THREATS BY KIDNAPPERS

Opunake Times, 16 January 1934, Page 1

THREATS BY KIDNAPPERS

LORD MAYOR'S BRIDE, I'OLXCE ON GUARD. Three anonymous letters, containing direct threats to kidnap the hew Lady Mayoress of Melhiuune (until yesterday Miss Cynthia Brookes, of South Yarra), and a fourth asking him to provide police protection for his bride, were received by the Lord Mayor (O. H. Gengoult Smith), in the week preceding; his civic wedding. To-day the bride's mother, Mrs Norman Brookes, received a fifth letter, posted to her home, apparently from the person who had written the note of warning. It "thanked God" that precautions had been taken by placing a guard near Miss Brookes's room on Tuesday and. exulted that the danger was past. So seriously were the threats regarded by the Lord Mayor, Miss Brookes's family and the police that the Police Commissioner (General Blarney) suggested -that a guard be placed at Miss Brookes's home on the eve of the wedding-. Police in Home. Mr Norman Brookes, father of Miss Cynthia Brookes, scouted the suggestion that the threatening letters were from a practical joker. He said he believed that they were sent by "some weak-minded person."

A more serious view was taken by Mrs Brookes, who suggested that there might be "malcontents" in the citv, who wished her daughter ill. Miss Brookes was guarded throughout Tuesday night by two specially selected and armed plain clothes police who occupied rooms near hers.

The bridal party was accompanied to the Cathedral from the family home by an armed detective.

For weeks before the wedding, reports were circulated that certain sections of the community, with little reg~ara v ?or good taste, had planned disturbances during the progress of the bridal party and guest from the Cathedral to the Town Hall.

Mock Wedding Plan Police lieadquartei's were aware of these proposals, and plans, which proved successful were laid to nip them in the bud. One of these "jokes" was formulated by a section of University students who planned ' a mock wedding, in which a student, with some resemblance to the Lord Mayor, was to have taken the leading part. Another proposal was the throwing of a trench bomb among the crowd at a critical moment in the afternoon.

The presence among the crowds of almost every detective and plain clothes man, in Melbourne yesterday prevented any such act, if it had been planned.