BIG LONDON SWINDLE

Southland Times, Issue 22489, 25 January 1935, Page 3

BIG LONDON SWINDLE

MILK DEALERS DEFRAUDED.

VICTIMS LOSE £25,084.

As the outcome of a swindle, which took five days to investigate in a London court recently, heavy sentences of imprisonment were passed upon five men. It was alleged in amazing revelations of trickery in milk dealing that they defrauded 31 milk roundsmen and obtained in all £25,084. '“I have never come across so. many cruel frauds gathered together in one case,” was the comment made by Sir Percival Clarke, chairman of the Bench, when administering punishment as follows:— Henry Collins, director of South London Dairies, eight years’ penal servitude; Maurice Jarvis, milk contractor, eight years’ penal servitude; Ernest Benjamin Miller, clerk, four years’ penal servitude; Albert Thomas Denning, salesman, four years’ penal servitude; Albert Edward Head, twelve months’ imprisonment with hard labour.

The five men either pleaded guilty or were found guilty on charges of conspiring to cheat and defraud such persons as could be induced to part with the money; falsely pretending that Jarvis and Collins were engaged in genuine dairy business. The charges, prosecuting counsel explained, arose out of two businesses, known as the Meadow Farm Dairies (Lambeth) Ltd., and the South London Dairies Ltd. Thirty-one men were induced to buy milk rounds, and they were introduced to Collins and Jarvis through a business transfer agency run by Miller and Denning. Men described as “boosters,” said counsel were turned on several districts, and after they had worked up rounds by selling milk IJd under the combine price, the rounds were sold. Sour milk and milk made from powder, was then supplied to the roundsmen by the two dairies, some of the powder being eight years old. Following complaints from customers, the takings on the rounds dwindled and the roundsmen lost all their money. When the five men came up for sentence, counsel remarked that he should describe Collins as an unmitigated blackguard. He added, “Many frauds will never be traced. Many unfortunate men have lost their all, and one man has not a penny left in the world.” A detective stated that Jarvis had a number of convictions for obtaining money by false pretences, horse-steal-ing and receiving. During the war the police had many complaints against him of selling worthless horses. Complaints had also been received of his association with men concerned in long-firm frauds.

Jarvis asked that 72 other charges, involving £4739, concerning a business at Camberwell, which was running at the same time as the other frauds, should be taken into consideration. Clever, Plausible and Persistent. “I have known Jarvis for the past 20 years,” the detective continued, “and during my 24 years experience in the police force I have never met such a clever, plausible, find persistent criminal as he is.” Collins, whose real name was Henry Kershaw, had seven previous convictions for long-firm frauds, larceny and conspiracy to defraud. He asked that 56 further charges, mostly in connection with the dairies, involving £3BlO, should be taken into consideration. “There is no doubt,” the detective declared, “that he has been the brains of this conspiracy from the clerical side.” Denning had four convictions and was serving a sentence of three years’ penal servitude passed in June last in connection with fraudulent business agencies. He admitted 25 other outstanding cases involving £lB2l. All arose out of advertisements for partners in fraudulent businesses. Miller had not been previously convicted, but in recent years had become associated with men. conducting fraudulent business transfer agencies, and had himself conducted a number of bogus agencies. There were 21 outstanding cases which he had admitted, involving £1461. Ex-Policeman’s Fall Head had no convictions, and bore an excellent character up to May, 1933, when he became associated with Miller and Denning. He was in the Metropolitan Police Force over three years, and was invalided out after losing his right foot in a motor cycle accident. Collins and Jarvis, the detective mentioned, also admitted obtaining £l6OO credit by fraud from the Milk Marketing Board. “You have all been convicted of a gigantic fraud,” Sir Percival Clarke said to the accused. “Its cruelty to the poor people who put up their money is beyond expression. It is time the public were made aware of the dangers they run in answering advertisements when money is asked for as a guarantee of honesty.”