HISTORY OF THE CASE.

Taranaki Herald, Volume LV, Issue 13945, 28 April 1909, Page 4

HISTORY OF THE CASE.

Tho facts of the case briefly statod ire that on Sunday, January 10, the Parcels Office staff left their work at ibout 5 p.m., and at that- time everyhir.g was safe and secure. At 7.5 C >'clock next morning Cadet' Andrews >amc down as usual for the purpose of >pening up the office for the work ol ,he day, and was surprised, as well he might bfi, to find the place full of ■Binoke. The police were at once communicated with, and an examination I quickly disclosed to the experienced eyes of the officers that the safe bad been blown open, apparently with gelignite. Portions of that "high explosive," which is now the favoured I above all others by the "entcrprisinp I burglar," were found on tho floor, and there were also discovered a few bits of fuse. 1 When the officer in charge of the force arrived, which was within a very few minutes of the reception at headquarters of the telephone message everything in the neighbourhood of the safe was carefully examined. The force of the explosion may be imagined wher it is stated that tho cover of the keyhole of the safe had been blown off completely; it had passed through tho window, and. was subsequently found in the street below the room, which wa« ■situated on an upper, floor. Tbo safe was found to be standing open and its contents were ascertained to have "been a numßer of registered parcels of jewellery valued at £39. four clerks' cashboxe^ containing £31 in money, £60 worth of- postage stamps, and a regter tered parcel containing cancelled Bank of New Zealand notes from tho. southern branches tif the bank which had been addressed, to tho head office iv Wellington. There were in the parcel four hundred and six £1 notes,'fiftyfour £5 notes, and eight £10 notes. Those notes had been cancelled by being punched through in the centre with a hole about the size of a shilling and impressed in two places' with j» stamp bearing the word "cnncelled" in large loiters. But neither the punch >»avk nor tho eanceUinpc word was placed exactly in the same pfacc in each note. Probably the cancellation was done much in tho same way that the stamps on ordinary lettors are effaced when passing through the post.