CONFIDENCE MEN BUSY.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXV, Issue 20086, 25 October 1928, Page 17

CONFIDENCE MEN BUSY.

TWO VICTIMS LOSE HEAVILY, NEW ZEALAND FARMER'S £4500. [moil OUR OWN COBJBESPONDENT.I EiONDON, Sept 2L The stories of two people who had been victimised by clever confidence people wcra published in a London paper on September 19. Mr.. James Deason, a New Zealand farmer, who is visiting England, complained to tho London police that confidence tricksters had robbed him of £4500. He mefcfthree men at his hotel and became friendly with them. When, it was discovered that lie was a New Zealand farmer tho men put forward a scheme for the treatment of meat in New Zealand. Mr. De;, son, it is understood, parted with his money for tho purchase of plant and patent rights. I)r. J. H. Morris-Jones, of Colwyn Bay, Denbighshire, has been robbed of £2JOO by a confidence trickster. Dr. Mor-ris-Jones is one of the best-known medical practitioners in the district. Recently ho was called upon by a man who said he wished tho doctor to visit his sick daughter. The confidence trickster, who had polished manners and a plausible tongue, was staying at a big hotel and appeared to bo a person of wealth and position. He made an alluring proposition to tho doctor, who handed over the money. The man lias not since been seen. Several other complaints havo been made in other parts of Hie country concerning tho activities of tho same trickster, who is known to tho police. Tho Evening News remarks"The averago man, well aware that by no effort could ho extract five shillings, let alone thousands of pounds, out of his fellowmeii by any but tho most rigorously honest methods, cannot believe that these plunderings arc sufficiently accounted for bv the Barnumian dictum that there is a sucker born every minute. Neither wo lit by New Zealand farmers nor medical practitioners can be complete mugs. The truth is that confidence trickstering moves with the tiries. Its technique becomes mere perfect. Its exports become still mere adept. "In lawn tennis or flying or chess an exhibition of the game in its most advanced form involves results that seem to us littlo short of miraculous. But tho stroke production of a Cochet is not more as( onishing, more smooth and irresistible, than the spoof-production of a high-grade confidence man. Tho way of a bird man in the air is not more marvellous than the way of a word man in tho loungo of a high-class hotel."-