PAY-ROLL STOLEN.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20966, 4 March 1930, Page 13

PAY-ROLL STOLEN.

ADMISSION OF THEFT. ACCUSED COMMITTED FOR SENTENCE. (Per United Press Association.) INVERCARGILL, March 3. A sensational development in connection with the dramatic robbery which occurred at Longwood a fortnight ago when a bag containing the pay roll for the employees of a sawmill, amounting to over £4OO, tyas stolen from a locomotive was that Timothy Edward Cosgracc, aged 47, in the Riverton Police Court to-day admitted responsibility for the theft, and was committed to the Supreme Court for sentence. _ Cosgrave was arrested at the Round Hill Hotel two days after the robbery, and was remanded twice in Invercargill on a charge of being an idle and disorderly person. He also pleaded guilty to a charge of theft from a store at Pahia in December last.

It was stated by the police that the accused had volunteered to make a statement to clear up the whole matter. In this statement the accused said that on the day of the Longwood robbery he had been lying in the grass near a gravel pit (where the train stopped), ns he had an idea that the pay bag would be on the train. While the backs of the driver and fireman vveie turned he crept up to the engine and looked round, but saw nothing, and crept away .- gain. Later, having noticed an old bag hanging inside the cab he returned surreptitiously, and finding the bag locked, he removed it. Returning to his camp he cut the bag open and removed some of the money. It was stated by the police that all the money liml been recovered except £47. Goods in hand, which the accused had bought, reduced the shortage to £3l.