ALTERNATIVE COUNTS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 27221, 26 October 1949, Page 8

ALTERNATIVE COUNTS

THEFT AND FALSE PRETENCES CASE AGAINST TWO MEN PA WELLINGTON, Oct. 25. The trial of two men on alternative charges of theft or obtaining money by false pretences began in the Supreme Court to-day, before the Chief Justice, Sir Humphrey O’Leary. The accused were William-John McCrea, aged 47, a painter, and William McDermott, aged 22, a seaman. The sum involved was stated to be £SOO. Mr W. R. Birks, for the Crown, told the court that McCrea, saying he was a ship’s officer, had sold a suit length for £7 to a Paremata storekeeper, Roy Maurice Aldridge. Mr Birks said McCrea had later told Aldridge that he could get cigarettes up to £SOO worth from an overseas ship. Aldridge, in company with his wife and another man named McNamara, had subsequently arrived at an hotel with £SOO —eight £SO notes and the remainder in notes of smaller denominations. McCrea, it was alleged, had said the cigarettes were in bond on the wharf, and that a lorry would be necessary to take them away. He introduced McDermott as the man who would get the cigarettes while he (McCrea) kept an urgent appointment elsewhere. Mr Birks said that Aldridge had gone away to find a lorry, and that in the meantime McCrea had persuaded Mrs Aldridge to give him the money. Subsequently, after McCrea had left, McDermott had taken Aldridge and McNamara to an overseas ship and told them that the wrong man was on duty, continued Mr Birks. They had been told to come back that evening, but on their arrival at the wharf in the evening no sign could be. found of either McDermott or McCrea.

Mr Birks said that evidence would be called to show that McCrea had banked £4OO in eight £SO notes bearing the same numbers as those drawn from Aldridge's bank on the same day, August 17. McCrea had travelled to Sydney, where he. had been arrested on August 29. McDermott, continued Mr Birks, had made a statement that McCrea had been going to hand him “ a few pounds ” for helping him, but McCraa had got away without paying up. When interviewed in Sydney, McCrea had alleged that he was being victimised, and threatened to issue a writ for damages on his return to New Zealand. “This is just another version of the old confidence tridk,’’ concluded Mr Birks.

Evidence was given by Aldridge and the police along the lines of Mr Birks’s statement, and the court adjourned till to-morrow.