WAIKERIA ESCAPE

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 23047, 26 May 1938, Page 12

WAIKERIA ESCAPE

DASH BY PRISONEB CONVERSION OF MOTOR-Cftf POLICE IN HOT PURSUIT I SMART RECAPTURE MADE [by telegraph—own correspondent} TE KUrn, Wednesday Smart work by the Te Kuiti police to-day resulted in the recapture of a prisoner a few hours after he had escaped from the Waikeria prison camp. The prisoner was Robert .John Mann, aged 21, who was serving a sentence for unlawfully converting a motor-car at Whangarei.

Mann escaped from the prison camp about 10 o'clock this morning trhila working in a potato field. News of bis escape was received by the police, and soon after came word that an Otorohanga resident, Mr. Norman Syrnes, had missed his motor-car. after lea Ting it unattended for only a few minutes. When the car passed through Te Kuiti, Constable C. O'Brien recognised the stolen vehicle and gave chase over the Awakino Hill. Seeing that he was being followed, Mann cut down Goulds Road, a by-road two miles south of Te Kuiti. After going along it soma distance the prisoner abandoned the car and took to the rough country. Police reinforcements arrived and a search was begun. After an hour and a-half Mann was found crouching in some blackberry bushes. Mann submitted quietly to arrest and was brought to Te Kuiti, where he wai charged with escaping from lawful custody and with the unlawful conversion of Mr. Symes' car. On the application of Sergeant Campangnolo, the prisoner was remanded for a week.