserted the woman. A police officer said Lopresti's wife was still living. " He appears to have lived a Jekyll and; Hyde existence," the officer said, " living first with his wife and then with another woman. He is a specious rogue and liar:" He had been rector of Racton, Emsworth, near- Chichester. Between 1917 and 1918, witness added, Lopresti obtained from a woman relative about £2850, In 1919 h> obtained £38 from another woman, and, in the case of, Mr. Hodgson, the sum (£289) represented his life savings.