BURGLARY CHARGE DENIED

Taranaki Daily News, 25 July 1930, Page 5

BURGLARY CHARGE DENIED

MAN COMMITTED FOR TRIAL ARCH O’.ECIN'S lIGUS'.'I INVOLVED. FAILURE OF ONE THEFT CHARGE. Pleading ' not guilty. Clarence Nelson Shore was yesterday committed for trial at the Supreme Court on a charge that at New Plymouth between December 13, 1929, and January, 1930, he by day broke and entered the dwelling house of Frank George Evans and stole a clock, a pair of men’s shoes, a pair of trousers, a mathematical set, a fountain pen, a silver pencil and a travelling rug, the total value being £9 Is. As the court considered there was not sufficient evidence to commit him Shoie was not sent for trial on a charge of stealing £3 belonging to the New Plymouth Gas Company on or about December 14. Security for bail was fixed at £IGiO self or two other sureties of £5O each. Mr. R. W. Tate, S.M., presided. Detective Meiklejohn prosecuted. Shore was represented by Mr. A. A. Bennett. Robert Garland, baker, said that for over two years , he occupied a whare on the corner of Dawson and St. Aubyn Streets. He left there on November 21, 1929. He obtained permission to keep the key. Later Shors came to him and told him he' was out of .work. He said he could save his board if he slept in the .whare. Jackson had told him witness had the key. Witness gave Shore the key for him to inspect the whare, but it was not returned until a week to a fortnight later. Edward Jackson, land agent, said one evening about Christmas time accused came to his office and asked him if he had the letting of a small cotage opposite the flats. He told accused the rent was 12s, but that it might be possible to get it. for 10s. Witness telephoned George Taylor, the owner, and found that Garland had the key. Next night accused called again and collected the key for an inspection. Witness made it clear that Shore would have to pay a week’s rent and collect the rent book before being given possession. In the meantime Taylor agreed to a rental of 10s a week, but accused did not return. Witness thought he had decided not to take the place. It appeared to bo empty when he passed it on several occasions. Cross-examined by Mr. Bennett, witness said he had no' means of fixing the dates of the interviews with accused. , SAW HIM ABOUT WHARE. Mrs. Charlotte Morehead said the tworoomed whare in St. Aubyn Street was opposite her house. In November or December she had seen accused about the whare in the mornings. To Mr. Bennett: She believed, it was about the end of November that she saw accused go in and out of the whare. She could not say positively that it was in November. It might have been the beginning of December. John George Morgan, manager for the New Plymouth Gas Company, said that on January 14 he and Constable O’Neill visited the whare. They examined the shilling in the. slot meter. The moneybox part had been, ripped open. According to the index reading £3 was missing. The meter was practically ruined and it would cost £4 to replace it. Alexander M. Eagles, an attendant at the New Plymouth hospital, said Gladys Eileen Shore was admitted to the hospital in February, 1929. She was still an inmate. She was discharged on December 13 and readmitted the next day. Archdeacon Frank George Evans said that on. December 13 he and his wife went for a holiday, returning on January 14, They then missed a number of articles'from their house in John Street and reported the matter to the police. The kitchen clock, a travelling rug, a pair of trousers, golfing shoes, a fountain pen, propelling pencil and a mathematical set in a mahogany case were missing. Early this month he had identified the rug and other articles produced at the police station. Mrs. Evans gave corroborative evidence. Thomas P. Hughson, junr., storekeeper, Opunake, said accused, ran an. account at the store in January, February and March, 1929. He hd not booked to accused a clock similar to that produced, though he might have sold one for cash. The value was about 16s. Clifford H. Deare, Yew Plymouth, and Charles W. Higgs, Stratford, gave evidence concerning the golfing shoes produced. Detective Meiklejohn said that after receiving complaints about the theft from the whare and from Evans’ place inquiries were made for Shore, whom he had seen about the town. He was located at Auckland, arrested on June 23 and brought to New Plymouth on July 9. In the meantime the shoes and rug produced had been forwarded from Auckland.

SHORE AND THE DETECTIVE.

On July 11 Shore told the detective he had bought the shoes two years ago at Deare’s or Hannah’s shop in New Plymouth for £2. He knew of no one in New Plymouth or Taranaki who could say he had had the rug or shoes before Christmas. He bought the rug in Wellington, he said. He admitted staying two or three nights in the St. Aubyn Street bach and that he left the key on the window-sill as he was told to do. He said he took his wife to the bach one night, but had to take her back to the hospital next day. He left the bach soon after that, on January 3 or 4, and arrived at Hastings a day or so later. ■Then he worked on Harding’s station, liuakawa. The clock and trousers were obtained by the police from Hawke’s Bay on July 18. Shore refused to give a signed statement. When shown the clock and trousers he said he got the latter from the Red Cross Society about two years ago. He could not produce anyone who had seen him with the trousers in New Plymouth or before, though Mrs. Shore might be able to, he said. Then he said Sister Gill gave them to him. The clock, he said, had been bought from Hughson’s at Opunake for 15s Gd 12 months ago. He denied having a mathematical set or pen and pencil.

He said he took size seven in shoes, but while the detective was examining his feet he said they had been frostbitten and he had to wear nines. He said the clock was booked to him by Hughson, junr. At that interview, too, he said Mrs. Shore was not liis wife but had been living with him for seven years. That was after the detective had told him she had been dangerously ill and that the hospital authorities had tried

to get in touch with him several months before. To Mr. Bennett: His evidence included all Shore’s statements there were of importance to the present charges. He would not say it was everything Shore had said. Before Shore pleaded Mr. Bennett submitted there was no evidence that Evans’ house had been broken and entered and the charge relating to that must obviously be reduced to one of theft. The magistrate said breaking and entering could only be inferred. Regarding the allegation of the theft of £3 Mr. Bennett submitted there was not a prima facie case to answer. The whare was admittedly empty between the time Garland left it and Shore obtained the key. But more important still was the fact that there was another break in its occupancy from Christmas to January 14, when it was visited by the gas manager. The only thing to connect Shore with that crime was that he was in the whare for a certain period, but, on the other hand, the place was unoccupied before and afterwards. In other circumstances, to say that there was a prima facie case w r as carrying things a little too far. The magistrate said the breaking, entering and theft'charge had better stand

as it was, but he did not think there was evidence to warrant a committal for trial on the charge of stealing £3 from the meter. Mr. Bennett said that the plea would be not guilty to the breaking, entering and theft charge as it stood. An application to reduce it could be made later. whi-mmi—