MRS BEVAN ON TRIAL

New Zealand Times, Volume LIII, Issue 12548, 10 September 1926, Page 8

MRS BEVAN ON TRIAL

SAYS SHE LOST HER MEMORY; } RECEIVED NO MONEY. • - / LONDON, * September / ' Mrs; Susannah Bevan, m her.- .-defence on a charge of fraud .inf connection with insurance, gave'evidenoe’that on-the day. of her disappearance/aho remembered being in Exeter attired-in only 'one stocking and a'roacktntesh:* She Mid not remember, her identify/, niitil. two days subsequently, when (she .did not want'.to. return 'to faoe.her son and friendsJ . She went, to: New Zealand because she wanted to leave (her : for-mer-life- behind. She obtained!a!ajtuation pihqr to sailing.. Her depanure .was not' - associated,with' insnnteee policies,, from which. she', had.- hot. received, a farthing., , Counsel: Why did.you not : communicate with a solicitor if you:were anxious about the insurance .money? Mrs Bevan: I should' have done so. ' • She said that she took out-insurance policies in order to make -some provision/for her. son. She'was about to marry a wealthy tea-planter, but this was . broken. off because of frequent quarrels about her son. The case was adjourned.- . Susannah Hughes Bevan was arrested in Canterbury, New Zealand, -last February on a charge of obtaining by .conspiracy and fraud from the Prudential Insurance Company tbe sum of £2BBI, about June, 1922. Her clothes were picked up at Ilfracombe, and it was assumed.that she had.been drowned. The insurance company paid over the amount due to. her son. Meanwhile Mrs Bevan, under an ■ assumed name, sailed for New Zealand.