THEFT OF CAR

Southland Times, Issue 23208, 25 May 1937, Page 8

THEFT OF CAR

Burglary At Hotel Follows A BUSY SUNDAY NIGHT (United Press Association) AUCKLAND, May 24. A cool theft of an expensive English saloon car from Cheltenham on Sunday night, a burglary at 'the Patumahoe Hotel bar early ihis morning and the conversion of a 2i> 'ton truck from West street, Pukekohe, some time during Sunday night are all linked in an investigation which the police are making in different parts of the Auckland province.

The thieves stole £t> from a purse left in the car and £7 from the till in the hotel bar. To deaden the' sound of moving coins mineral water was poured into the till receptable. The car and truck were found abandoned down a bank on the Pukekohe-Patu-mahoe road. Just after 6.30 p.m. on Sunday Mrs Harper, of Tainui road, Cheltenham, drove her car into the garage at the side of the house. Early this morning It was not there. The house is about 100 yards from the roadway and to remove the car and start it without the risk of detection it would be necessary to open the garage doors and push the car down the long driveway. Mrs Harper learned this afternoon that her car was found badly damaged at the roadside about 35 miles south of Auckland. Apparently the thieves drove to the Patumahoe hotel early this morning, climbed through the office window and found the keys of the bar door. The next move appears to have been toward Pukekohe and the suggestion is that the driver of the car was either travelling too fast and was unfamiliar with the controls which are different on this particular make of ear from most others, or that the car skidded, for it went over a six-foot bank, through a fence and into a paddock. The next move seems to have been made in Pukekohe, where a truck, belonging to Harold Carter, a carrier, of Bombay, was stolen. It is evident that the truck was driven to the spot where the car went over the bank and used in an endeavour to haul the car back on to the road for, when the police arrived latejr in the morning, they found the two vehicles roped together. Nearby residents heard the sound of a truck being accelerated. They raised their windows to look out on to the road and, in doing so, presumably frightened the thieves since the noise of the motor died away and was not heard again. When the police found the two vehicles the car mudguards were badly crumpled, the running boards were smashed and the front of the car was damaged. Inside the car were found the keys to the door of the Paturhahoe hotel bar and Mrs Harper’s house.