DEAD MEN’S MONEY.

Taranaki Daily News, 17 December 1926, Page 13 (Supplement)

DEAD MEN’S MONEY.

ALLEGED FORGERY OF WILLS. RELATIONSHIP CLAIMS. Eighteen charges relating to the aPeged forgery of certain wills were preferred at Preston against Lucy Summers, 52, and eight charges of a similar nature were made against her husband, John James Summers, 49, of Grimsargh Street, Preston. Mr Paling, for the Public Prosecutor, said the woman was born in Beckenham, and had been twice married. Within one year she had claimed relationship with seven deceased intestate persons, all of whom had died without kin, and in six of these cases by her, or through her agency, she had produced wills, all of which were forgeries. The prosecution sought to show, he added, that where the next of kin had been advertised for the woman had established claims by means of forged wills and letters. A man named Wilson died in a lodging-house near Euston Road, St. Pancras, with £5B in his possession ard no means of identification, and Mrs Summers claimed him as her husband. It was suggested that she got her description of the man from a newspaper paragraph. The prosecution is to call 45 witnesses.