IMPOSTOR PUNISHED

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LV, Issue 17472, 22 January 1931, Page 11

IMPOSTOR PUNISHED

DESPICABLE CASE POSED AS RETURNED SOLDIER (Per Press Association.) INVKRCAKOIU- this day. Frederick Alexander Daniel Fraser, a laborer, pleaded guilty in the Police Court to-day to three charges of obtaining from the F'eilding. Patriotic Society, Natibn,al War Funds Council, and Southland War Funds Association sums totalling £lO2 Era, falsely representing thaihe was a returned soldier. Detective Sergeant Hewitt said the case was rather unusual. Some years previously defendant met with an accident whereby he lost one arm. lie then conceived the idea of posing as a returned soldier, and so successful had he been that he had completely deceived the bodies mentioned, from whom he received in all about £lO2. The returned soldiers became suspicious, and as a result- of inquiries discovered that the defendant was an impostcr. Some time previously he had been burned out and neighbors and others had helped him with a gift of a separator and other articles. It was one of the finest pieces of bluff the detective-sergeant had met with. Defendant said that, if he had been able to obtain work he would not have committed the offences. The probation officer reported that he had made careful inquiries. Defendant had ;i bad record, and was nothing but a- drunken waster, and probation could not possibly be recommended. The Magistrate. Mr. E. C. Levvey, remarked that the whole matter was despicable, and defendant, was .sentenced In reformative detention for .1 period not exceeding two. years.