THE ALBION ASSURANCE FRAUDS.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 5420, 10 August 1878, Page 1 (Supplement)

THE ALBION ASSURANCE FRAUDS.

(From the Daily Tdeynph, June 10.) Seldom, even iu those days of gigantic frauds, Ims a more heartless series of swindles been brought to light than those exposed in the course of the Albion Life Assurance case, which was concluded , on Saturday. And never, heavy though the term of five years’ penal servitude may appear, has a sentence been more thoroughly merited by gross dishonesty than that pronounced by Mr. Justice Hawkins upon the prisoners Wood, Northcott, and‘ Thompson. Found guilty, after a long and patient investigation, of conspiracy and obtaining money by false pretences, they have been condemed to a severe and, it is to ,'ne hoped, salutary and deterring punishment. But the obloquy attaching to them on account of the offences for which they have been condemned will long be borne in mind, owiugtothe peculiar circumstances underwhioh these frauds were committed. To obtain money by false and fraudulent pretences is at all times* a grave and often a cruel offence—grave when the persons defrauded are rich or well-to-do, cruel and heartless when they are poor. When, however, we find a party of men conspiring to take advantage of those temporarily embarrassed, and, therefore, doubly in need, and deliberately'planning, under pretence of aiding, to rob them of what little they may possess, words almost fail to describe iu adequate terms the depravity implied iu such a course of proceeding. And this is what the convicted prisoners in the present case have indisputably done. Two of them—Wood and William Shaw—opened and conducted sham loan offices, offering to lend, upon apparently easy terms, money to those requiring it. One of the conditions under which the loan was promised was that the intending borrower should insure his life iu an office named, which invariably turned out to be the Albion Assurance Company, of which, again, Thompson was director, and Northcott manager and secretary. The borrower, urged by necessity and prompted by hopes of an advance, generally agreed to insure. The modus operandi is thus easily understood. The first year’s premium having been paid to the insurance office, the unfortunate dupe was then informed that tire money could not be lent, and there was an end of the matter as far as he was concerned. His premium went one-half to the two gentlemen conducting the loan office, and the other moiety to those who undertook the management of the insurance part of the fraud. It need hardly, of coitrse, bo said that the insurance was as great ■ a sham as the loan office. Few of those defrauded felt inclined to achieve the notoriety incurred in exposing the swindle, partly from a feeling of shame and dislike to provoke comment upon their folly, while others, from motives which we can more readily excuse, objected to making public the circumstances,that had induced or compelled them to apply to the prisoners. As'a result tile swindle throve amazingly, as may be judged from the fact that the Albion insured lives to the extent of two million pounds, and that Wood, uuder various aliases, received, according to the books, commissions amounting to upwards of ten thousand pounds, showing that, at tho very least and lowest calculation, more than double this amount must have been got out of the pockets of necessitous peapie who had gone to him for loans, and been persuaded or induced to insure at the Albion Office in the hope and expectation of getting the advance they sought. Fpr the exposure of these shameful frauds, and tho punishment of their originators, the public have to thank the Ksv. Mr. Jex-Blake, who had the moral courage to come forward, notwithstanding.! natural disinclination readily understood, and show up in a Court of Law the practices carried on by the prisoners. In 1874 this gentleman was rector of Great Dunham in Norfolk. Desirous of purchasing a better preferment in the market, he wished to borrow £ISOO in order to do so. _ Seeing an advertisement iu the papers, offering to lend money on easy terms, he wrote to the presumed lender, one Mr. Howard, of Eustonsquare. He was duly favored with a reply, informing him that the money would he advanced, provided he insured Ids life in the Albion Assurance Company for a similar sum of £ISOO, and deposited the policy to be held as a security for the loan. To this Mr. Jex-Blako consented; and he accordingly paid to the office £59 6s. SJ. the amount of the .first year’s premium. On sending his receipt to Mr. Howard, who iu the present case figures as Thomas Gard Wood, he received a further communication to the effect that before the money could be lent he must furnish, as additional security, a bill of sale on his furniture, a guarantee signed by two solvent sureties, a bond on his own part, and a declaration of his debts before a Justice of the Peace ! To those impudent demands he naturally decliued to accede. Clearly perceiving that he had been swindled, he brought an action iu March last against the Albion Company on the ground that the office was in collusion with Howard to obtain the amount of premium paid, under pretence of granting a loan which in reality they had not the remotest intention of doing. Mr. Jex-Blake waiued his case, and such a mass of evidence was forthcoming as to the complicity of the company and their connection with the loan office swindle that the Treasury were induced on public grounds to prosecute to the end a thorough inquiry into the frauds alleged. The result was the institution, of tho present proceedings, leading to the indictment of seven persons, namely, Woods, alias Howard, Gard, Brown, Rogers, and half-a-dozeu other names; Northcott, Thompson, William Shaw, Stinker, George Shaw, and Thomas Shaw. The case, tried in the Central Criminal Court, b fora Mx*. Justice Hawkins, has proceeded from day to day, and concluded on Saturday with the conviction and sentence of the prisoners Wood, Northcott, Thompson, William Shaw, and Slinker. The able summing up of tho Judge carefully traced the history of these frauds from the inception and commencement when the .Albion Assurance Company was established iu 1803. The ovi-

deace was exhaustively analysed and sifted, but was too conclusive to’ leavo the slightest doubt in the minds of tho jury as to the guilt of tho prisoners convicted. ■ The . witucsso*, among whom were Miss Gray, of Sheerness ; Mr. Joseph Dew, Mr. Barnes, and Mr. Horsey, wore all persons of respectability, And had been swindled, with, of course, some little difference in each case, precisely in tho same manner as the Rev. Mr. Jex-Blake. Tho identity of the prisoner Wood with the fictitious . personages Gard, Rogers, and Williams was clearly proved by the handwriting of certain documents signed in those names, which were submitted to the inspection of the expert, M. Chabot, who was also called as a witness. Ample evidence was adduced as to the collusion existing among the prisoners Wood, Northcott, Thompson, and William Shaw, and the deliberate‘nature of the conspiracy. No one who reads the aide and comprehensive summing-up of* Mr. Justice Hawkins will fail to concur in the finding .of the jury and the perfect justness of the sentences. There was really no evidence against either George er Thomas Shaw, and' they very properly stand acquitted. SUaker is sufficiently punished with nine months* imprisonment, and William Shaw has no right to complain of two years* hard labor, considering his full knowledge of all that was going on. As regards the other prisoners, Wood, or whatever is hia right name, Northcott, and Thompson, even live years’ penal servitude is not too severe a punishment for the utterly unprincipled and heartless course of swindling they have during so many years carried on with impunity. It is a bounden duty of society at large to hunt down without mercy these pests, who have • no pity, and spare neither tho fatherless nor the widow. Promoters of sham companies, keepers of swindling loan agencies, and managers of lying insurance offices, are, in short, so many wolves who go about seeking whom they can find to devour. By the exposure of such frauds as the Albion. Assurance Company those swindling societies which we fear still exist will perhaps warning, while tho heavy punishment of Messrs, Wood, Northcott, and Thompson may prove a salutary caution to such enterprising presous as feel inclined to embark in the same line of business, ’