CAUGHT BY YOUTH

Star (Christchurch), Volume XLIV, Issue 644, 23 December 1932, Page 7

CAUGHT BY YOUTH

Man Found Lurking in House. (Special to the " Star.”) TIMARU, December 23. The plucky action of a fifteen-year-old boy, in chasing and grappling with a man, led to the appearance of Charles Edward Solomon, aged twentythree, a blacksmith, in the Magistrate’s Court yesterday. He was sentenced to one month’s imprisonment by the Magistrate, Mr C. R. Orr Walker, for being unlawfully on enclosed premises. Last night about 9.45 Mr W. HFoden and his family were sitting in the breakfast room talking. A daughter who had gone outside, returned and asked her father who was in his bedroom. Mr Foden investigated and saw a man standing with his hands on the dressing table. “What are you doing here?” demanded Mr Foden. The intruder immediately jumped through the open window, but Mr Foden grasped one of his legs as they were disappearing over the sill. Kicking out .viciously the intruder winded his captor with the other foot and escaped Mr Foden’s grandson, aged fifteen, rushed into the room just in time to see the man disappearing. He immediately gave chase and followed the man through the streets, past the gasworks, to the corner of Bank and Arthur Streets, where the boy overtook and grappled with him. With the assistance of Mr Foden, who soon arrived on the scene, the man was led to the police station. He continued to struggle violently, and Mr Foden's appeal for assistance from two men met with the response that they did not want to be involved in a C -urt case. Accused pleaded guilty when charged in the Court, and raised the defence of being drunk and having no recollection of the event. The Magistrate said he thought accused could consider himself fortunate that a more serious charge was not laid against him.