FLIGHT IN DARKNESS

Taranaki Daily News, 29 May 1933, Page 7

FLIGHT IN DARKNESS

FOUND IN GROCERY SHOP. FIERCE STRUGGLE ENSUES. Christchurch, May 24. Flickering lights in the Supply Stores, Limited, grocery shop, at the comer of Lawson Street and Colombo Street, Sydenham, at 2 a.m. to-day, and the astuteness of Mr. W. Duffield, of Lawson Street, led to the sensational arrest of three men after a vigorous struggle with a police sergeant and a constable. Mr. Duffield was on his way home at 2 a.m. when he noticed the effect of a flickering light on the window of the premises. He hastened to the slot telephone cabinet at the corner, telephoned to the Sydenham police, and kept watch until the quick arrival of Constables R. F. Leith and J. Johnston. The constables discovered that a panel on a side door had been forced, making an aperture of about 20in. square. Listening near this aperture, the constables came to the decision that there were men inside. The police were not taking any risks, and the central station was telephoned to for reinforcements. Soon, Sergeant C. J. Harrison and Constable G. Simpson arrived. , The men were trapped inside, since the front door was securely barred and locked, and the only means of escape was by the hole in the side door.. As the police waited at the side door, with others at the front door, they heard the men inside shuffling in the darkness towards the hole. The door was smartly rapped with a baton and there was a scatter inside, stock falling in the process. SERGEANT’S TORCH FAILS. Then Sergeant Harrison and Constable Leith entered through the hole in the door, a guard of the other constables and Mr. Duffield being outside. All was quiet inside, and no one could be seen as the torches of the police were played on likely hiding places. Presently the torchlight showed the crouching forms of three men under the counter. The men made no display of resistance as Constable Leith pocketed his torch and handcuffed one of them. The police were about to handcuff a second man when the sergeant’s torch failed. All was darkness and commotion in a second, and the men and the police became involved in a desperate rough and tumble within the narrow limits of the space behind the counter. The police were outnumbered, though one man was handcuffed. Butter was swept from the counter, and containers of honey came down from the shelves on top of the struggling men, rolling on the sawdust of the floor. Eventually the other men were handcuffed and peace reigned in the shop. On the floor was a small pool of blood. An elbow had hit somebody’s nose in the darkness. “SHIP LEAVING TO-NIGHT.” Still the police were taking no risks. It was not practicable to wedge handcuffed men out through the hole in the door, so Mr. A. W. Soanes, the manager of the shop, who lives in Bealey Avenue, was telephoned for, and captors and captives recovered their breath while they waited for the manager and the keys of the front door. Apparently the intruders had just entered the shop when they were discovered, as nothing had been collected, although it was evident, that a search of the premises was in full swing. On the floor the police found several partly-burned rolls of paper, which had been lighted and used as torches. In the Magistrate’s Court torday, before Mr. E. D. Mosley, S.M., George Grainger, aged 27, seam...i, Patrick Gannon, aged 25, seaman, and Jajnes Tanner, aged 25, seaman, were remanded to appear on May 30 on a change of breaking and entering the warehouse of the Supply Stores and committing theft. Sub-Inspector G. B. Edwards said that the men were arrested' only during the night., “Our ship is leaving to-night,” exclaimed one of the men when a remand was granted. , " ' The sub-inspector said that Grainger and Gannon were members of the crew of the Tasmania, which was to leave Lyttelton this evening for Bluff and then for London.