SUCCESSFUL CLAIM

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26778, 22 May 1948, Page 8

SUCCESSFUL CLAIM

Repayment of investment IN SYNDICATE FALSE PRETENCES ALLEGED P.A. AUCKLAND, May 21. A claim for the repayment of an investment of £SOO based on allegations of fraud was heard by Mr Justice Finlay and a jury of four to-day. The claim was brought by Morton Gladstone Tuck, a sawmiller, of Hamilton, against Heinz Gustav Buetow, known as Harry Buetow, and William Davidson, of Auckland, a company director. Buetow did not appear and was not represented. The plaintiff alleged that in May, 1946, the defendants approached him to subscribe £SOO to Pino Products Syndicate, a syndicate promoted for the purpose of marketing products of Resoturp, Ltd. Resoturp, Ltd., was promoted. by the defendants to extract gum from pine trees, and to manufacture turpentine and resin from it. It was alleged that the defendants induced the plaintiff, to pay over £SOO by falsely representing that photographs of milk in jars were photographs of gum’ being extracted from trees, that the defendants had a concession from Resoturp, Ltd., to market its outpqt, and that Resoturp, Ltd., had all the necessary plant and machinery available for immediate installations at Tauranga. The plaintiff therefore claimed a refund of the £SOO invested and costs.

: Davidson denied that he approached the plaintiff to subscribe to the syndicate, denied that Pino Products was •promoted by him, and denied that he made the representations alleged. He said that any payment made by the plaintiff was made with full knowledge of the relevant facts. When the jury brought in a verdict for Tuck, Justice Finlay made an order that the exhibits be impounded, and handed to the police for examination. After entering judgment for the plaintiff, his Honor said that at least one man whose liability was directly proved had never been brought to account. “I think it is in the interests of the public," said his Honor, “that I should impound the exhibits, and I will make an order that they be handed to the police for investigation. There seems to be an incipient recrudescence of a practice that was not uncommon in the past,' and the sooner it is nipped in the bud the better.”