TAXI DRIVER ASSAULTED

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26781, 26 May 1948, Page 6

TAXI DRIVER ASSAULTED

BATTERED BY THREE MEN LEFT ON VACANT SECTION P.A. AUCKLAND, May 25. Assaulted by three men he had picked up as fares in the city, a taxi driver, Clarence John Williams, aged 46, was left bound in a property at Orakei to-night while his attackers drove away in his car. Williams was later admitted to the Auckland Hospital. Hailed by a man in the city about 7.30, Williams said he later picked up two others and drove them to Orakei. Without warning the three men attacked him and the engine of the car stalled as he was pulled backward from the driver’s seat into the back of the car. Williams said he was severely battered about the face. The men tied his legs with a belt and his arms with his own tie. He was then carried from the car and left on vacant ground nearby while the men drove off in his taxi. After a struggle Williams managed to free his legs. He hailed the first motor car he saw, and the occupants drove him to the police station, where it was found that his face was covered in blood and that he also had a cut over one eye and extensive bruises. The police acted promptly. A mes-. sage was broadcast seeking to locate the missing taxi, and a search was begun. The car was found abandoned in Newmarket within half an hour. A police party in a patrol car later arrested two men.