RUSE THAT FAILED.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVII, Issue 20650, 23 August 1930, Page 2 (Supplement)

RUSE THAT FAILED.

STORY OF AN " AGONY AD."

TRAP SET BY INJURED WIFE. Pronto.—Reconsidered No. 1. Yes, No. 5 and G. Meet Fen. St. 3.29 "Wednesday. Honestly baby. Does Walter Arthur Charles Dieketts, formerly of Southend, says a London newspaper, and now undergoing sentence of 12 months' imprisonment for frauds, know of this little "agony" column trap which tho police set for him ? Tho trap was set at Fenchurch Street station several weeks boforo lie (led the country and was arrested at Salzburg, in Austria. Dieketts ran away with and married a Leigh-on-Sea girl aged 15. One of his gifts to tho girl-wife was a gt.Jd Jockot with his photograph inside. Dieketts' wife saw her husband's photograph and a story about him in a newspaper in May of last year, and it was because of that that she left him at Poolo, Dorset. But before they parted Dieketts, who appearod to have great affection for his wife, suggested that if* she. wanted to got in touch with him sho should do so through tho agony column of a certain London newspaper. Convinced of her husband's roguery, tho girl fell in with the suggestion of tho police, and inserted an "agony" notice, promising forgiveness and inviting Dieketts to meet her at Fenchurch Street. Tho young wife, wearing the loclcot, walked up and down the station for a couple of hours. There were plain clothes officers in the porter's room, and others dotted about muling, newspapers. Was Dieketts thoro laughing up his sleeve 1 No one recognised him if ho was, and so the ruse failed.